392 pp. March 2003
cloth, ISBN 978-0-8248-2511-9, $51.00
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Keywords: |
Asia
Korea
theater
literature |
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Voices from the Straw Mat: Toward an Ethnography of Korean Story Singing
by Chan E. Park
Hawai`i Studies on Korea
Published in association with the Center for Korean Studies, UH
“Groundbreaking. . . . This is certainly a major contribution to the literature on Korea’s traditional performing arts, but it is both exemplary and unique in its successful interweaving of p’ansori particulars with an abiding concern with the genre’s aesthetic powers and the complexities of negotiating meaning through changing times. . . . It is rare to find anyone so well qualified as both scholar and performer—with the requisite intellectual and theoretical background, command of primary and secondary sources, and ability to perform and apprehend with understanding.” —Journal of Asian Studies (May 2004)
“Delightful . . . enlightening and engaging.” —Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies (February 2004)
“[Park] rescues her book from academism through her enthusiasm and insider’s knowledge. Detailed it is, yet absorbing as well.” —Korean Quarterly (spring 2004)
From its humble "straw mat" origins to its paradoxical status as a national treasure, p'ansori has survived centuries of change and remains the primary source of Korean narrative and poetic consciousness. In this innovative work, Chan Park celebrates her subject not as a static phenomenon but a living, organic tradition adapting to an ever-shifting context. Drawing on her extensive literary and performance backgrounds, Park provides insights into the relationship between language and music, singing and speaking, and traditional and modern reception. Her "performance-centered" approach to p'ansori informs the discussion of a wide range of topics, including the amalgamation of the dramatic, the narrative, and the poetic; the invocation of traditional narrative in contemporary politics; the vocal construction of gender; and the politics of preservation.
Chan E. Park is associate professor of Korean language, literature, and performance folklore at Ohio State University.
Read the introduction (PDF).
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