• Lingua Humanitatis
• /
• v.1 no.2
• /
• pp.3-20
• /
• 2001

The concept of "modernism" has always posed problems in definition from the beginnings of "early-modernism" to our age of post-modernism and multi-culturalism. And yet, the concept has been consistently aligned with the search for new paradigms of thinking about "modernity" as the age experiences it. In this sense, this study tries to explain the meaning of the term "modern," why it still matters in the study of literature, and how to apply it to the examination of Kim Soo-Young′s poems. Kim is one of the leading poets who understood the importance of modernism in the development of Korean modern poetry. But, despite his dedication to the western literary style and modernism, Kim also attempted the renewal of traditional Confucian thought in his poems. The result of such efforts can be seen in poems such as "Difficulties of Confucius ′Everyday Life," in which Kim tries to juxtapose the ancient life of Confucius with life in a much-westernized modern Korea. Another poem "Grass" shows his eagerness to transform traditional eastern aesthetics into a new mode of thinking that encompasses both the influence of the west and changes in 20th-century Korea. Through the study of Kim′s poems in relation to the critical reception of modernism in Korea, we can conclude the following: that Kim led the modernist movement in Korea; that modernism still matters in post-modern Korean literature; and that, because Kin tried to bring together the ideas of western modernism and traditional Confucianism, his poetry not only spoke to his own time but speaks also to our multi-cultural age.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
• /
• v.52
• /
• pp.371-392
• /
• 2018

Beginning with ethical nature inherent in the novel, this paper argues that ethical responsibility of $21^{st}$ century global fiction lies in its invitation to readers to rethink the status quo in a globalized world. While David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas and Min-gyu Park's Dinner with Buffett use international settings, these works exemplify how global fiction fails at, or succeeds in, the ethical task of challenging the contemporary world, respectively. This is because Mitchell's 500-page novel, although a felicitous embodiment of globalization and hybridity, does not challenge dominant ideologies and instead ends up reproducing a conventional humanist ideology against the backdrop of exotic places and diverting literary pastiches. In contrast, Dinner with Buffett, a novella about a Korean average Joe who wins a charity meal with tycoon Warren Buffett, perplexes the reader with counterintuitive turns and, in doing so, uncovers what we believe to be common sense today that serves global capitalism.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
• /
• v.52
• /
• pp.277-312
• /
• 2018

First-order cybernetics during the 1940s and 1950s aimed for control of an observed system, while second-order cybernetics during the mid-1970s aspired to address the mechanism of an observing system. The former pursues an objective, subjectless, approach to a system, whereas the latter prefers a subjective, personal approach to a system. Second-order observation must be noted since a human observer is a living system that has its unique cognition. Maturana and Varela place the autopoiesis of this biological system at the core of second-order cybernetics. They contend that an autpoietic system maintains, transforms and produces itself. Technoscientific recreation of biological autopoiesis opens up to a new step in cybernetics: what I describe as third-order cybernetics. The formation of technoscientific autopoiesis overlaps with the Fourth Industrial Revolution or what Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee call the Second Machine Age. It leads to a radical shift from human centrism to posthumanity whereby humanity is mechanized, and machinery is biologized. In two versions of the novel Demon Seed, American novelist Dean Koontz explores the significance of technoscientific autopoiesis. The 1973 version dramatizes two kinds of observers: the technophobic human observer and the technology-friendly machine observer Proteus. As the story concludes, the former dominates the latter with the result that an anthropocentric position still works. The 1997 version, however, reveals the victory of the techno-friendly narrator Proteus over the anthropocentric narrator. Losing his narrational position, the technophobic human narrator of the story disappears. In the 1997 version, Proteus becomes the subject of desire in luring divorcee Susan. He longs to flaunt his male egomaniac. His achievement of male identity is a sign of technological autopoiesis characteristic of third-order cybernetics. To display self-producing capabilities integral to the autonomy of machinery, Koontz's novel demonstrates that Proteus manipulates Susan's egg to produce a human-machine mixture. Koontz's demon child, problematically enough, implicates the future of eugenics in an era of technological autopoiesis. Proteus creates a crossbreed of humanity and machinery to engineer a perfect body and mind. He fixes incurable or intractable diseases through genetic modifications. Proteus transfers a vast amount of digital information to his offspring's brain, which enables the demon child to achieve state-of-the-art intelligence. His technological editing of human genes and consciousness leads to digital standardization through unanimous spread of the best qualities of humanity. He gathers distinguished human genes and mental status much like collecting luxury brands. Accordingly, Proteus's child-making project ultimately moves towards technologically-controlled eugenics. Pointedly, it disturbs the classical ideal of liberal humanism celebrating a human being as the master of his or her nature.