한국국제교류재단

Since 1999 the Foundation has provided assistance to overseas publishers for the publication of Korea-related books. Reference materials and books recently published under this program include the following:

The New York-based Asia Society recently produced and released a two- volume video and teaching package entitled 'Tune in Korea' with the support of the Foundation. The package was prepared for secondary school students and beginning college students. The theme of the first video is 'Geography and Society' and focuses on Korea's history, language, family life, customs, education, and belief systems as well as its place in the world. The second volume, 'Legacy and Transformation' explores the many facets of South Korea's history and culture by investigating such questions as: What is South Korea's place in the world today? Which historical events led to the division of the Korean Peninsula? How are North and South Korea poised for the future together? In addition, an extensive teacher's guide that includes lesson plans, annotated excerpts from the script, bibliographies and reference materials accompany the video.

The Foundation has distributed the catalogue of the Korean Art at Museum Guimet (L'Art coreen au musee Guimet) to 165 major museums and art galleries all over the world. This volume of Korean arts on display at the French national Museum Guimet was published in 2001 with the financial support of the Foundation for the ive of publicizing Ko-rean arts to the world. Written by Korean art curator Pierre Cambon of the Asian Art Museum, the book is both in English and French. Its introduction is written in Korean as well.

The Foundation provided the support for The Last Emperess that was performed in London from Feb. 1 through Feb. 16, 2002. This operatic musical, staged at Londons Apollo Hammersmith Theater, was rewritten in English. Six songs were added to the musical for the international audience.

With the support of the Foundation, the Iranian Cultural Troupe performed traditional music of southern Iran (formerly Persia) in Korea, including a performance on February 7 at Woomyeon Hall, National Center for Korean Traditional Performing Arts, and Hankuk University of Foreign Studies. Exhibitions of Iranian tourism photography and Iranian traditional paintings were held on February 4-8 at Exhibition Hall, National Library.

Jacques Revel, rector of France's Ecoles des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (EHESS), visited Korea February 17-23, 2002 by invitation of the Foundation. He visited Korea University, the Academy of Korean Studies, Yeungnam University, and the National Museum of Korea, and explored ways to promote cultural and academic exchange between the two countries. EHESS has operated a Korean studies center since 1989. In 1995, EHESS d two professorships for Korean studies, reaffirming its status as France's leading Korean studies center.

A group of five young leaders from Central and South America visited Korea Dec. 10-16, 2001, at the invitation of the Foundation. These next-generation leaders came from Mexico, Chile, Peru, Argentina and Brazil, and had discussions with Korean experts in the related fields and visited major cultural sites and industrial facilities during their one-week stay.

The Foundation recently provided financial support for three international conferences. They were "Building on an East Asian Community: Conditions and Prospects" sponsored by Korea University's Asia Center; "the 9th International Conference on the History Textbooks between Korea and Japan" jointly sponsored by the Association for International History Textbooks Studies and a Japanese society on history education; and "East Asian Cultural Communication and Co-existence under Neo-Liberalism" co-sponsored by Korea Social & Cultural Research Institute of SungKongHoe University and the Forum for East Asian Cultural Exchange. The Korea Foundation also supported 12 Korean scholars who participated in various international conferences held in the United States, Australia and other countries.

Under its graduate scholarship program, the Foundation granted scholarships to five European graduate students specializing in Korean studies― two each at London University and Oxford University and one at University of Paris 7. In addition, the scholarships were awarded to 19 students majoring in Korean studies at Peking University, 17 at Fudan University, three at Bochum University and one at the University of Erfurt this year. Five scholars from four countries were involved in advanced Korean studies in Korea with the financial support of the Foundation as of the end of January. Forty people from 22 countries participated in the Korean language training under the Korean Language Fellowship program. Most of them are Korean language lecturers, or scholars and graduate students engaged in advanced Korean studies.

With the Foundation's support, a virtual gateway to all German academic institutions dealing with modern Korea has been established on the World Wide Web by Rudiger Frank of Humboldt-University Berlin. The gateway can be found at http://www. koreanstudies.de/ and provides access to Korea-related teaching, research and publication activities of German universities and academic organizations. Although the website can be viewed in both German and English, the English version is currently being upgraded.