John R . Eperjesi
Professor
Department of English Linguistics and Literature
Kyung Hee University (Seoul)
Research: American Studies, Ecocriticism, Postcolonial Theory
Oceans, mountains, caves, islands, regions, military bases, the atmosphere, and dancefloors are some of the spaces that have been the focus of my research and writing over the past twenty-five years. My work moves across American Studies, Asian American Studies, Transpacific Studies, and Korean Studies. Ecocriticism and postcolonial theory have helped me understand the politics of a variety of cultural forms: novels, short stories, poems, documentaries, music, and film.
After receiving my doctorate in Literary and Cultural Theory from Carnegie Mellon University in 2000, I published my first book, The Imperialist Imaginary: Visions of Asia and the Pacific in American Culture (UP of New England 2005). The book is a study of Orientalism in US culture with a focus on the 1890s, the period in which the US began to build a Pacific Empire by colonizing Hawaii, the Philippines, Guam, and Samoa.
My current research is on climate fiction and debates over the question of the Anthropocene. What role can the study of literature play in addressing the climate emergency? There is no easy answer to this question, but any meaningful answer must involve dialogue between the humanities and sciences, and between academia and the public sphere.
I am currently a Professor in the Department of English Linguistics and Literature at Kyung Hee University in Seoul, South Korea, where I have been living since 2006. Seoul is a thrilling global city, surrounded by equally thrilling mountains, the ideal setting for both the flaneur and the hiker. The School of Humanities at Kyung Hee is an exciting intellectual space, and the students and faculty have generously made me feel at home here.
My work has appeared in: Amerasia, Asian Studies Review, boundary 2, The Contemporary Pacific, Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, Interdisciplinary Studies of Literature and the Environment (ISLE), Journal of American Studies, Journal of Popular Music Studies, Korea Journal, Minnesota Review, and Pacific Historical Review.
Department of English Linguistics and Literature
Kyung Hee University (Seoul)
Research: American Studies, Ecocriticism, Postcolonial Theory
Oceans, mountains, caves, islands, regions, military bases, the atmosphere, and dancefloors are some of the spaces that have been the focus of my research and writing over the past twenty-five years. My work moves across American Studies, Asian American Studies, Transpacific Studies, and Korean Studies. Ecocriticism and postcolonial theory have helped me understand the politics of a variety of cultural forms: novels, short stories, poems, documentaries, music, and film.
After receiving my doctorate in Literary and Cultural Theory from Carnegie Mellon University in 2000, I published my first book, The Imperialist Imaginary: Visions of Asia and the Pacific in American Culture (UP of New England 2005). The book is a study of Orientalism in US culture with a focus on the 1890s, the period in which the US began to build a Pacific Empire by colonizing Hawaii, the Philippines, Guam, and Samoa.
My current research is on climate fiction and debates over the question of the Anthropocene. What role can the study of literature play in addressing the climate emergency? There is no easy answer to this question, but any meaningful answer must involve dialogue between the humanities and sciences, and between academia and the public sphere.
I am currently a Professor in the Department of English Linguistics and Literature at Kyung Hee University in Seoul, South Korea, where I have been living since 2006. Seoul is a thrilling global city, surrounded by equally thrilling mountains, the ideal setting for both the flaneur and the hiker. The School of Humanities at Kyung Hee is an exciting intellectual space, and the students and faculty have generously made me feel at home here.
My work has appeared in: Amerasia, Asian Studies Review, boundary 2, The Contemporary Pacific, Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, Interdisciplinary Studies of Literature and the Environment (ISLE), Journal of American Studies, Journal of Popular Music Studies, Korea Journal, Minnesota Review, and Pacific Historical Review.
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Books by John R . Eperjesi
Papers by John R . Eperjesi
A Ricepaper Airplane constructs memories of mountains in general, and Kumgangsan in particular, as a constitutive feature of the Korean diasporic imagination. Lawrence Buell argues that “acts of environmental imagination … potentially register and energize … engagement with the world. They may reconnect readers with the places they have been and send them where they would otherwise never physically go. They may direct thought toward alternative futures” (2). In addition to offering (re)connections to the homeland and home mountains for those readers who, like Sung Wha, cannot return home because of the militarized division of the peninsula and the unending Korean War, A Ricepaper Airplane directs attention to the affirmative role that memories of mountains can play as a discursive resource for those movements working toward the overcoming of territorial division and the eventual reunification of the Korean Peninsula.
Recent Publications by John R . Eperjesi
A Ricepaper Airplane constructs memories of mountains in general, and Kumgangsan in particular, as a constitutive feature of the Korean diasporic imagination. Lawrence Buell argues that “acts of environmental imagination … potentially register and energize … engagement with the world. They may reconnect readers with the places they have been and send them where they would otherwise never physically go. They may direct thought toward alternative futures” (2). In addition to offering (re)connections to the homeland and home mountains for those readers who, like Sung Wha, cannot return home because of the militarized division of the peninsula and the unending Korean War, A Ricepaper Airplane directs attention to the affirmative role that memories of mountains can play as a discursive resource for those movements working toward the overcoming of territorial division and the eventual reunification of the Korean Peninsula.
Like the ocean, Drexciya’s music is fluid and shifting, incorporating a wide variety of styles within the broader genre of Detroit techno, from ambient to hard techno to noise. Their sound signature is an otherworldly blend of electro and techno and strange sea sounds, though. Through their music, album and song titles, liner notes, and label art, Drexciya took listeners on submarine journeys which sadly ended in 2002 when Stinson passed away.
A little over a decade later, on September 27, 2013, one of Althusser’s students, the French philosopher Alain Badiou, delivered the keynote address at a conference in Seoul organized around left philosophy, politics and art entitled, “The Žižek/Badiou Event of Philosophy.” Badiou was joined by the Slovenian psychoanalytic philosopher Slavoj Žižek, Chinese language and literature professor Wang Hui and a number of other Korean and international scholars. The conference took place at Platoon Kunstalle, a military bunker/art space located in the plastic heart of Gangnam. The irony of holding an event on communism and Marxism in Gangnam, the zone of gaudy consumerism made famous by Psy, was lost on no one. This irony was compounded by the fact that Gangnam is only 35 miles away from the DMZ and our Cold War neighbors to the north.
And yet, if some African Americans are hesitant to enter nature, whether it be in the form of a local urban park, the remote wilderness, or some place in between, Mr. Cooper’s encounter with Amy Cooper, who called the police and told them that an African American man was threatening her, when in fact he had simply asked her to follow the park rules and leash her dog, reveals why such hesitation can often function as a survival strategy.
I geared the lesson toward middle school and high school students, but it could probably be used for both younger and older students.
The first lesson is entitled "Drexciya and Our Ocean Planet," which focuses on the ocean as a marine environment. I am working on a second lesson plan, "Drexciya and the Middle Passage," which will deal with the famous liner notes to The Quest, which speculate about the origins of Drexciyans.
I've never made a lesson plan like this before, so I have no idea if this is something that teachers could use or would be interesting for students. I included a "Rough Teacher's Guide" with a few ideas about possible discussion topics and approaches. I'm sending it as a Word document so people can cut and paste and modify as they see fit. Feel free to share with anyone who you think might be interested.
If anyone has suggestions, feel free to pass them on.