• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.1-12
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• 2014

From the mid 17th century, Joseon mathematics had a new beginning and developed along two directions, namely the traditional mathematics and one influenced by western mathematics. A great Joseon mathematician if not the greatest, Hong JeongHa was able to complete the Song-Yuan mathematics in his book GuIlJib based on his studies of merely Suanxue Qimeng, YangHui Suanfa and Suanfa Tongzong. Although Hong JeongHa did not deal with the systems of equations of higher degrees and general systems of linear congruences, he had the more advanced theories of right triangles and equations together with the number theory. The purpose of this paper is to show that Hong was able to realize the completion through his perfect understanding of mathematical structures.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.35 no.4
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• pp.117-128
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• 2022

In learning mathematics, if you know how much mathematics is related to real life, you can understand mathematics much more easily. So, in many cases, practical instances are used in exercises. This is the way that has been used in mathematical texts since ancient times. From this perspective, these practical problems enable to reflect the very contemporary lives of those who learn mathematics. In this paper, types of contents of the exercises in mathematical texts of Joseon Dynasty are investigated, so that it may be possible to imagine the life in Joseon dynasty.

• Communications of Mathematical Education
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.641-651
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• 2011

In 2007, a Taiwanese mathematics historian Wann-Sheng HORNG made a visit to Kyujanggak(the royal library of Joseon Dynasty) in Seoul, Korea. During this visit, he found the Korean math book An abridged version of the Joseon Mathematics (<數學節要>, Su-Hak-Jeol-Yo), which was written by Jong-Hwa AN(9 Nov 1860 - 24 Nov 1924) in 1882. Then he mentioned the possible importance of AN's book in his article in the Journal Kyujanggak(vol. 32, June 2008). Jong-Hwa AN is a Korean scholar, activist of patriotism and enlightenment in the latter era of Joseon Dynasty. He passed the last examination of Joseon Dynasty to become a high government officer in 1894. The father of the modern mathematics education in Korea, Sang-Seol LEE(1870-1917) also passed the same examination with him. It is interesting that government high officer AN and LEE both wrote mathematics books in 19th century. In this talk, we now analyze this mathematics book of Joseon written in 1882.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.61-78
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• 2023

By virtue of the characteristics inherent in diagrams, diagrammatic reasoning has potential and limitations that distinguish it from general thinking. It is natural that diagrams rarely appeared in Joseon mathematical books, which were heavily focused on computation and algebra in content, and preferred linguistic expressions in form. However, as the late Joseon Dynasty unfolded, there emerged a noticeable increase in the frequency of employing diagrams, due to the educational purposes to facilitate explanations and the influence of Western mathematics. Analyzing the role of diagrams included in Jo Taegu's 'JuseoGwangyeon', an exemplary book, this study includes discussions on the utilization of diagrams from the perspective of mathematics education, based on the findings of the analysis.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.14 no.7
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• pp.93-102
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• 2014

Recently, various types of dramas have been broadcasted in Korea. Especially, historical dramas having backgrounds about historical events or characters have been recorded high ratings of the viewing audience, as well as a lot of influence on many parts of Korean society. Besides, the historical drama like raised a craze for popular Korean cultures in many Asian countries. The subjects and characters of historical drama are diversifying in recent years. For example, is a royal cook, is a story about running away slaves and their chaser, is a story about a very well-known painter of the Joseon Dynasty era, and is a veterinarian. At this point, in celebration of the officially appointed "year of mathematics", it is very meaningful to demonstrate the importance of mathematics with a historical drama about mathematics and mathematicians of the Joseon Dynasty. In this article, the reasons for production of historical dramas about mathematics and mathematicians in the Joseon Dynasty was presented in two ways. First, modern mathematics has high level of abstractness as its nature, and therefore many students and the public can not understand what except for some areas. Second, it is possible the easier and various approaches can be used to deal with contents about real-life in the view of popularization of mathematics. Also, this article would aim to explore the main character and episodes about mathematics and mathematicians in Joseon Dynasty. For example, the anecdote of Hong Jung Ha, the works of mathematics in the King Sejong's periods, the study of Hong Gil Ju, the joint researches between Nam Byung Gil and Lee Sang Hyuk, the story of Lee Seung Hun, and the mathematics study of middle class people.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.259-269
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• 2014

