A Study on the Students of Left Department of ‘The Royal Academy (Yukyoung-gongwon)' in Late Chosen Dynasty

Abstract—The Royal Academy (育英公院, Yukyounggongwon) is a modern educational institution founded by the Chosen government in 1886. Since the opening the port, political situations and economic situations have changed rapidly, and the establishment of diplomatic relations with foreign governments has continued to rise. Thus, new knowledge, including foreign language skills, has begun to demand high ranking officials. To address this need, the Chosen government attempted to train young upstart bureaucrats to strengthen education on new culture through a foreign language, and to respond to the needs of the nation. Therefore, this study aims to focus on the students' career, especially among those who studied at The Royal Academy. The students of Left Department was a rookie who passed the civil service examinations at the time of the The Royal Academy. Therefore, it is necessary for the young bureaucrats to study the new educational system to prove the effectiveness of the new educational system that the Chosen Dynasty established and tried to achieve. As a result, the students of Left Department was selected as the elite in the traditional educational system of Chosen Dynasty. Through studying at The Royal Academy, they learned new knowledges, including foreign languages, with traditional Confucian knowledge. They also played an important role in the Chosen dynasty as a close aide to King Gojong. The learning of the students of Left Department was a refresher to young and talented bureaucrats. This was evidence of the Chosen Government's efforts to respond to changes in the times.

Index Terms—Modern education in Chosen Dynasty, the royal academy in Chosen Dynasty, elite education in the Late Chosen Dynasty

Jinkyoung Min, Hyunjung Woo, Youngmi Park and Kwangman Choi are with Chungnam National University, Daejeon, Korean, Republic of Korea (e-mail: ian0735@naver.com, mobflore@cnu.ac.kr, youngmi@cnu.ac.kr, kmchoi@cnu.ac.kr).

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Cite: Jinkyoung Min, Hyunjung Woo, Youngmi Park, and Kwangman Choi, "A Study on the Students of Left Department of ‘The Royal Academy (Yukyoung-gongwon)' in Late Chosen Dynasty," International Journal of Culture and History vol. 3, no. 4, pp. 198-202, 2017.