Korean Studies

University of California, Berkeley

This is an archived copy of the 2014-15 guide. To access the most recent version of the guide, please visit http://guide.berkeley.edu/.

About the Program

Minor

The Group in Asian Studies offers a minor in Korean Studies. This minor program gives students an introduction to the study of one region of Asia through social science and humanities courses.

Declaring the Minor

Students must see the undergraduate major adviser in 101 Stephens Hall on Monday or Wednesday between 10:00am-noon or 1:00pm-3:30pm to fill out paperwork. It is recommended that students do this shortly after they decide to pursue a minor.

Other Majors and Minors Offered by the Group in Asian Studies

Asian Studies: Multi-Area  (Area 1): Includes all countries and regions of Asia (Major only)
Asian Studies: China  (Area 2) (Major only)
Asian Studies: Japan  (Area 3) (Major only)
Chinese Studies  (Minor only)
Japanese Studies  (Minor only)

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Minor Requirements

Students who have a strong interest in an area of study outside their major often decide to complete a minor program. These programs have set requirements and are noted officially on the transcript in the memoranda section, but they are not noted on diplomas.

General Guidelines

  1. All courses taken to fulfill the minor requirements below must be taken for graded credit.
  2. A minimum of three of the upper-division courses taken to fulfill the minor requirements must be completed at UC Berkeley.
  3. A minimum grade point average (GPA) of 2.0 is required for courses used to fulfill the minor requirements.
  4. Courses used to fulfill the minor requirements may be applied toward the Seven-Course Breadth Requirement, for Letters and Science students.
  5. No more than one upper-division course may be used to simultaneously fulfill requirements for a student's major and minor programs.
  6. All minor requirements must be completed prior to the last day of finals during the semester in which you plan to graduate. If you cannot finish all courses required for the minor by that time, please see a College of Letters and Science adviser.
  7. All minor requirements must be completed within the unit ceiling. (For further information regarding the unit ceiling, please see the College Requirements tab.)

Requirements

Upper-division
Select five upper-division courses focusing on Korea:
50% or more of each course's content must deal with Korea, in order to fulfill the minor requirements.
Only two language and literature courses (e.g., the Korean 100 series) may count toward the five courses.
There are no language requirements for this minor.

Courses

Korean Studies

KOREAN 1 Intensive Elementary Korean 10 Units

This is the equivalent of 1A-1B offered in the regular academic year.

KOREAN 1A Elementary Korean 5 Units

This course is designed for students who have little or no prior knowledge of the Korean language. Students will learn the Korean alphabet and basic grammar.

KOREAN 1AX Elementary Korean for Heritage Speakers 5 Units

This course is designed for students who already have elementary comprehension and speaking skills in Korean and have minimum exposure to reading and/or writing in Korean.

KOREAN 1B Elementary Korean 5 Units

With an emphasis on speaking, listening, reading and writing, students will learn daily life expressions, common colloquialisms, and speech acts. The course is also intended to introduce certain cultural aspects through media sources and various activities.

KOREAN 1BX Elementary Korean for Heritage Speakers 5 Units

With special emphasis on reading and writing, students will expand common colloquialisms and appropriate speech acts.

KOREAN 7A Introduction to Premodern Korean Literature and Culture 4 Units

A survey of pre-modern Korean literature and culture from the seventh century to the 19th century, focusing on the relation between literary texts and various aspects of performance tradition. Topics include literati culture, gender relations, humor, and material culture. Texts to be examined include ritual songs, sijo, kasa, p'ansori, prose narratives, art, and contemporary media representation of performance traditions. All readings are in English.

KOREAN 7B Introduction to Modern Korean Literature and Culture 4 Units

A survey of modern Korean literature and culture in the 20th century, focusing on the development of nationalist aesthetics in both North and South Korea. Topics include "new woman" narratives, urban culture, colonial modernity, war and trauma, and diaspora. Texts to be examined include works of fiction, poetry, art, and film. All readings are in English.

KOREAN 10 Intensive Intermediate Korean 10 Units

This course is the equivalent of 10A-10B offered in the regular academic year.

KOREAN 10A Intermediate Korean 5 Units

With equal attention given to speaking, listening, reading, writing, and cultural aspects of the language, students will further develop their language skills for handling various everyday situations.

KOREAN 10AX Intermediate Korean for Heritage Speakers 5 Units

This is an intermediate course for students whose Korean proficiency level is higher in speaking than in reading or writing due to Korean-heritage background. Students will elaborate their language skills for handling various everyday situations.

KOREAN 10B Intermediate Korean 5 Units

With equal attention given to speaking, listening, reading, writing, and cultural aspects of the language, students will learn vocabulary, expressions, and varieties of speech styles beyond the basic level.

KOREAN 10BX Intermediate Korean for Heritage Speakers 5 Units

This intermediate course will emphasize reading and writing so that students can reach a comparable proficiency with their already high speaking and listening skills.

