뉴스레터

International seminar resumed after COVID-19

  The ‘29th International Seminar on the Place Name of East Sea and Sea Names’ was held in Depok City, near Jakarta, Indonesia, from October 18 to 21, 2023. Since the first seminar was held in 1995, this is a historic seminar that celebrates its 29th anniversary this year and has played an important role in disseminating the legitimacy of Korea’s claim to call it the East Sea to domestic and foreign experts. Since its founding, our foundation has been attending the event every year as a co-organizer. This seminar, which is held every year with the goal of informing domestic and foreign place name experts about the East Sea notation, is held one year in Korea and the next year abroad in principle. However, due to the outbreak of COVID-19 in December 2019, both online and offline events were conducted in Korea in 2020 and 2021. It was not until 2022 that the method of directly inviting foreign scholars to Korea and conducting the program entirely offline was resumed. This year, the seminar was held successfully in Indonesia.

Seminar held at the University of Indonesia

  Since this seminar was held in Indonesia, it was co-hosted by Indonesian partners, the University of Indonesia, and the Indonesia Place Name Society. In particular, a seminar venue was prepared at the University of Indonesia, and linguistic major faculty and students within the Department of Humanities were responsible for holding and operating the international seminar. In particular, Professor Multamia Lauder of the Department of Linguistics was in charge of overseeing the conference. In addition, many professors and students majoring in Korean studies also attended the seminar. In particular, Professor Rostinho, majoring in Korean Studies, received a master’s degree from Chairman Young-ho Lee while studying abroad at Inha University, so he provided special help in enabling many Korean undergraduate students to participate in the seminar.

Main contents of the seminar

A two-day seminar was held from October 19th to 20th under the main theme of ‘Sustainable use of place names in border areas for peace and inclusion.’ First, at the opening ceremony held on October 19, Seong-jae Joo, Chairman of the East Sea Research Association, gave an opening speech titled ‘The Meaning of Sustainable Use of Geographical Names,’ followed by welcoming speeches by Foundation Chairman Young-ho Lee and Indonesian Place Name Society Chairman Multamia Lauder. In the following seminar, 17 teams presented in four sub-topic sessions, including ‘Place Name Issues in Asia’, ‘Resolution of Place Name Disputes’, ‘Cultural Values of Place Names’, and ‘New Dimensions in Sustainable Use of Place Names.’ In particular, the session on ‘Place Name Issues in Asia’ introduced the names called by countries other than China on the South China Sea and its scope. Specifically, there was the North Natuna Sea in Indonesia, Bien Dong in Vietnam, and the West Philippine Sea in the Philippines.

  On October 20th, the session of ‘New Dimensions in Sustainable Use of Place Names’ followed. The author summarized and explained the notation of the East Sea on old maps of the East and West under the topic ‘East Sea Shown on Old Maps.’ In a panel discussion session on prospects, Youngmi Jeong, director of Dokdo Research Institute, discussed matters related to the recent change in the U.S. Undo-Pacific Command’s position on the notation of the East Sea.

Visit the old historic town

  On October 21, a field trip to the Kota Tuta area, which was created during the Dutch colonial period was conducted. We traveled about 2 hours from accommodation in Depok and were able to experience Jakarta’s infamous traffic jams. The center of the Kota Tua area, which can be translated as the old town in Korean, is Fatahila Square. Around this square stood various government buildings built during the colonial period. The building we visited across the square was the Jakarta History Museum. As a building that was previously used by the Dutch Government-general and various government offices, it has been used as a museum since 1974. The museum displayed artifacts from the Paleolithic era to modern times. Although the facilities and scale of the history museum were not very large or modern, it was impressive to see many local students visiting and studying history with enthusiasm.