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After Western pressure forced the Choson
government to open its ports, Korea's brilliant classical tradition became
fundamentally unstable. Thus, the opening of ports signaled the transition from
a classical to a modern society and led to a fundamental restructuring of Korean
society and culture.
The opening to the West created a tremendous cultural shock,
which led to three general reactions. The first was opposition, based on the
conclusion that Western power and culture would destroy Korea's culture and
social order. Most Choson-era intellectuals,
directly witnessing the destruction of China's social institutions and classical
culture, naturally assumed this attitude.
This anti-Western attitude has come to
be seen as inherently conservative. The second was an attitude of positive
acceptance, for some believed that in order to retrieve Choson
power, reforms had to be made based upon the acceptance of Western culture and
social institutions. Intellectuals of this reformist disposition claimed that
Koreans should learn about the West in order to overcome the impotence and
backwardness of Asia. There has been an excessive tendency on the part of
historians to see this reformist attitude as pro-Western. Third, there were
those who wanted a selective acceptance of Western ways, rejecting Western
culture and spirit but accepting its technology and institutions. This attitude
appeared in the assertion that Asian spiritual culture was generally superior,
while Western technology was more advanced. This attitude was put forth by a
small group of Neo-Confucian thinkers around the end of the Choson
period, but their efforts could do little to alter the turbulent waves of
modernization that were sweeping the country.
After the opening of ports, the attitude of conservative
opposition has continued to manifest itself to the present day in two forms:
classical Eastern religions such as Confucianism and Buddhism, and folk
movements, including native Korean religions and nationalist forces.
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