KOREAN 24 Freshman Seminar 1 Unit

The Freshman Seminar Program has been designed to provide new students with the opportunity to explore an intellectual topic with a faculty member in a small seminar setting. Freshman seminars are offered in all campus departments and topics vary from department to department and semester to semester. Enrollment limited to fifteen freshmen.

KOREAN 84 Sophomore Seminar 1 Unit

Sophomore seminars are small interactive courses offered by faculty members in departments all across the campus. Sophomore seminars offer opportunity for close, regular intellectual contact between faculty members and students in the crucial second year. The topics vary from department to department and semester to semester. Enrollment limited to 15 sophomores.

KOREAN 98 Directed Group Study for Lower Division Students 1 - 4 Units

Small group instruction in topics not covered by regularly scheduled courses.

KOREAN 99 Independent Study for Lower Division Students 1 - 4 Units

Independent study in topics not covered by regularly scheduled courses.

KOREAN 100A Advanced Korean 5 Units

This is a third-year course in modern Korean with emphasis on acquisition of advanced vocabulary and grammatical structure. Equal attention will be given to all four language skills: speaking, listening, reading, and writing.

KOREAN 100AX Advanced Korean for Heritage Speakers 4 Units

This is a third-year course in modern Korean with emphasis on acquisition of advanced vocabulary and grammatical structure.

KOREAN 100B Advanced Korean 5 Units

Students will learn more advanced expressions and use them in reading and writing. Small group discussions will enhance speaking and listening skills.

KOREAN 100BX Advanced Korean for Heritage Speakers 4 Units

Students will be introduced to advanced-level Korean by reading authentic texts and writing short compositions, summaries, essays, and critical reviews. Students will be encouraged to speak using advanced vocabulary and expressions.

KOREAN 101 Fourth-Year Readings: Korean Literature 4 Units

This is an advanced course of reading and textual literary analysis in Korean. Advanced reading and writing skills and practice in the use of standard reference tools will also be introduced.

KOREAN 102 Fourth-Year Readings: Korean Social Sciences and History 4 Units

This is an advanced course of reading and textual analysis in various areas including politics, economics, society, and history. Both fluency and accuracy will also be emphasized in speaking and writing with the goal of preparing students to conduct independent research in Korean.

KOREAN 111 Fifth-Year Readings: Reading and Analysis of Advanced Korean Texts 4 Units

This course is designed to increase the students' proficiency to advanced-high (or superior for some students) level in all aspects of Korean. Texts and materials are drawn from authentic sources in various genres. Some will be selected according to student interests. Students will write research papers based on specialized topics of their choice and present them orally in class.

KOREAN 112 Fifth-Year Readings: Korean for Research and Professional Use 4 Units

This course aims to prepare students for research or employment in a Korea-related field. Authentic materials will be used to discuss various issues in Korea and some may be selected by students to explore their specific interests/needs. Students will conduct research projects in their own fields of study.

KOREAN 130 Genre and Occasion in Traditional Poetry 4 Units

This course will examine traditional and poetry, and consider the performative and cultural contexts of compositional practice before the 20th century. The course is intended to introduce key verse forms as well as basic reading knowledge of premodern Korean texts. Topics will vary.

KOREAN 140 Narrating Persons and Objects in Traditional Korean Prose 4 Units

This course is a critical exploration of the broad range of prose literature before the 20th century, including vernacular fiction, memoirs, travel accounts, and essays. Particular attention will be given to narrative styles, issues of personal identity, and a link between literary text and material culture in the development of prose literature before the 20th century. The course is intended as a close reading of key prose narrative works, while functioning simultaneously as an introduction to basic reading knowledge of premodern Korean texts. Topics will vary.

KOREAN 150 Modern Korean Poetry 4 Units

This course will examine the works of major poets in the first half of the 20th century and will consider the formation of modern Korean poetry. Particular attention will be given to the ideas of lyricism, modernism, and the identity of a poet in the context of the colonial occupation of Korea.

KOREAN 153 Readings in Modern Korean Literature 4 Units

This course aims to facilitate critical understanding of persistent themes and diverse styles of modern Korean literature through close readings of canonical works from the colonial period (1910-1945). It encourages students to develop broad comprehension of “post-colonial” characteristics of Korean literature. Concurrently, it explores how Korean literature aspired to the expression of the universal aesthetic values and judgment against the particularistic historical condition of colonialism.

KOREAN 155 Modern Korean Fiction 4 Units

This course surveys modern Korean fiction in the first half of the 20th century. Readings include major works of the novel, short fiction, and literary criticism. The course examines the development of modern fiction in the context of nationalist movements, colonialism, and the Korean War.

