What do you think?
Rate this book
The Koreas: The Birth of Two Nations Divided
Korea is one of the last divided countries in the world. Twins born of the Cold War, one is vilified as an isolated, impoverished, time-warped state with an abysmal human rights record and a reclusive leader who perennially threatens global security with his clandestine nuclear weapons program. The other is lauded as a thriving democratic and capitalist state with the thirteenth largest economy in the world and a model that developing countries should emulate. In The Koreas, Theodore Jun Yoo provides a compelling gateway to understanding the divergent developments of contemporary North and South Korea. In contrast to standard histories, Yoo examines the unique qualities of the Korean diaspora experience, which has challenged the master narratives of national culture, homogeneity, belongingness, and identity. This book draws from the latest research to present a decidedly demythologized history, with chapters focusing on feature stories that capture the key issues of the day as they affect popular culture and everyday life. The Koreas will be indispensable to any historian, armchair or otherwise, in need of a discerning and reliable guide to the region.
395 pages, Kindle Edition
Published October 6, 2020
8 people are currently reading
339 people want to read
About the author
Theodore Jun Yoo
7 books3 followersTheodore Jun Yoo is Associate Professor in the Department of Korean Language and Literature at Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea. He is the author of The Politics of Gender in Colonial Korea and It's Madness.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
October 5, 2024
Strong background in the fissure of the Korean Peninsula. Jun Yoo does an incredible job illustrating the politics behind everything that became of Korea after WWII. What blew my mind was how much the politics exacerbated this split and how quickly the two nations took on their own cultural identities. This book is perfect in demonstrating everything that went wrong and pulls no punches on the various mistakes and atrocities both the north and south committed in history. 10/10 read; I’d recommend this book to anyone who wanted to learn the stories behind North and South Korea. There’s a schism here that needs to be studied thoroughly so to prevent any split between a common people again.
Read
March 6, 2022“At the end of the novel [The Square], Yi decides to return neither to the North nor the South but rather to live in a neutral state, a space where empty ideology and brute force do not govern people’s lives. Unable to find such a place, Yi’s only option is to commit suicide. It is an indictment of the two Koreas, where dictatorship and repression of dissent kill the best of the young.”
What I had known about the Korean Peninsula came from undergraduate history requirements and leisurely reading in books like Beasts of a Little Land and Pachinko. My understanding of the divided countries was adequate but incomplete, and Yoo’s book was the perfect remedy for filling those gaps.
Yoo chronicles the tragic missteps that shaped the divergent paths of a once-united peninsula. Even before the end of World War II, the U.S., the Soviet Union, China, and Great Britain discussed the fate of the nation without any Korean leaders present: “… the midwives of the painful birth of two nations from a unified Korea were more concerned with their own Cold War agendas than the fate of the people.”
In its fear of growing communism, the U.S. exerted its influence over the southern region and backed Korean leaders and politicians who were staunchly pro-U.S. and virulently anti-Communist / anti-leftist. Most of these individuals had been Japanese collaborators and/or part of the old colonial police, which meant that Korean liberation was essentially meaningless.
To the North, however, communist and former anti-Japanese guerilla fighter Kim Il Sung was selected as leader. His consequent agrarian reforms, land redistribution policies, and ideology of juche, or self-reliance, actually propelled the North to exceed the South’s economic development until the early 1970s.
Nonetheless, both Koreas suffered under brutal regimes. While the South was celebrated as a bastion of democracy and freedom, free from communist rule, military dictatorships, corrupt leaders that curried cronyism, and policies that essentially gave American troops free reign over the region, its people, especially dissidents and progressive students, suffered extreme human rights abuses. While South Korea finally elected its first civilian president in 1993, the country still suffers from traumatic memories inflicted by earlier military regimes. Coupled with mass divides in income and class inequality, South Korea is still healing from the scars of its past.