In China and Joseon, the measurement of the areas of various plane figures is a very important subject for mathematical officials because it is connected directly with tax problems. Most of mathematical texts in China and Joseon contained Chinese character '田', which means a field for farming, in title name for parts that dealt with problems of areas and treated as areas of plane figures. The form of mathematical texts in Joseon is identical with those in China because mathematicians in Joseon referred to texts in China. Gyeong SeonJing and Hong JeongHa also referred to Chinese texts. But they added their interpretations or investigated new methods for the measurement of areas. In this paper, we investigate the history of the measurement of areas in Joseon, which described in two books MukSaJibSanBeob and GuIlJib, with comparing some mathematical texts in China.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.28 no.5
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• pp.233-248
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• 2015

Year 2014 was very special to Korean mathematical society. Year 2014 was the Mathematical Year of Korea, and the International Congress of Mathematicians "ICM 2014" was held in Seoul, Korea. The year 2014 was also the 330th anniversary year of the birth of Joseon mathematician Hong JeongHa. He is one of the best, in fact the best, of Joseon mathematicians. So it is worth celebrating his birth. Joseon dynasty adopted a caste system, according to which Hong JeongHa was not in the higher class, but in the lower class of the Joseon society. In fact, he was a mathematician, a middle class member, called Jungin, of the society. We think over how Hong JeongHa was able to write his mathematical book GuIlJib in Joseon dynasty.

• Communications of Mathematical Education
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.1-19
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• 2011

HPM(History and Pedagogy of Mathematics) become an important issue to us now. Study on old Korean mathematics books were made recently. We study mathematics books in Kyujanggak in this article. Horng Wann-Sheng 洪萬生, an math. historian and a member of editorial board of Historia Mathematica, visited Kyujanggak, the royal library of Joseon Dynasty. After his visit, he published a paper, "The first visit to mathematics books in Kyujanggak 奎章閣收藏算書初訪"(2008 Kyujanggak 32, p. 283-293). In his paper, he also raised several research problems on the history of Korean mathematics. In this paper, we analyze his paper "The first visit to mathematics books in Kyujanggak" and give some answers to those raised problems on Korean mathematics. Also we correct some misunderstanding of Horng on some facts. Especially, we make it clear that the author of SinJungSanSul(New Arithmetics 新訂算術) was not Lee Sang-Seol(李相卨), whom Horng considered as the author, but Lee Gyo-Seung(李敎承) through the correct translation of its preface and an article about its copyright lawsuit. And we added some pathways how Chinese mathematics books were imported by Joseon. We introduce the case of Hong Dae-Yong(洪大容) in detail.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.181-222
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• 2020

《Xiangming Suanfa》 is a mathematics text published in 1373. The preface and postscript of the block books 《Xiangming Suanfa》 in the Joseon Dynasty were published as they had been in the original text from China. It can be considered to be based on 《Xiangming Suanfa》 was published in Mingjingtang. The five different block books which is published in Korea, possessed in Yonsei University Library, Sanghuh Memorial Library of Konkuk University and the National Library of Korea, were compared. Through recension-correction of the text, this thesis is intended to help researchers in utilizing the research by providing fine print.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.127-150
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• 2018

In spite of important researches and translational works of the Joseon mathematical treatises in the 80's and on, these results were almost out of reach to the school teachers as well as students due to the antiquity of their contents and the terms used. In order to make our traditional mathematics approachable to the middle and high school students, it will be educationally meaningful to reinterpret them tuned at the student's level using modern terminology and symbols. In this study, we reinterpreted 9 problems from Cheukryang Dohae, which is one of the representative mathematical books of Joseon Dynasty. We used the terminology and symbols from the school curriculum. We also reconstructed two of them using modern metrologies adapted to modern situations adding illustrations and photos, so that they are useful at the teaching site.