Talk:Korean nationalism

Although relationship between China and two Koreas are quite well, however, there is a continous dispute between both China and Korea. Koreans believe that China was the cause of the situation between North and South Korea, dated back from the Korean War. In recently, there are historical conflicts between both because of many controversy towards Goguryeo, language origins and the ancient war between China and Korea.^{[citation needed ]}

Since the merger is complete I believe it should be adequate we discuss some issues over this article before making any further revamps.

Some major contentions I see:

1. Is this entire article (or at least the #State-aligned nationalism section) a WP:UNDUE (or WP:POV) issue? I have seen numerous accusations, both inside and outside the wiki, that this article and Korean ethnic nationalism, which was recently merged into this one, are biased. There used to be an entire rant section on NamuWiki's article on the English Wikipedia just because of these two articles (apparently someone just wasn't WP:BOLD enough to make the changes on their own) and has been used as evidence to Wikipedia's apparent "anti-Korean bias" ().

So anyways, back to the point. It does appear to me that a large portion of references here are from B.R. Myers, Andrei Lankov, and Shin Ki-Wook. Myers and Shin have been described as 'conservative' scholars, and they are definitely critical of ethnic nationalism(, ). However, all of these scholars do have a well-established position as experts on Korean affairs, which is why I urge editors to not delete any source from these scholars. If there is consensus that this article does have a bias/undue weight issue on conservative opinion then I will tag it with {{undue weight }} or {{unbalanced }}. What we could do then is to clarify which opinion came from whom, and add opinions from scholars who have a positive view on ethnic nationalism. What we should NOT do is delete sentences or sources from Myers, Shin, Kelly, or Lankov without consensus.

2. In the case of Korean sources, should 'minjok, be translated as "nation" or "race"? It appears to me that the term minjok-juui(minjok-ism) is translated as "nationalism" in many sources, and the translation of minjok as "race" mostly derives from a conservative viewpoint. (, ). Nevertheless, we should meet a consensus on this before someone else is accused of whitewashing the article. A third option here would be using the term minjok itself without translation.

3. Did the term minjok originate from the Japanese cognate minzoku? Or did both terms germinate spontaneously in the two countries during a similar time period, with minzoku predating minjok? The article vaguely says that minjok is a term that had been coined in Imperial Japan ("minzoku") in the early Meiji period, and I cannot find the source of this claim.

@Korean National History, Notendiesonmyplate, Seefooddiet, Illegitimate Barrister, and Joren: pinging recent and major contributers. -- 00101984hjw (talk) 04:03, 4 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

1. I've heard the same, and before my revision a while back the problem was definitely worse. Korean editors tried to rightfully but sloppily tone down the article, but it was being guarded by POV leaning editors who used any of the sloppiness as an excuse to maintain the POV. Honestly even after the merger it still reads POV, like it's angrily harping on the topic. I do think you should tag it as WP:UNDUE. It needs to be cut down in length; it's also pretty repetitive.

2. "Minjok" is hard to translate, maybe could provide both translations. I don't think we should be worried about appearing to whitewash the article, given that the previous article was redwashed with POV.

3. Idr the source I read it in, but I'm fairly certain that the Korean concept came from the Japanese. I'll look up the source in near future.

Now that the MOS is finished, I may just take the task up of revising this myself. Just need to find energy to do it. Waiting for this to all go through committee will take a lot of time. seefooddiet (talk) 04:36, 4 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

{{Undue }} has been tagged. I try and work on this if I have the time but I'll need to find academic sources first. -- 00101984hjw (talk) 15:53, 4 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

Giving it a shot, but the problems run really deep. Nearly every sentence has issues where subjective arguments that aren't directly in the source are being extrapolated upon. This issue is so systemic and the topic so contentious that scrapping most of it and rewriting it may be better. Can't trust anything being said. At present, the writing seems actively harmful to me. seefooddiet (talk) 09:26, 6 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

I'll strike the talk page with {{controversial }} for now. - 00101984hjw (talk) 15:15, 6 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

There is an entire reliance on Myers, who have blatantly stated on his articles that they are opinions, in this article alone. Things from his opinion pieces are just stated as facts, whether his observation of both Koreas' societies are accurate or not. Notendiesonmyplate (talk) 04:28, 22 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

Ok, even the word "reliance" is lightly putting it. Basically every quote, every "explanation", every opinion is from Myers. The worst part of it all, is that anything from Myers is just written here as if it's just a fact. He literally puts whatever he wrote under "opinions". As a matter of fact, the name Myers appears on this article for about a good 20 times even before I edited the North Korean section. This is unprofessional at best. Notendiesonmyplate (talk) 12:09, 22 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

Rather than pour time into trying to fix everything, I'd recommend being more liberal with deleting offending bits, given how contentious this topic is. It's not worth the time to fix everything, and the writing is often difficult to fix.

