Remco Breuker MA (Leiden) PhD (Leiden)
Postdoctoral Fellow, Division of Pacific and Asian History

Email: remco.breuker@anu.edu.au

Biographical Statement

After obtaining an MA in Japanese Language and Culture and in Korean Language and Culture at Leiden University, I entered the Graduate School of Korean History of Seoul National University. Finishing my courses and research there, I returned to Leiden to complete a Ph.D. on medieval Korean history. My research focuses on questions of identity formation (in particular in pre-modern periods), medieval Korean (Koryŏ) history, the history of ideas and the history of Northeast Asia between the 10th and the 12th centuries. My current research project concerns the historical relationship between Koryŏ (918-1392) and the Liao (916-1125) and the influence Manchurian civilizations such as the Liao and the Jin (1115-1234) have exercised on the Korean peninsula in particular and on Asia in general.

Research Interests

Apart from the history of medieval Korea and Northeast Asia, I have a profound interest in the colonial period in Korea, the role of landscape in history and in the history of Korean cinema. One theoretical concern I have is how pre-modern periods can be meaningfully distinguished from modern periods. I am currently also writing a book on Korean cinema with Dr. Roald Maliangkay (Faculty of Asian Studies), which is scheduled to be finished in early 2008.

Key Publications

• (2007) [forthcoming]. Forging the truth: Creative deception and national identity in medieval Korea. Center for Korean Studies Monograph Series. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press.
• (2007) [forthcoming] "Within or without? Ambiguity of borders and Koryŏ Koreans' travels during the Liao, Song, Jin and Yuan". Chapter in Imagining Korea, Imagining the World [working title], edited by Marion Eggert, JaHyun Kim Haboush and Boudewijn Walraven.
• (2006) When truth is everywhere: The formation of plural identities in early Koryo (918-1170). Ph.D. thesis on the origins and development of a transregional consciousness and the formation of a pluralist ideology at the School of Asian, African, and Amerindian Studies (CNWS), Leiden University.
• (2005) "Contested objectivities: Ikeuchi Hiroshi, Kim Sanggi and the tradition of Oriental History (Tōyōshigaku) in Japan and Korea". East Asian History 29: 69-106. Canberra: Australian National University.
• (2003) "Koryŏ as an independent realm: The emperor's clothes?". Korean Studies 27: 48-84. University of Hawai'i Press.