© by the author(s). This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0.
Edited by Jeong-Rock Lee, Jungjae Park, Taesoo Lee, and Jongnam Choi
Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, and Transport; and National Geographic Information Institute, Republic of Korea, 2014
170 pages, color maps, color photos, charts, and other illustrations. Free online; see “Obtaining this Atlas,” below.
ISBN: 978-8-9856-8230-5
Review by: Aimée C. Quinn, Central Washington University
I was very excited to read about the production of a new five-part national atlas, and I have not been disappointed by this first volume of The National Atlas of Korea, devoted to the Republic of Korea’s history, government, culture, and socioeconomics. Beautifully bound in boards covered with dark blue cloth, with the Korean title imprinted on the endpapers, fewer than ten numbered pages in this 170-page atlas do not include some kind of color map, photo, or other image. This work, made in the grand tradition of national atlases, harnesses new technologies like GIS and data mining to illustrate the dynamic growth of Korea and to display its dramatic societal and territorial changes. The volume begins with a Foreword by the Republic of Korea’s Minister of Land, Infrastructure, and Transport (MLIT), and a Preface written by the Director General of the National Geographic Information Institute (NGII). These two agencies are responsible for the production of the National Atlas. Four pages are given over to a detailed Table of Contents, which is followed by a two-page satellite image of Korea. The volume’s last pages reference the photographic sources and copyrights. In between this fore and aft matter is the meat of the atlas, divided into four overall sections: “Territory,” “Government and Local Autonomy,” “Transformation and Development of the Land,” and “Korea in the World.” As a government publications librarian, I regularly see and read works presenting the viewpoints of United States federal and state government bodies, and one reason I wanted to read this atlas was to learn more about this country through the eyes of its people and their government. One note about the text: the editors frequently refer their country as “Korea.” Several of the maps show the entire peninsula with the Republic of Korea highlighted while the Democratic People's Republic of Korea is contrasted in a solid, lighter color and without any geographic or geocoded features.
This edition thoroughly revises and updates the 2007 version of the national atlas, which was itself a revision of the original 1989 edition. Each of these earlier editions are of interest in their own right, as was the 2009 concise edition, but none were as comprehensive a project as this one. Volume I: National Territory, the subject of this review, introduces the overall project—a three-year plan to issue five volumes that capture, showcase, and revitalize a Korea that is strong—economically, socially, and politically. After 60 years of strife and hardship, the reinvigorated Republic of Korea is using this national atlas as a platform to highlight the major changes and accomplishments made since its independence in August 1948, while acknowledging and documenting the residence of the Korean people on their land since early times. According to the introduction to South Korea, a Country Study (Savada and Shaw 1992, xxiii), “Korean historians trace the ethnic roots of the Korean people at least as far back as the pottery-using cultures of the fourth and third centuries B.C.”
The atlas’ first section is entitled “Territory”—a term that was chosen deliberately, in order to provoke the reader’s consideration of all the nuances of that important term. Korea is a place where the people have long held very strong ties to the land, despite having often been dominated for long periods by other countries. At different times in the relatively recent past, Korea had been invaded and controlled by both China (Manchu) and Japan, before finding independence in 1948 as a result of the 1945 Allied victory over the Axis powers. The term territory is thus used to inform readers of the atlas about Korea’s national record and proud history. The desire for independence is well illustrated by one of Korea’s best known and loved poets, Yi Yuk-sa and by his best-known poem, a beautiful work with an anti-colonialist spirit.
July’s the month when green grapes ripen
Back in my village at home.
The village legend ripens in clusters
The dreaming sky settles on each grape.
A white-sailed boat will come drifting by
As the sea bares its bosom to the sky
And the longed-for guest will at last arrive
His weary limbs wrapped all in green.
With a feast of grapes I’ll welcome him
Happy with dripping hands.
Quickly, prepare the dishes, lad,
White napkin on a silver tray.
(Yi Yuk-sa, Green Grapes, translated by Kim Jong-gil: hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/YiYukSa.html)
The defense of Korean territory from invasion is a central theme of this atlas. The maps, photos, and charts in the “Territory” section all support the ideal of resistance and resilience through the revitalization of trade and transportation systems, as well as through the land structure (the term used for human-made landmarks like railroads, airports, etc.), geography, topographies, dialects, histories, economics, and demographics of Korea since ancient times.
