Paper short abstract:

The classic hypothesis of the dual structure of Korean spiritual world which was published by a colonial Japanese anthropologist has been used to describe Korean culture until today in Japan and South Korea. The hermeneutic circle behind the scene is, however, rather lack of dialogues and unities.

Paper long abstract:

Anthropological studies of Korean culture were systematically started by Japanese researchers under the Japanese regime of the Korean Peninsula, and have been uniquely developed in the world of Japanese texts. A good example of this would be the dual structural hypothesis which interprets the basis of Korean spiritual world as a combination of masculine Confucianism and feminine shamanism. This hypothesis was first published by a Japanese anthropologist in the colonial period, and still reflects the comprehension of Korean culture even in today's South Korea. In the contemporary academic world, we are rather critical to the extent that it is obviously based on the colonialist and/or Orientalist point of view from Japanese scholars to Korean people in the modern political settings. We, however, are still talking and teaching about it, partly because no counter hypothesis is given yet by any other anthropologists with high authority, including those in the Western countries. At the same time, in South Korean highly intellectualized society, most people learn the hypothesis as a common sense of intellectuals, with no serious skepticism; even core doers both of ancestral worships and shamanist rituals are aware of it and are sometimes making use of it when they are in need to justify their deeds. This situation proves the postmodernist idea of hermeneutic circle is mostly correct, but we can never say that the circle is totally founded on any good dialogues or unities between the dead hypothesis and grassroots recognition, or those between Japan-oriented anthropology and post-colonial Korean society.

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