Tineke D'Haeseleer
In Spring 2020 I taught Korean history as a stand-alone course for the first time. My vision was for the students to create a variety of materials that would make the history of this fascinating country more accessible to high school and college students. For some reason, China and Japan get the spotlight, and Korea is often left out, if East Asia gets more than a passing glance in the curriculum.
Before we were able to finalize what projects our class might undertake, we were yanked out of our classroom and into emergency remote learning due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. I made the executive decision to focus our efforts on an OER textbook: an Open Educational Resource, available to others for further development.
Rather than creating another textbook by a professional who claims to know what students want and need to know, I think it makes sense to ask students “What do you think your peers need to know, now you’ve studied some of this history?” Students who’ve had their first excursions inside a new field (as Korean history is for many of them) have a better understanding of what a total newbie needs to know before they can proceed to a slightly more advanced level of historical inquiry. My students came up with a variety of topics, and I’m sure you’ll find something that piques your curiosity: Korean food? Music? The Imjin War and why we call it that? Relations with Japan in the seventeenth century? Different interpretations of the archeological past? The Colonial Period? The rebuilding after the war? And what’s up with how US media portray North Korea? The students got you covered!
As I prepare this volume for the next iteration of the course in Spring 2022, and we enter the fifth semester of “pandemic teaching and learning”, I look back at the work these students completed in the midst of the first panic of our encounter with Covid-19. I am thoroughly impressed by what they achieved under very trying circumstances and in times of great uncertainty: away from their College community and for the first time working remotely; with limited access to library resources; and when we still knew next to nothing about this virus. This first edition of our Open Korean History textbook is testament to the students’ drive to learn, and to share what they learned, and there was no stopping them!
We (students and teacher) hope this effort may spark your curiosity to explore, to dive into a book that’s mentioned, to dine at a Korean restaurant and try some new flavors, to learn more about Korean history, to reach out to your Korean friends and share your appreciation for their culture and history, and of course: to take this book with you and write your own chapter.
Tineke D’Haeseleer, Jan. 20, 2022
Cover image: Stone statues guarding the tomb of Goryeo king Gongmin (r. 1351-1374) in Gaesong, North Korea. Photo by T. D’Haeseleer.
