Sigh. Read this. (Thanks, Nomad.)
I'm no expert on the subject, but the most compelling argument for using the Land of the Morning Calm's term "East Sea" to refer to the body of water that the Land of the Rising Sun likes to call the "Sea of Japan" is that of precedent and common convention. Otherwise, it's just a matter of preference and each country's choice to call that body of water whatever it wants. But if you want to convince international bodies to make changes, early conventions and precedents are important.
From what I understand, the "East Sea" was referred to as such long before there was even a place called "Korea" or "Japan", by what we would now call "China." Way back when China was truly the cultural, literal, and every other kind of center for East Asia, the sea was called the "East Sea" way back when China was the main referent, and remained the conventional name for that body of water across Asia until Japan's sense of pride began growing along with its international and military prominence. Tellingly, the name was officialized to the world when Japan had become an imperial power and the only force to be reckoned with in Asia. Korea, as a nation, had ceased to exist.
So I think "East Sea" is fair because it was a fairly conventional term that long pre-dated the egotistical interests of either of the two bodies involved.
The recent move to simply just go all the way and start calling it the "Sea of Korea" seems short-sighted, chauvinistic, and just plain obstinate. Instead of arguing for the term "East Sea" out of the arguments that it was both an old convention and the present term was seemed unfairly set at a time when Japan happened to be in a position to make the decision for other countries which likely would have protested at that time, now some in Korea are moving to set up an argument based out of the same jingoism that the rightist Japanese display.
It may make Korean netizens and nationalists feel good to call it the "Sea of Korea", but it's a weaker argument that smacks of exactly the same kind of selfish logic that the Japanese use to make historical claims on it being the "Sea of Japan."
If we're gonna fight about maps, the only tenable arguments to me are those that calculate the extent of precedence, naming conventions across borders, and the international circumstances that went into the official naming of that body of water.
"Sea of Korea" strikes me as being just as igg'nant as "Sea of Japan." It's almost as stupid as the false idea and historical urban myth that Korea needs to be spelled with a "C" because the Japanese government wanted Japan to come first in international forums, which would have used Roman alphabetical order.
God, I hate ignorance enabled by the wishful thinking of the present that in further enabled by a complete lack of historical evidence for one's point, while the evidence pointing to the contrary abounds.
Here's the post that neatly does away with this post-1990's, Korean American "KP" pride, very convenient "truth" that is anything but. In other words, it's a nice story – too bad it's all made up. It's bad history meets identity politics meets flies-in-the-face-of-evidence. I'll borrow a few of the easy-to-show examples from the site:
In sum? "Corea", as expected, was spelled with a "C" because that's how romance languages spell it, and still do to this day. It popped up as "C" sometimes, but was generally used with a "K" well BEFORE the Japanese bumrushed anything. And the country was also referred to as "Chosen" which is just the Japanese pronunciation of the same Chinese characters that Koreans pronounce as "Chosun."
Korean "Chosun Empire"-era passport with the "K". Hello? It doesn't get more daehan minguk (which is the era from where the idea for such the present-day term comes from, when the Chosun Dynasty was briefly-but-importantly and "Empire") than that.
And since the Japanese Imperial government continued the varying usage of "Corea" and "Chosen" – along with Korea – all through its rule, the "C" argument gets extra unfounded. When you consider that Korea was generally referred to as "Chosen" (HINT: That also begins with the letter "C") by the Japanese and in international documents, this is pretty much the stupid historical urban myth that got started when I started hearing this crap in the 1990's.
An argument that would work, according to my line of reasoning? If Korean folks wanted to just say that "Corea" or "Coreé" were alternative spellings and for some reason is aesthetically more pleasing, or because it comes ahead of Japan in the dictionary – to each, one's own. And if you want to throw in berets, baguettes, and bidets to round it out, more power to you.
But don't act like it's historical. So people with no knowledge of the history other than just present-day, jingoistic fantasies – can ya'll at least just admit that this is what it is? No one who has claimed that "the Japanese made a policy to change the spelling of Korea to a 'K' to make sure it was last" has ever produced anything other than, "No, really! My friend is researching this in a paper..." or "I think I read it somewhere" or "No, seriously, there's all this historical evidence somewhere..."
It's a historical urban myth, as far as I understand it. Can anyone produce any compelling evidence to the contrary – that there was a specific policy to spell Korea with a "K" for the purposes stated?
In the same way, how many of us who might advocate for calling it the "Sea of Korea" could actually sit down and tease out the logical bases of a real historical argument for doing so. If you have a real argument, then yes, I say by all means change it to something. If it's just "national pride," well, the Japanese can call it the "Sea of Japan," then can't they?
This debate can only get "more stupider" by actually combining the two silly arguments, sort of like the Wonder Twins' powers activating to form even more truly useless and inane things that serve no purpose:
Let's call it the "Sea of Corea" and be done with it.
