Don Baker (University of British Columbia 교수)

Don Baker
Name in Latin Alphabet:	Don Baker
Nationality:	Canada
Affiliation:	University of British Columbia

강연자 소개

Don Baker is a professor of Korean history in the Department of Asian Studies at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada. Born and raised in the American south, he first became interested in Korea when he taught English in the city of Kwangju as a Peace Corps volunteer in the early 1970s. He earned a Ph. D from the University of Washington in 1983 with a dissertation on the conflict between Confucianism and Catholicism in Korea in the late 18th century. He has published widely on Korean history, religion, and traditional science, with a special focus on the life and thought of Tasan Chŏng Yagyong. His most recent book is Korean Spirituality (University of Hawaii Press, 2008). He is currently involved in research on the relationship between religious communities and the state since the founding of the Chosŏn dynasty six centuries ago. Among his recent articles are “Rhetoric, Ritual, and Political Legitimacy: Justifying Yi Seong-gye’s Ascension to the Throne” (Korea Journal 53:4), “The Transformation of the Catholic Church in Korea: From a Missionary Church to an Indigenous Church” (Journal of Korean Religions 4: 1) and “Tasan’s Pragmatic Approach to the Confucian Classics” (Tasanhak 22). He has also published on the history of traditional medicine in Korea, including "Oriental Medicine in Korea," in Helaine Selin, ed. Medicine Across Cultures: History and Practice of Medicine in Non-Western Cultures (Dordrecht, the Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2003), 133-153, and “Sirhak Medicine: Measles, Smallpox, and Chong Tasan,” Korean Studies, vol. 14 (1990), pp. 135-166.