The Epistolary Brush: Letter Writing and Power in Chosŏn Korea

This article explores how new modes of writing and reading that developed in epistolary culture brought about intellectual, social, and political changes in Chosŏn society. From the sixteenth century onwards, the diverse uses of letters transformed the lifestyle and the mode of political participation of Confucian intellectuals. Letters became the main reading materials for neo-Confucian studies and self-cultivation as well as a medium for political action, especially for rural scholars, who innovated various epistolary genres to raise their political voices. New epistolary practices facilitated their collective activism, the spread of radical opinions, and the mobilization of new political groups. Toward the end of the dynasty, even nonelites emulated these practices for their activism. In this period, “spiral letters” developed in both vernacular Korean and literary Chinese letters. These new letter forms, used by both male elites and women, reflected and subverted the existing gender dynamics and power relations associated with the norms of reading and writing. The rise and fall of spiral letters demonstrate the mutual influence between the written culture and sociopolitical changes. The versatility and resourcefulness of epistolary practices characterized Chosŏn letter writers' fashionable choice of a radical lifestyle, which geared their social life to yield actual political power.

Qi Jiguang’s Wujing Qishu Zhaiti. A Few Notes On A Synopsis Of The Military Classics

The famous Ming general Qi Jiguang (1522-1582) is best known for his military treatises, namely the Jixiao xinshu and the Lianbing shiji, while his other writings are much neglected by researchers. This article is an annotated translation and discussion of Qi Jiguang’s Wujing qishu zhaiti (16th cent.) The Wujing qishu zhaiti is a collage of excerpts from the Seven Military Classics (Wujing qishu), which are then re-arranged to form a new text. This new text, which is constructed like a wordgame, can be read as a commentary on the meaning of the military classics and their relative importance to the canon of military texts. In this re-arranged text, new meaning is constructed and new interpretations are suggested. While the history of the reception of the Wujing qishu zhaiti is unknown due to a lack of sources, the text seems to bear traces of discursive confrontations of the time and of a struggle for legitimacy. Qi Jiguang even seems to challenge the established order of the elites by re-enforcing the position of military studies as a serious subject, comparable to civil (Confucian) studies.

The Taiwanese Perspective in Investigating Korean Confucianism: Lee Ming-huei's Interpretation of Han Wonjin (1682–1750)

Numerous representatives of the contemporary Confucian revival from Taiwan are increasingly demonstrating the fact that the development of Confucian philosophy has to be viewed in a broader cultural context, especially in the context of different East Asian regions. While the development of the Japanese Confucian studies has been elaborated to a great extent during the last decades, studies in Korean Confucianism are still rare. Hence, the present article aims to offer a report on a pioneer contribution in this regard. It introduces Lee Ming-huei’s investigation into the work of one of the most influential Korean Confucians of the Joseon period; on the basis of Huang Chun-chieh’s methodology which exposes the contextualization paradigm, the article explains the main hypotheses and offers a theoretical reflection of the main issues discussed in this research work.

Neo-Aristotelian Confucianism? Applicability of virtue ethics in early Confucian studies

Since the 80’s of the last century a trend has emerged in the English language literature on Chinese thought that suggests reading early Confucian texts as a form of virtue ethics. However, Alasdair MacIntyre has presented early Confucian and Aristotle’s thoughts as incommensurable thought systems and doubted that notions and statements of one incommensurable thought system can be adequately expressed and addressed within the framework of another. This article discusses MacIntyre’s position and two strategies - employed by the proponents of virtue ethics interpretation of early Confucian texts - of meeting MacIntyre’s challenge. The article attempts to show that none of the responses were successful, thus leaving the quest for the most adequate philosophical framework to interpret early Confucian ethical thought open.