Richard D. McBride, II, Washington University, St. Louis
| DATE: | Friday, October 7, 2005 |
|---|---|
| TIME: | 4:15 PM |
| PLACE: | IEAS Conference Room, 2223 Fulton Street, 6th Floor |
| FORMAT: | Colloquium |
| SPONSORS: | Center for Korean Studies |
The Samguk yusa (Memorabilia of the Three Kingdoms, ca. 1285) is not a "Buddhist history" to counter supposed "Confucian history" Samguk sagi (History of the Three Kingdoms, 1136-46). Iryon (1206-89), who took refuge in North Kyongsang Province after passing monastic examinations in the Koryo capital, composed the Samguk yusa to preserve anecdotes from antiquity for to demonstrate that the tales of Korea's founding ancestors were the equal of those of China. A more fruitful way to conceptualize the differences between the Samguk sagi and Samguk yusa is to think of the former as representative of official or central discourse and the latter as promoting local discourse. The great wealth and worth of the Samguk yusa comes from its inclusion of many types of local materials, anecdotes, traditional narratives, and native songs, as well as ancient myths and legends transformed by Buddhist conceptualizations of the universe. It is a valuable demonstration of how ancient Koreans of the Silla kingdom and their Koryo successors forged a meaningful amalgamation of native beliefs and practices within the broader Sinitic and Buddhist culture of East Asia.
Richard D. McBride, II, currently postdoctoral fellow in Korean and Buddhist Studies at Washington University-St. Louis, received his Ph.D. in East Asian Languages and Cultures from UCLA. His publications include "Dharani and Spells in Medieval Sinitic Buddhism." Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 28, no. 1 (forthcoming, 2005); "Hidden Agendas in the Life Writings of Kim Yusin." (Acta Koreana 1, August, 1998:101-142); "The Hwarang segi Manuscripts: An In-Progress Colonial Period Fiction." Korea Journal (forthcoming, 2006); "Is There Really 'Esoteric' Buddhism?" (Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 27, no. 2, 2004: 323-350); and "The Vision-Quest Motif in Narrative Literature on the Buddhist Traditions of Silla" (Korean Studies 27, 2003:16-47). His book Domesticating the Dharma: Buddhist Cults and the Hwaom Synthesis in Silla Korea is under review at the U. Hawai'i Press.
Free and open to the public. Sponsored through a grant from the Korea Foundation.
