한국 대학에서 영문학교육의 해체와 그 해체의 (불)가능성

The Deconstruction of English Studies in Korean Universities and its (im)Possibility for the Future to Come

The commercialization of higher education no longer surprises anyone. Contemporary capitalistic cultures and forces have transformed almost every aspect of Korean universities. This change radically dismantles the traditional authority and character of the humanities, once claimed as the sanctum of knowledge and the spirit of the modern university. While examining the capitalistic transformation of Korean universities, this article reviews what English studies in Korea faces as challenges. Over the course of the last twenty years many English departments in Korean universities drastically rebuilt their course curricula in order to strengthen practical English education. This curriculum reform was a convenient and arguably the most effective way of justifying the social functions and purposes of English studies in Korea. The consecutive deterioration of literary education in English studies, however, also raised concerns and disputes regarding the academic integrity and identity of English studies, while echoing with various discourses on the decline of the humanities in general. Then, what is the origin of the decline of the humanities or of the English department in Korea? And what can be a performative and rightful response to this crisis or change in English studies? What is the (im)possiblity of literary studies or literature in a society where the humanities simply fail to matter? This article attempts to answer these questions. After examining the contemporary challenges of English studies in Korea in a historical context, this essay introduces Jacques Derrida’s idea of the university to come. In doing so, it reformulates today’s challenges as a condition for constituting the university without condition, in which literary education re-defines and re-invents its meaning and existence.