I suspect a good chunk of this article is attributable to a user who's been sockpuppeting and editing on this topic for years. Their writing consistently has these issues. Has been frustrating to deal with them. seefooddiet (talk) 12:22, 22 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

What's weird here is that many Wikipedia articles on Korean nationalism seem to be treating Korea's usage of minjok as some mystical and unique thing only exclusive to Korea. In reality, the equivalent term is also use in China and Japan. Replacing every instance of minjok with race/ethnicity might make South Korea look pretty racist. But so would replacing every instance of minzu with race in China (Zhonghua Minzu gets turned into Chinese race for example). The Account 2 (talk) 19:23, 23 December 2025 (UTC) Reply

Largely agree, although noting ethnic nationalism and the use of that term in both China and Japan are somewhat different, namely due to current and historical imperialism. grapesurgeon (talk) 19:26, 23 December 2025 (UTC) Reply

Yes I agree. It's just that many of these articles somehow morphed into the assumption of Koreans being a uniquely racist group not found anywhere else in the world, so racist in fact that they share sympathies with North Korea (!!!) just because they're of the same ethnicity. Of course, anyone with more than an elementary knowledge of Korea these days knows that less and less South Koreans feel any kind of affinity to North Korea because of shared ethnicity; most are simply disinterested. Honestly, I feel like some of these articles can sometimes veneer into Orientalism... The Account 2 (talk) 19:46, 23 December 2025 (UTC) Reply

Though as a Korean, you'll definitely be more knowledgeable about this topic. The Account 2 (talk) 19:50, 23 December 2025 (UTC) Reply

Yea I have same impression; most are disinterested. It's worth noting the people often cited in this article are older, and knew Korea during the democratization movement when this was more important. It's much much less relevant now. grapesurgeon (talk) 19:53, 23 December 2025 (UTC) Reply

I just tagged it with WP:OR after flipping around the rest of the article. Basically every sentence in this has problems and fixing them would effectively mean rewriting the article anyway. Given that some of the topics are really contentious, the state of the article is especially unacceptable. This article (Korean nationalism) got around 20,000 views in the last year.

I may stop my attempts to fix what's already here, and start giving a total rewrite a shot by using the existing sources in the article myself. It may be shorter but it'll be tighter writing. seefooddiet (talk) 10:08, 6 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

You may be write. In my experience, collective process can only take us so far; in the end articles need attention from one person, occasionally a small, dedicated group, otherwise they are a bigger or smaller mess. Good luck with the rewrite _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | reply here} 05:54, 7 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

Not enough energy to do the rewrite lately; may not end up doing it. At least managed to tone down the article some more. I may keep chipping away at it. seefooddiet (talk) 04:30, 9 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

Do you think an intensive revamp could fix the thing? Or is it an inevitable WP:TNT case? -- 00101984hjw (talk) 01:03, 10 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

An intensive revamp would basically be a rewrite, so I think basically TNT. seefooddiet (talk) 01:07, 10 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

Well, TNT = deletion, I don't think we need to delete this. No prejudice to see this being replaced by a better article, but I'd oppose deletion at AFD. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | reply here} 06:42, 10 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

Oops, I didn't read that essay close enough. Yes total rewrite instead of something like a deletion. On the other hand, I do feel uncomfortable with the current content of the article because it feels actively harmful. But deletion until revision isn't the solution. seefooddiet (talk) 06:44, 10 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

Adding topic to notify users attempting to edit this page easier. This entire article is completely reliant on Myers. Brian Myers cannot tell the difference between the East Asian concept of 民族 and the concept of race. Because of this, he attributes almost all of anti-American sentiment to racism, meaning IF you are against the American hegemony in any way, shape or form possible, you are racist.

The worst case of this "Myers Dependency" is quoting what he wrote under "Opinions" and using it as fact. By WP:NPOV, this is prohibited.

Please be mindful. Notendiesonmyplate (talk) 05:47, 6 January 2025 (UTC) Reply

I've also been wary of this. If I recall correctly, the article even had an instance where like 8 different Myers articles were cited for a single fact. WP:CITEKILL. seefooddiet (talk) 06:03, 6 January 2025 (UTC) Reply

Can we...schedule a rewrite? Little by little? The whole article is unprofessional at best, full of agenda driven and racist wording at worst. I'm aware people have already talked about this 3 months ago, but it seems to be worth it. Notendiesonmyplate (talk) 10:58, 6 January 2025 (UTC) Reply

Yeah it needs to be done. Part of why I've acted slower on this article is because of pageviews. While the page is harmful, it gets low enough views that it doesn't keep me up at night.

I'd approve if you took a big eraser to much of the harmful writing btw. No need to do this so surgically if there's harm at play. seefooddiet (talk) 11:04, 6 January 2025 (UTC) Reply

Alright. Going to do this one by one. Notendiesonmyplate (talk) 11:07, 6 January 2025 (UTC) Reply

The article is problematic in most places, but the issues section has been bugging me some of the most. I may do my own cleaning in future. seefooddiet (talk) 10:59, 7 January 2025 (UTC) Reply

I edited out most of the parts that misquote Myers or were his complete opinions up to the State-Aligned Nationalism section. I also edited out parts that did not reflect the actual contents of the references.

I also edited the parts that said "Korean race" to "Korean ethnicity", since those usually refer to minjok, also known as 民族, which means ethnicity.