In addition, utilizing GIS and other visualization tools, MLIT and NGII worked together to create new data products that examine the development of cities and the effects of urbanization on the infrastructure across each administrative region. Detailed maps show the transformations that have occurred in the national administrative regions as rural communities grew into large city centers. Starting on page thirty-four there is an examination of the Korean Ocean Observation Network (KOON), through which data related to various oceanic and environmental conditions are collected from the Pacific Ocean. The final six pages in this section are devoted to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, and include some demographic, economic, and trade data. It is interesting to note that the “Territory” section is the largest in the atlas, a fact that suggests the importance of the idea to the Korean people.
The second section, “Government and Local Autonomy” is only twelve pages in length, yet is packed with information about civic life. There are, we learn, five main parts of the Korean government: the Executive (Administrative), National Assembly (Legislative), and Judiciary, plus the Constitutional Court of Korea and the National Election Commission. The Administrative branch comprises 17 executive ministries, 3 ministries, and 17 offices. On the map of administrative regions each is differently colored, and each has a chart highlighting such government data as the number of firefighters or police officers in that region, as well as the number of legal cases heard there by the courts. There are a lot of data compacted into these pages.
The third section, “The Transformation and the Development of the Land” is a hodge-podge of eclectic thematic maps. They range from the effects of the Republic of Korea’s military involvement in such recent wars as Iraq and Afghanistan, to the changes brought on by the growth and globalization of Seoul. Through both words and illustrations, the reader learns of transformative changes to the land and to transportation networks, and those brought by Internet use and smart phones, before moving on to spatial and territorial planning. That word territory crops up again, and it is almost as if we were back in the first section as we look at very similar maps. The difference is that these maps belong to a series of comprehensive territorial plans from 1972–2001. This spatial development is all part of a larger, national plan, which is then taken down to the regional administrative level. At the regional level, the atlas turns to research and development, local economies, industry, demographics, and quality of life. The quality of life illustrations are some of my favorites, along with the maps of population and human settlement. I really appreciated the combination of maps, charts, and photographs in this section of the Atlas, and it was interesting to see the juxtaposition of maps developed from newer GIS technologies with the ancient maps found on pages 24 through 33. I am left with the impression, however, that these newer technologies could have been utilized more fully, such as to intersect layers of data. For example, school data and happiness data could have been combined to show if children attending school in the Republic of Korea are happier than school children elsewhere in the world. Instead the reader has to find and compare data from different places in the Atlas to discover this.
The fourth section is “Korea in the World,” and it begins with a world map on Robinson’s projection, with countries color-coded by the date of establishment of diplomatic relations, and superimposed with colored dots representing the types of major treaties in effect. This base map is used, with a of couple variants and exceptions, throughout this section to illustrate Korea’s place on the world political stage, and in such global economic fields as international investment and trade, global research, and lending/aid to other countries. The last part of this section looks at the cultural richness of Korean heritage through photographs of sites and celebrations, with the location of each mapped. There are photos of temples and historic villages, as well as of dances, martial arts, festivals, and collections of cultural artifacts with historic significance. These include the Baegun Hwasang Chorok Buljo Jikji Simchi Yojeol—roughly translated as the Anthology of the Great Buddhist Priests’ Zen Teachings—which was produced in 1377, and is the oldest known book printed with movable metal type anywhere in the world.
The final pages of this atlas contain three beautiful, 1:1,2000,000-scale maps of the Northern, Central, and Southern regions of Korea, and come complete with an Index. All in all, this book can perhaps be best described as it was in the Preface: “the National Atlas of Korea, with name of localities in indigenous language, will circulate a truthful understanding of Korea’s physical and human environments internationally” (ii).
All volumes of The National Atlas of Korea are available online for viewing or download at no cost by visiting nationalatlas.ngii.go.kr.
Distribution of the five hardcover volumes of the atlas has been delegated to the Korean Geographical Society (KGS). We are told that KGS is distributing a very limited number of the books for $150 per volume (excluding shipping). It is suggested that interested parties contact KGS directly at this address: Korean Geographical Society. 1413-ho, 213-12. Saechang-ro. Yongsan-gu. Seoul. 140-871. Korea.
Savada, Andrea Matles, and William Shaw, eds. 1992. A Country Study: South Korea, 4th edition. Washington, DC: Library of Congress. https://www.loc.gov/item/91039109.