Archive for July, 2012:
Rough Around the Edges: Christianity along the Sino-North Korean Border
Rough Around the Edges: Christianity along the Sino-North Korean Border by Jared Ward There is little debate that religion in China remains a socially and politically charged issue. Nowhere is this truer than amongst ethnic minority borderland populations in the PRC. In volatile areas such as Tibet, Xinjiang and, though less publicized, the Sino-North Korean […]
Ko Young-hee: Joseon’s Nameless, Newly Canonized Mother
A sister, lover, or just good friend? As the speculation fury over Kim Jong-un’s plus-one at the recent Moranbong Band performance suggests, it may behoove analysts and North Korea watchers to be pay closer attention to the women accompanying the Great Successor than the man himself. SinoNK’s analyst for Gender Issues, Darcie Draudt, leaves the identity […]
North Korea’s China Connection: Documenting Transnational Cadre Ties during the North Korean Revolution, 1945-1949
North Korea’s China Connection: Documenting Transnational Cadre Ties during the North Korean Revolution, 1945-1949 by Charles Kraus The history of Chinese-North Korean relations has been dominated by the largest personalities. While it is easy to understand why Kim Il Sung and Mao Zedong have loomed large over the historiography, this tendency to focus on “the […]
Editor’s Note
Summer arrives in earnest at Sino-NK with several new additions to our team of analysts, including recent contributors Darcie Draudt in Seoul, Erin Hoshibata in Hawai’i and Nick Miller in Washington, D.C. With a revitalized and global Staff, we have a strong lineup of essays planned for the summer, along with our customary level (other adjectives […]
Let Them Eat Concerts: Music, the Moranbong Band and Cultural Turns in Kim Jong Un’s Korea
Sometimes analysts fixate all of their energies on hard institutions, such as the central government, the military, or emergent non-governmental groups, as the primary drivers of society. Although government decrees, military drills and protests are important indicators, sometimes the less obvious — that which doesn’t involve rocket launches or social upheaval — tells an equal amount […]