I'm reading excerpts from two books (focusing on North Korea) which have drastically different descriptions of the period before the split and WWII. I'm aware that China, then Japan, controlled the Korean peninsula. Here is what confuses me:
[After WWII, w]hat by international standards had been an enviably placid history was not remembered as a long litany of suffering and humiliation at foreign hands. In depictions of the colonial era, novelists and painters focused on the forced labor of little girls and boys, thus reinforcing the impression of a child race abused by an adult one. Because Koreans truly were as the perfidious Japanese had only claimed to be, i.e. inherently virtuous, never evil by nature, all atrocities they had committed during the Pacific War were ascribed to duress and quickly erased from the collective memory. Koreans had done nothing under the Japanese but suffer.
From B.B. Myers' The Cleanest Race, page 34. Contrast this with the following:
The South Koreans were a disgrace because of their dependence on the United States [to the North Koreans]. "Establishing juche means, in a nutshell, being the master of revolution and reconstruction in one's own country. This means holding fast to an independent position, rejecting dependence on others, using one's own brains, believing in one's own strength, displaying the revolutionary spirit of self-reliance," [Kim Il-sung] expounded in one of his many treatises. This was seductive to a proud people whose dignity had been trampled by its neighbors for centuries.
From Barbara Demick's Nothing to Envy, page 44.
Which is it? Did Koreans view themselves as trampled people with a nationalist bent that was being denied prior to WWII? How would one reconcile the two quotes?
Thanks in advance, hopefully an expert can clarify a little more on what the consensus is for pre-WWII Korean nationalism :).
As for Juche ideology, it is mostly a repetition and evolved ideology from Joseon dynasty's ideology of Hermit Kingdom. Heungseon Daewongun saw that when Japan and China opened its doors to the west, they were dominated and humiliated by "barbarians". In order to prevent this, he closed off all contact with the West.
There are several ideologies that needs to be kept in mind, one of them being the idea of "Sojunghwa" which means little China. While Koreans dont consider themselves related to China ethnically, or through blood, they did see themselves as inheritor of the cultural achievements after the fall of Ming dynasty by the "Barbarian" Manchurian Qings. However, this is only mostly during the Joseon dynasty and probably only existed in the back of their head through out the later stages of Joseon.
In terms of National identity, even the Korean peasants had a strong ties as we see in the Donghak rebellion, a major peasant revolt, we see the peasant leaders agreeing to back down when the Government officials notified them that their rebellion would only bring in Chinese and Japanese armies who would "protect" their interest. As history would have it, China and Japan would both send armies in the the peninsula, which then resulted in Sino-Japanese war.
The Korean imperial court also did its part to stop or at least slow down the process of colonization by bringing China and then Russian interest in to the peninsula to offset Japanese interest. These would result in Sino-Japanese War and Russo-Japanese War, with Japan being the victor. Without other great powers to offset Japanese interest, Japanese gained momentum in colonizing Korea.
However, many Koreans on almost all levels rejected colonization. We see the Emperor Gojong sending diplomats to Hague Peace convention only to be denied access. We also see peasants and soldiers run away in to the mountains to form guerrilla army. Independence army being created post colonization, which used the border between Manchuria (prior to Manchuko) to raid Japanese post offices and police stations in the Korean peninsula. Formation of independence government in exile which planned assassination on political and military leaders of Japan. However, this is not to say that there were numerous factions and almost none of them were united. Koreans have history of groups splitting off in to factions and constantly vying for power. However, during the era of colonization, most were focused in gaining independence rather than slitting each other's throats, which is to say that most were at that point in time more interested in seeing Korea becoming independent rather than arguing whether they should be dependent or independent of foreign influence.
Post-WWII and Pre-Korean War, there were huge hopes that the country would united once more. This Nationalist stance was mostly held by Kim Gu, a highly respected independence movement leader. However, this nationalist stance was snubbed by both Kim Il Sung and Lee Seung Man who were playing off their benefactors, Soviets and United States.
To get in to the positions presented by the books, Juche ideology is mostly in the North. South Korea, for the most part until the 90's had the simple stance of Anti-North. However, this is not to say that Juche thought and Sojunghwa thoughts did not exist. Many Koreans think that their entrance to the world spotlight through the Miracle at Han river is only natural and done by the leadership of Park and or Korean ingenuity/nature (while there are numerous factors going in to the miracle of Han River).
I would also like to point out that the quotes are not mutually exclusive as the humiliation Koreans suffered at the hands of foreign power really fueled the Juche/Independence. The idea of Sojunghwa really plays in to this as well as Koreans see themselves as the most civilized Barbarians in terms of Sinocentric view, thus giving them the idea that its natural for them to be at the higher part of the world stage and that they were snubbed by island barbarians of Japan.