Conoscere la Corea. Viaggio attraverso la cultura, la lingua, la storia e l'economia.

Proceedings of the Conference “Knowing Korea: journey through culture, language, history and economy”, which was held in 2010 as part of the project Training Course for secondary school teachers, in cooperation with the Korea Foundation. The volume includes works by Jung Imsuk, who reviews Italian culture studies in Korea and Korean culture studies in Italy, and illustrates “the hidden dimension of Korean culture”, comparing cultural aspects peculiar Korea and Italy, likewise in the context of linguistic and cultural comparisons between the two countries. Valdo Ferretti’s paper, entitled Korea in the international relations of the 19th-20th century, focused on the geopolitical issues that affect the northeast Asia area, reconstructing the role played not only by China and Japan but also by the USSR and the United States, concerning the situation of the Korean Peninsula, which paradoxically had the least say of all. Antonio Fiori in a sense started where Ferretti left off, speaking instead from a socio-political perspective; his paper, entitled Civil society in Korea from transition to democratic consolidation, reconstructed the essential contribution of the civil society in the process of establishing a democratic system, and came to the conclusion that Korea is an example of a grass-roots democracy. History also formed the background of the subsequent papers. Stefano Locati, an expert on Asian cinema, argued that social and political events constitute a valid interpretive key to the history of Korean cinema, and dwelt in particular on the hallyu (Korean Wave) phenomenon in his article In the shadow of the 38th parallel. Korean cinema from ‘han’ to reunification, in which he concluded an interesting historical reconstruction and categorization of film productions with some thoughts on the recent rebirth of Korean cinema, especially in Asian markets and international festivals. Daniele Sestili, an ethno-musicologist, gave an introduction to the history of Korean music in his speech, Korean musical culture, today and yesterday. An introduction. Lastly, my speech, entitled South Korea: “Morning Calm” or “Dynamic Korea”? interpreted the creation of the identity-image of Korea, taking into account the cultural aspects that have determined this process of creation and comparing the image of Korea as it is perceived in the West with that which Korea offers of itself..

Il progetto di organizzare e ospitare presso la Facoltà di Studi Orientali e il Dipartimento di Studi Orientali (oggi Istituto Italiano di Studi Orientali) un Corso di Formazione per gli insegnanti della scuola secondaria di secondo livello parte dalla Korea Foundation (un ente affiliato al governo coreano), in sostituzione dell’invito, già presentato a cadenza annuale a rappresentanti delle scuole superiori, a visitare la Corea. La cattedra di Lingua e Traduzione Coreana ha raccolto con gratitudine la proposta di includere la Sapienza fra i tre atenei selezionati a questo scopo in Europa. il mio intervento dal titolo Corea del Sud: “Calma mattutina” o “Corea dinamica”? presenta una lettura semiotica della creazione dell’immagine-identità della Corea, prendendo in considerazione gli aspetti culturali che hanno determinato tale processo di creazione e ponendo a confronto l’immagine della Corea, come viene percepita in Occidente, e quella che la Corea offre di sé.