Likewise, North Korea, while enjoying a strong reputation among developing nations up until the late 70s, as well as a self-reliant ideology that shielded the country from Western imperialism, also cracked down its dissidents in equal brutality. Its emphasis on military also spelled disaster for civilians when a devastating famine struck the region, starving and killing thousands. The Norther regime event went so far as to criminalize acts of hunger and justified the famine as “The arduous marching [against imperialism].” Up until this day, however, little is known about the region apart from accounts from defectors and glimpses on social media.
Lengthy, thorough, and multifaceted, Yoo’s The Koreas is perfect for anyone looking to understand just how these two countries diverged and the repeated attempts to seek reconciliation. While Yoo also discusses collective traumas both regions have endured, he also touches upon popular culture like K-Pop, food and cuisine, and plastic surgery that has been instrumental in sparking global frenzies about Korean culture and people.
Yoo also takes time to detail the plight of Korean orphans, diasporic populations in Asia and Europe, refugees and migrant workers in the shadow of prosperity, mix-raced individuals, competition in student life and employment, gender disparities, loaded geopolitical relations with countries like Japan, and the insidious roles that countries like the United States play in Korean politics. Collectively, these examples and examinations help explain how and why the nation(s) have developed and evolved the way they have.
Perhaps what is most tragic about this book is the sheer length in which the Korean people have been exposed to almost constant war, division, and trauma. Korea is one of the last divided countries in the world and is a reminder of the ugly legacy of Cold War politics.
As Yoo concludes, “On both sides of the border a new generation of millennials has grown up without having witnessed the traumatic civil war firsthand or having pined after kin on the other side of the 38th parallel… They will be the new caretakers of both nations. Will they call for reunification and light the lamp to illuminate the East through peace and reconciliation?”
What I had known about the Korean Peninsula came from undergraduate history requirements and leisurely reading in books like Beasts of a Little Land and Pachinko. My understanding of the divided countries was adequate but incomplete, and Yoo’s book was the perfect remedy for filling those gaps.
Yoo chronicles the tragic missteps that shaped the divergent paths of a once-united peninsula. Even before the end of World War II, the U.S., the Soviet Union, China, and Great Britain discussed the fate of the nation without any Korean leaders present: “… the midwives of the painful birth of two nations from a unified Korea were more concerned with their own Cold War agendas than the fate of the people.”
In its fear of growing communism, the U.S. exerted its influence over the southern region and backed Korean leaders and politicians who were staunchly pro-U.S. and virulently anti-Communist / anti-leftist. Most of these individuals had been Japanese collaborators and/or part of the old colonial police, which meant that Korean liberation was essentially meaningless.
To the North, however, communist and former anti-Japanese guerilla fighter Kim Il Sung was selected as leader. His consequent agrarian reforms, land redistribution policies, and ideology of juche, or self-reliance, actually propelled the North to exceed the South’s economic development until the early 1970s.
Nonetheless, both Koreas suffered under brutal regimes. While the South was celebrated as a bastion of democracy and freedom, free from communist rule, military dictatorships, corrupt leaders that curried cronyism, and policies that essentially gave American troops free reign over the region, its people, especially dissidents and progressive students, suffered extreme human rights abuses. While South Korea finally elected its first civilian president in 1993, the country still suffers from traumatic memories inflicted by earlier military regimes. Coupled with mass divides in income and class inequality, South Korea is still healing from the scars of its past.
Likewise, North Korea, while enjoying a strong reputation among developing nations up until the late 70s, as well as a self-reliant ideology that shielded the country from Western imperialism, also cracked down its dissidents in equal brutality. Its emphasis on military also spelled disaster for civilians when a devastating famine struck the region, starving and killing thousands. The Norther regime event went so far as to criminalize acts of hunger and justified the famine as “The arduous marching [against imperialism].” Up until this day, however, little is known about the region apart from accounts from defectors and glimpses on social media.
Lengthy, thorough, and multifaceted, Yoo’s The Koreas is perfect for anyone looking to understand just how these two countries diverged and the repeated attempts to seek reconciliation. While Yoo also discusses collective traumas both regions have endured, he also touches upon popular culture like K-Pop, food and cuisine, and plastic surgery that has been instrumental in sparking global frenzies about Korean culture and people.
