Yuktang Choe Nam son and Korean Modernity : 육당 최남선과 한국의 근대화

Preface
Introduction: Seventeen Years with My Grandfather

PART ONE Modern Korea in Yuktang’s Family History

Chapter 1 My Great-Grandfather and the Enlightenment Movement
1. Every Year on New Year’s Day
2. My Great-Grandfather, Ch’oe Hon-gyu, a Self-Made Man
3. The Tragic Trailblazer, Ch’oe Chong-uk
4. The Stories Grandmother Told Me
5. Grandfather’s Notebook
6.Grandfather’s “Self-Reminders”

Chapter 2 The Intersection of Ideologies
1. Grandfather and My Father
2. My Father’s Diary Entry of April 2, 1934
3. Grandfather’s Advice: “Don’t Major in the Humanities”
4. My Maternal Grandfather, Yi Ik-sang
5. My Great-Uncle, Ch’oe Tu-son
6. My Great-Aunt’s Husband, Pak Sok-yun

Chapter 3 The Ui-dong Period and the Korean War
1. The Sowon Memories
2. The Anti-National Law and Grandfather’s “Open Letter”
3. Third Uncle Goes North
4. North Korean Soldiers Visit Ui-dong
5. Grandfather Escapes Abduction to the North
6. My Aunt Is Murdered and My Mother Is Beaten
7. The Burning of Grandfather’s Library
8. The Return to Seoul and My Father’s Death
9. Grandfather’s Stroke and His Conversion to Catholicism
10. One Year after Grandfather’s Death

PART TWO Building a Foundation and Making a Path for Korean Modernity

Chapter 1 The Discovery of Minjok
1. Sinmun’gwan: Opening the Doors to Modernity
2. Choson Kwangmunhoe: Laying the Groundwork for Choson Study
3. “The Declaration of Independence”: Realizing the Idea of Minjok

Chapter 2 The Establishment of Choson Identity
1. Tongmyong and Sidae Ilbo: Establishing Minjok
2. The Theory of the Purham Civilization: Tan’gun, the Progenitor of Choson
3. The Kyemyong Club and the Korean Dictionary: Clear Language Leads to Clear Thinking
4. A Paean to the Choson Land and the Sijo Form: Reawakening the “Choson Spirit”
5. Sin’ganhoe: Forestalling the Division among the Nationalists

Chapter 3 The Globalization of Korean History
1. The Commission for the Compilation of Choson History: Korean History as Part of World History
2. Songmak’yonunrok and Ancient Korean History: Korean History Is at the Center of Northeast Asia’s History
3. Kosatong, Yoksa Ilgam, and Choson Sangsik Mundap: Keeping the Embers of Korean History Alive
4. The Sojourn in Manchuria and “Manmong Munhwa”: Koreans Need to Study Military Science

Chapter 4 The Establishment of the Legitimacy of Min’guk
1. A History of Choson for the Korean People: Writing a “New” History of Korea
2. The Encyclopedia of Korean History: Fifty Years into the Future
3. The Maritime History of Korea: The Korean Peninsula, the Junction of Continental and Maritime Cultures
4. “The Spirit of Truth”: Reflecting on Postwar Korean Society

PART THREE The Future of Yuktang Study

Chapter 1 After Yuktang’s Death
1. “Pro-Japanese” Criticism and the Sowon Monument
2. Biographies, Collections, and the Yuktang Archive
3. The Reconstruction of Kwangmunhoe, the Cradle of Korean Modernity

Chapter 2 Establishing Yuktang Study
1. The Concepts of Minjok and Nation
2. “Open” Nationalism
3. An Interdisciplinary Approach

Afterword

Chronology
Appendix A: “The Declaration of Independence”
Appendix B: “Who Is Yuktang Ch’oe Nam-son?”
Bibliography
Index