『독립신문』 외국인물평으로 본 근대의 모습

The Modern Society of Korea: Looking through The Independent’s Reviews of Foreign Historical Figures

On April 7th, 1896, the Independent Association published its first edition of The Independent, and started to present their own programs of political and social reforms to the public, and also let the public be aware of the modern philosophies that the Independent Association members have embraced. The vision of modernity and also a modernized society, introduced to the public by the editors of The Independent, was depicted with concepts such as independence and liberation, self determined achievements, and the act of establishing a wealthy and strong(in military terms) country. Renowned figures such as Washington, Napoleon, and Bismark were delivered as the embodiments of such modern qualities and modernization. The interesting similarity shared by all these figures was the fact that they were all war heroes. At the time, the Joseon dynasty needed to independently thwart the military threats of invasion launched by the imperial Japan, and in order to do that the country had to achieve strength in military terms through certain modernization efforts. In essence, they needed war heroes to applaud and sing the heroics, and The Independent answered to that need and recalled such historic war heroes out of the textbooks and depicted such characters as characters of whose the kind of strength should be needed in the Koreans’ efforts to lead the country themselves and win the war as well in a drastic period of time. The Independent was essentially delivering the cases of foreign heroes and also the modern qualities that they were supposedly projecting, as examples which the Koreans would have to consult and aim for in their efforts to achieve such a modernized status. And such notion was very much based upon a dichotomy that was essentially suggesting and rationalizing the conflict between civilization and barbarians over the issue of modernization. The modern societies of the Western worlds were depicted with absolute positivity, and were established as the ultimate goal of the Korean(Joseon) people. So, in order to see to it, The Independent editorials argued that the Koreans must consult the success of the Japanese as effective models, must learn a few things from the failed attempts of the Chinese Qing dynasty, and must continue their own efforts toward modern reforms. We can see what kind of independent liberation and modernization was being pursued by the Koreans, by reviewing the characters of foreign historical figures described by tThe Independent columns at the time. The position of The Independent, which suggested the characters and efforts of certain foreign renowned figures in the past as prime examples of how one should behave in his or her attempts to garner similar achievements, was certainly showing dual and possibly self-conflicting natures: the consciousness of thwarting the imperialistic invasions to achieve independence and liberation, and also the consciousness of achieving modernization by consulting the cases of Western worlds which had already turned into imperialistic states.