KOREAN 157 Contemporary Korean Literature 4 Units

This course surveys contemporary Korean literature, focusing on the separate development of language, literary aesthetics, and nationalism in North and South Korea from the end of the Korean War to the present. The course examines an assortment of works of fiction, poetry, literary criticism, and visual media. Emphasis is on close readings of the texts, while considering various issues involving post colonial cultural production: war and trauma, gender and labor, political violence, modernization and dislocation, and diaspora. Topics will vary.

KOREAN 170 Intercultural Encounters in Korean Literature 4 Units

This course will explore the moments of intercultural encounters captured in Korean literature. Encounters with foreign cultures and literary reflections on them have emerged as prominent at critical moments of Korean history, such as periods of great social transition or international conflict. In this course, we will be addressing questions concerning how experiences of the encounters of foreign cultures have been represented in Korean literature from the sixteenth through the twentieth century; what their domestic ramifications were, especially in terms of literary genres; and how the transformation of Korean national identity have been imagined and articulated in literary works.

KOREAN 172 Gender and Korean Literature 4 Units

This course examines Korean literature from the fifteenth through the nineteenth centuries through the perspectives of gender. Although the modern discourse of enlightenment in Korea, beginning in the early twentieth century, has been sharply critical of gender inequality in premodern Korea, the gender relations represented in premodern Korean literature are much more complex and dynamic than we might expect. To revise our understanding of gender in premodern Korea, this course seeks to examine how gender is imagined particularly in terms of the body, bodily practice, and theatrical performance.

KOREAN 174 Modern Korean Fiction in Translation 4 Units

This course surveys modern Korean fiction of the 20th century in literary and visual media. Topics will vary.

KOREAN 180 Critical Approaches to Modern Korean Literature 4 Units

This course introduces various critical approaches to modern Korean literature through a set of texts in English translation. Readings will include an assortment of works of fiction, poetry, literary criticism, and visual media. Emphasis is on close reading of texts and literary approaches to them.

KOREAN 185 Picturing Korea 4 Units

This course explores the role of modern visual media in shaping geopolitical, cultural, and historical imaginations of Korea during the last hundred years. Drawing examples from photographs, films, and literature, produced in and outside Korea, the course aims to consider the idea of "Korea" primarily via images constructed through transnational cultural networks. Consideration will be given to the relationship between visual media and cultural memory. We will think in particular about the ways in which globally accessible visual media such as photography and film narrate the key local sites of contested memories of colonization, war, and political violence.

KOREAN 186 Introduction to Korean Cinema 4 Units

This course offers a historical overview of Korean cinema from its colonial development to its present renaissance. It covers Korean film aesthetics, major directors, film movements, genre, censorship issues, and industrial transformation as well as global circulation and transnational reception. In an effort to read film as sociocultural texts, various topics will be discussed. All readings are in English.

KOREAN 187 History and Memory in Korean Cinema 4 Units

This course examines representations of history and memory in contemporary Korean cinema. Korean films have displayed a thematic preoccupation with the nation's tumultuous past by presenting diverse stories of past events and experiences. The course pays close attention to the ways in which popular narrative films render history and memory meaningful and pertinent to contemporary film viewers. All readings are in English.

KOREAN 188 Cold War Culture in Korea: Literature and Film 4 Units

This course examines the formation and transformation of global Cold War culture in South Korean literature and film of the 20th century. It pays close attention to representations of the Korean War and its aftermath in literature and cinema, but opens up the field of inquiry to encompass larger sociocultural issues related to the Cold War system manifest in literature and cinema. All readings are in English.

KOREAN 189 Korean Film Authors 4 Units

This undergraduate course examines aesthetic features and thematic preoccupation of major Korean film authors. It begins with the brief survey of historical development and theoretical underpinnings of the concept of “auteur” and advances an inquiry into the application of such theoretical tool in the area of film criticism and culture in Korea. In addition to analyzing signature style, generic orientation, and thematic consistency, the course also situates and explores the unique film authorship in relation to larger contexts that constitute the dynamics of Korean cinema: industrial structure, government censorship, social changes and cultural phenomena, intellectual development, technological shifts and discourse of national cinema.

KOREAN 198 Directed Group Study 1 - 4 Units

Small group instruction in topics not covered by regularly scheduled courses.

KOREAN 199 Independent Study 1 - 4 Units

Independent study in topics not covered by regularly scheduled courses.

Contact Information

Group in Asian Studies

2223 Fulton Street, Room 524

Phone: 510-642-7062

Fax: 510-643-7062

asianst@berkeley.edu

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Department Chair

Bonnie Wade, PhD (Department of Music)

bcwade@berkeley.edu

Student Services Adviser

Sharmila Shinde

Phone: 510-642-0333

shinde@berkeley.edu

Undergraduate Office

101 Stephens Hall (International and Area Studies Program Office)

Phone: 510-643-1738

Fax: 510-642-9850

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