Mitsui Distinguished Lecture

What is the Mitsui Distinguished Lecture?

The East Asian Studies program, with support from John Carroll University and the Cleveland Office of USA, Inc. and the Mitsui USA Foundation, has sponsored the Mitsui Distinguished Lecture each spring since its inaugural year in 1993. The lecture brings both nationally and internationally prominent speakers to address the concepts and historic issues that concern China, Korea and Japan.

The 2008 Mitsui Distinguished Lecturer is Dr. Mark Peterson.

Dr. Mark Peterson is Professor of Asian and Near Eastern Languages at Brigham Young University. He received his BA in Anthropology and Asian Studies from Brigham Young University in 1971 and later earned an MA (1973) and a Ph.D. (1987) in Asian Languages and Civilizations from Harvard University. Prior to joining the BYU faculty, he was director of the Fulbright program in Korea. Currently he is head of the Korean Section of the Department of Asian and Near East Languages and chair of the Korean Studies Committee of the Association for Asian Studies.

The topic of this lecture is“What's Wrong with Korean History?:  A New History in a New Century.”

There is an old Korean saying: “when whales fight, shrimp get their backs broken." In the modern era, Korea has often been the shrimp caught in the fight between the whales of China, Japan, Russia, and the United States. As Korea moves into the twenty-first century, a new and powerful country is replacing the old and weak one. How will the emergence of this new Korea affect the way Korea looks at its history? Prof. Peterson will look at a new view of Korean history and the implications this new history will have not only on Korea, but China and Japan, as they continue to re-imagine their past in light of their present.

This lecture was featured at 5:30 p.m. on March 10 at the Donahue Auditorium in the Dolan Center for Science and Technology to kickoff John Carroll University's A Celebration of Scholarship!, a week-long, campus-wide showcase for research and scholarship by faculty and students. For more information on the Celebration, visit the website at www.jcu.edu/research/celebrate.

Click here to see previous Mitsui Distinguished Lecture speakers and topics.