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Korean Studies in Warsaw, Poland

The history of Korea as a subject of university study in Poland began in 1953, but Polish and Korean contact was initiated much sooner.

In the second half of the 19th century, political exiles were the first Poles to have direct contact with Korea. These exiles were compelled by Russia, one of the occupiers of Poland at the time, to settle in the eastern lands of the Russian empire, from where they sometimes escaped into neighboring Manchuria or even the Sakhalin Island. It was in Manchuria, or in the coastal areas of eastern Russia, that many Poles first met Koreans who were settled in the border areas between Korea, Russia and China. Among these Poles was Waclaw Sieroszewski, a traveler and writer, who was the first Pole to reach Korea, at the beginning of the 20th century. Poles were able to read about Korea for the first time when Sieroszewski wrote two books entitled Korea: The Key to East Asia and Ol-Soni Kisan. Both of these books are travelogues from his sojourns in Korea, and contain some detailed and perceptive descriptions of the daily life of Koreans, but also present an incorrect interpretation of the political events occurring in Korea at that time, a fault that can surely be ascribed to the author's lack of acquaintance with any of the main Asian languages.

Studying Korean Before 1970s
In Poland itself, there was no chance to learn Korean until the end of the Second World War. At that time, for both Poland and for Europe in general, Korea was merely a part of the extensive Japanese empire and the fate of occupied Korea was not of interest to many Poles. Koreans who reached Poland were treated as citizens of Japan. One of these visitors was Yu Dong-ju, a Korean dentist working at the Japanese embassy in Warsaw in the 1930s. After the war, Yu became the first teacher of Korean in Poland.

After 1948, North Korea established diplomatic relations with Poland and reserved for itself the right to represent the interests of all Koreans. With the arrival of the first language lecturer from North Korea, Dr. Yu was forced to cease private teaching of Korean to students of East Asian studies. One of his most famous students was my own first aca- demic teacher of Korean, Dr. Halina Ogarek-Czoj, whom we honor as the first academic scholar of Korea in Poland.

In the years from 1953 to 1983, an academic concentration in Korean studies did not exist in Poland. Students of Chinese or Japanese studied Korean as a second or third East Asian langu - age. The only teachers of Korean at that time were lecturers who were sent from Pyeongyang, and Dr. Ogarek-Czoj. There were not many students of Japanese at that time who desired to burden themselves with additional studies in Korean, mainly because of the considerable obstacles placed in their way by the North Korean side. Moreover, at that time, Warsaw University did not have any serious academic teaching materials. A lack of dictionaries, appropriate text books, literary texts and academic monographs frequently compelled those who were studying Korean to improvise. Sometimes we would ask South Koreans or Japanese whom we had gotten to know on neutral ground, in countries other than Poland or Korea, to send us any kind of academic materials.

During the Cold War, the late Dr. Kim Yeon-su, a permanent resident of The Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany at the time) and a professor at the University of Kiel, was the first South Korean citizen to come to Communist Poland. He immediately saw our difficulties and it was through him that we obtained many books published in South Korea.

Establishment of Korean Studies Concentration
Romuald Huszcza, one of the graduates of Japanese studies at my alma mater, initiated and built up from the very foundations a true center of Korean linguistics at Warsaw University. He also regularly teaches Korean studies simultaneously with his sustained activity in the areas of general and Japanese linguistics. In 1983, the concentration of Korean Studies was officially inaugurated at the university within the newly formed Department of Japanese and Korean Studies. The creation of this concentration was made possible by the dedication of four people: Dr. Ogarek-Czoj, the scholar of Korean; Professor Mikolaj Melanowicz, a scholar of Japanese; Professor Romuald Huszcza, a Korean and Japanese scholar; and Professor Tadeusz Zbikowski of Chinese studies. Without the assistance of Polish scholars of Japanese and Chinese, it would have been impossible to establish Korean as a separate and quasi-independent course of study.

The 1970s and 1980s were a time of increased contact for Polish scholars of Korean with both Western Europe and, indirectly, with South Korea. During this period, direct and official contacts were beginning to be made between scholars of Korea in Poland and the Association for Korean Studies in Europe (AKSE), an association established in the 1970s by the very founders of modern Korean stu- dies in Europe. After many years of isolation, our Koreanists were able to participate in international Korean studies conferences held by AKSE, despite sharp protests from the North Korean embassy in Warsaw, incidents of intimidation on the part of some North Korean diplomats, and other attempts to prevent Polish scholars of Korean from any kind of academic contact with the West.

The first students of the new Korean studies section at Warsaw University graduated in 1988. Most of them had undergone a six-month language practicum in North Korea, at Kim Il Sung University in Pyeongyang. However, the next generation of graduates would have much better professional prospects before them. The years of 1989 and 1990 represented a time of decisive change in Poland and in all of Eastern Europe, a time that allowed the return of freedom to this part of the world. This period allowed for radical and positive changes in the study of Korea. Even before diplomatic relations were officially established between South Korea and the post-Communist Polish Republic, Korean businessmen and journalists began to arrive in Warsaw; they were followed by writers, musicians, artists and students from South Korea, and finally by scientists, politicians, official representatives of South Korean universities, and the executives of large business conglomerates.

Development Assisted by Korean Organizations
Since 1989, Warsaw University─ the largest and most important academic institution in Poland, with almost 55,000 students─ has signed a series of bilateral academic exchange agreements with many South Korean universities. The greatly improved political situation in Poland has made it possible to invite many distinguished Korean professors to work at Warsaw University for a year or even two years at a time, teaching Polish students. The sojourns of most of these professors in Warsaw were made possible by academic and financial assistance from South Korean foundations, such as the Korea Foundation and the Korea Research Foundation.

Between 1996 and 2003, the Korea Foundation has also sponsored three positions for Polish researchers. This assistance has made the continuing development of Korean studies in Poland possible. Thanks to the Korea Foun-dation, three of our graduate students were also able to finish their doctorates and two of them, previously sponsored by the Korea Foundation, were hired by our university.

At present, the Korean section admits students yearly at two levels of study: a three-year B.A. program, and a further two-year M.A., which continues and extends the B.A.level degree. The staff and students enjoy a collection of over seven thousand volumes in our Korean library, and every year we continue to receive gifts of books from the Korea Foundation and other private Korean donors.

These days, our graduates find employment in the offices of Korean firms, both in Poland and abroad, and many of them also decide to continue on to doctoral studies at Korean universities. At present, five of our students are continuing their doctoral studies in the areas of modern and pre-modern history, sociology, economics, and political science. Last year, one of our graduates, Dr. Anna Paradowska, as the first European doctoral degree candidate in the field of Korean linguistics at Seoul
National University, successfully defended a doctoral thesis about the phonetic aspects of contemporary spoken Korean.

At present, the Korean section remains an integral part of the Japanese and Korean Department at Warsaw University. Since a separate position of director of the Korean section does not exist at this time, the head of the department is ex officio also the head of the Korean section. The department chair is chosen by rotation from among the members of the department; usually, he is a professor of distinction elected by the majority vote of the professors of Korean and Japanese.

The Korean section, as is true these days with Korean and other humanistic studies at universities around the world, is struggling with financial and other practical difficulties. I personally feel positive, however, about the present condition of Korean studies at Warsaw University. I have no doubt that, despite temporary difficulties, our research and scholarship will produce many academic achievements, as the high number of M.A. graduates in Korean studies─almost fifty students at this point─may suggest. The practical and constant support from the Korea Foundation is a major factor in the development of Korean studies, and is a major reason why studying Korean has become both practically attractive and intellectually stimulating for many Poles.

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