For future viewers, 民族 is a concept interchangeable with ethnicity. In China, it is a concept that is used to categorize people such as Han, Zhuang, Uyghur, Hui, Miao, Man, Yi, etc. In Japan, it's a concept that defines the Yamato. In Korea, it's a concept that defines Koreans. This is the reason why I argue that any parts that previously had "Korean race" should be changed into "Korean ethnicity". Notendiesonmyplate (talk) 12:06, 7 January 2025 (UTC) Reply

Also I think I'll separate "discrimination" from issues, then replace the issues category with geopolitics. Discrimination seems to just be alien compared to the contents in other sub sections. Notendiesonmyplate (talk) 13:57, 7 January 2025 (UTC) Reply

Entire article may need a complete WP:TNT rewrite imo: article barely goes into the background and various interpretations & impact of the ideology and has sporadic, often poor sourcing. A lot of the stuff in the #Geopolitics section should honestly belong in Anti-Japanese sentiment in Korea, Anti-Chinese sentiment in Korea, and Anti-American sentiment in Korea, with the entire section drastically summarized.

Either way, we might want to start finding rigorous sources first, ideally scholarly journals or even better, books. I really wish we had more experts on Korea-related topics here, since this is not an easy topic to write a good article about, but I guess the three of us are all there is now. -- 00101984hjw (talk) 05:53, 26 January 2025 (UTC) Reply

I think there are other problems with using Myers' work. Per this article, he seems to hold some... controversial views. In his substack, he seems to allude to a shadowy Jewish elite that controlled the Soviet Union and owns the US media and even compares Nick Fuentes to Dostoevsky. I really don't know how his past work should be treated in the revelation of this. The Account 2 (talk) 11:39, 2 April 2026 (UTC) Reply

It'd depend on 1. if RS have discussed his views 2. if he held such views at the time of writings from him that are being cited 3. if such writings have possibly affected his academic work in some way.

I think those things are possibly good to be aware of, but not immediately disqualifying except for if the above points are given evidence for. grapesurgeon (talk) 13:00, 2 April 2026 (UTC) Reply

Ethnic and state identities are different; "Korean nationalism" (Category:Korean nationalism), "South Korean nationalism" (Category:South Korean nationalism), and "North Korean nationalism" (Category:North Korean nationalism) must exist as individual articles, respectively.

• South Korean nationalists are not all Korean nationalists: South Korea's youth have a nationalistic affiliation with Republic of Korea does not necessarily mean they support minjok or reunification; New Right (South Korea) is a similar example; South Korean conservatives are less obsessed with minjok than South Korean progressives.^[1]
• After 2023, North Korean nationalism officially opposes Korean nationalism: North Korea has effectively relinquished the "ownership" of pan-Korean nationalism. South Korea is given the golden opportunity to portray itself as the sole supporter of Korean unity, thereby undermining one of the few ideological strengths North Korea had in the bilateral struggle for ideological supremacy.^[2]

Currently, dealing with South Korean nationalism and North Korean nationalism in Korean nationalism articles is not much different from those covered in German nationalism articles without separating Austrian nationalism articles; even fascist Austrian nationalists like the Fatherland Front opposed German nationalism; Austrians are ethnic Germans. ProgramT (talk) 06:44, 9 July 2026 (UTC) Reply

Weak oppose splitting articles I think while we could have separate articles on those topics (both are definitely distinct and individually notable), no WP:SIZESPLIT incentive and both have a shared foundation and history of pre-division Korean nationalism. We'd end up reduplicating a lot of info across 3 separate short articles; just seems like making this more diffuse for not much gain.

Support creating split categories; think no issue with this. grapesurgeon (talk) 08:18, 9 July 2026 (UTC) Reply

Thank you. Since this talk section was originally intended to focus on creating articles, and creating categories (Category:South Korean nationalism, Category:North Korean nationalism) doesn’t seem likely to cause much controversy, I’ll go ahead and create one. However, as for creating articles South Korean nationalism" (South Korean nationalism, North Korean nationalism)—as opposed to categories—I won’t do so until I’ve had sufficient discussion with other users. ProgramT (talk) 08:19, 10 July 2026 (UTC) Reply

I have created drafts in my sandbox to split the content from the Korean nationalism article into separate articles on "North Korean nationalism" and "South Korean nationalism":

• User:ProgramT/sandbox3 (North Korean nationalism)
• User:ProgramT/sandbox4 (South Korean nationalism)

Once the split is complete, most of the duplicated content will be removed from the "Korean nationalism" article. Could you change your opinion from oppose to support? ProgramT (talk) 08:29, 14 July 2026 (UTC) Reply

• Support per nom. Lova Falk (talk) 15:03, 18 July 2026 (UTC) Reply

  Thank you. More than 18 days later, only three users participated in the talk section, and two out of three supported the separation of the articles by a majority vote grapesurgeon seems to be 'weak oppose', so I will separate the articles. ProgramT (talk) 09:00, 21 July 2026 (UTC) Reply

• Support reason is explained above. ProgramT (talk) 09:00, 21 July 2026 (UTC) Reply