Yoo also takes time to detail the plight of Korean orphans, diasporic populations in Asia and Europe, refugees and migrant workers in the shadow of prosperity, mix-raced individuals, competition in student life and employment, gender disparities, loaded geopolitical relations with countries like Japan, and the insidious roles that countries like the United States play in Korean politics. Collectively, these examples and examinations help explain how and why the nation(s) have developed and evolved the way they have.
Perhaps what is most tragic about this book is the sheer length in which the Korean people have been exposed to almost constant war, division, and trauma. Korea is one of the last divided countries in the world and is a reminder of the ugly legacy of Cold War politics.
As Yoo concludes, “On both sides of the border a new generation of millennials has grown up without having witnessed the traumatic civil war firsthand or having pined after kin on the other side of the 38th parallel… They will be the new caretakers of both nations. Will they call for reunification and light the lamp to illuminate the East through peace and reconciliation?”
research
September 15, 2020This looks really interesting. Definitely picking up a copy!
August 5, 2021
Very informative book about the post-World War II history of the Korean Peninsula. Fascinating history that really impacts current geopolitics, and which I was taught approximately none of at any level of my education. Also super helpful to understanding the cultural context of K-pop, K-dramas, and other Korean cultural exploits that I enjoy!
April 3, 2022
An interesting book. I found it through my subscription to Foreign Affairs. It offered the opportunity for me to learn something about the Koreas. I've seen and heard the propaganda from the US, South and North. Both the South and North appear to have similar issues with equality and workers rights. I would never have thought that the North had a better economy in the early years. That, of course has changed dramatically for the better in the South with the 11th largest economy and the South is in a better place politically compared to the early anti-communist dictatorships. The societal problems presented in the epilogue are very disturbing: highest rate of suicide, probably the highest rate of plastic surgery, the lowest birth rate which is compounding problems for the economy with a very old population and for millennials a sense of failure or non achievement. All this with who is and isn't a real or true Korean. There's more but I leave it for others to discover.
February 22, 2023
Very insightful! Interesting look into the social, economic, political and cultural aspects of both Koreas from the Korean War up till the present. I especially enjoyed how stories of individuals were included to highlight how the wider policy changes and prevailing cultural attitudes affected the lives of individuals. As a history student who has studied the Korean War and a consumer of Korean entertainment, it was very eye-opening to be able to enrich my current understanding of the history and culture of both Koreas with a more comprehensive and nuanced one. I thoroughly enjoyed this book!
January 29, 2025
An absolutely excellent overview of Korean history since the partition. Jun Yoo's focus on individuals through history as well as pop culture makes for an extremely accessible read on this complicated subject. He presents a very moderate, centered view on both nations as well, which is what I was looking for. So glad I picked this up, and I recommend this to anyone, especially Americans, even if you don't have an existing interest in the Koreas. It's very illuminating on the US role in the development of these countries.
May 21, 2022
A very interesting book about recent history and culture in Korea. Mainly focused on South Korea but with some interesting articles on North Korea this explains the turbulent history from second war to Trump meetings with Kim.
A treasure trove of information from movies, K-pop, gender relationships evolution,brutal dictatorship and the ferry disaster certainly life changes fast in South Korea. Difficult to put down once started
A treasure trove of information from movies, K-pop, gender relationships evolution,brutal dictatorship and the ferry disaster certainly life changes fast in South Korea. Difficult to put down once started
June 11, 2023
An interesting dive into the history of North and South Korea that spans a variety of topics. The writing style is approachable and engaging (includes stories from different Koreans). Sometimes I wish he had dug more into some topics, but overall I recommend.
February 23, 2021
Excellent book on the modern history of both North and South Korea.
January 3, 2024
Likely intended for readers with more background knowledge on Korea, still an interesting and uniquely styled read.
September 16, 2024
An interesting skim over the differing trajectories of North and South Korea starting with the Korean War, but the writing and organization leaves a lot to be desired.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews