Title:
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Localised modernities : modernization, genealogy and landscape change in South Korea
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Broadly, this thesis is concerned with the interconnection between the macro-historical process and micro-geographical issues of localised modernity. The primary focus in on the cultural meanings of localised modernity in South Korea, explored through the historical and cultural landscapes of a local-lineage-based village community in South Korea. Specifically, the research objectives of the present project are as follow: first, to find out the meaning of localised modernity in South Korea through the hidden historical and cultural threads in the thirty-year time gap between the change to the material domain of South Korea in the 1970s and the change to the country s spiritual domain in the 2000s; second, to present the historical and cultural landscapes of Darsil village - as a case study - in the genealogical context of the Kwon family of the village as the key to unravelling the hidden historical and cultural threads of the thirty-year time gap.
The historical and cultural landscapes of Darsil village consist of the following three themes; geographical lives spent in rice cultivation, social lives in the sense of familial homogeneity, and the feng-shui landscapes of the collective ancestors tombs of the village. By exploring the interdependencies between those three themes in the context of the genealogical history of the Kwon family of the village, it is demonstrated that the historical and cultural landscapes of the village has been the critical clue to comprehending the hidden socio-cultural mechanism of the thirty-year time gap between the changes to the two domains of South Korea. From this empirical basis, the meaning of localised modernity of South Korea emerges, bridging the three key concepts of the present project; historical and cultural landscape, genealogy, and localised modernity.
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