ScholarWorks@숙명여자대학교

초록

This thesis extensively analyzed how geographical knowledge was produced and what it meant, centering on ‘The Part of Geography’ of Household Encyclopedia made in Fujian Province. Chinese traditionally imagined that China is at center of the whole earth around which barbarians lived. And this concept was kept until before the modern time. However, there has been not a little change in this concept. Originally, in their ancient concept of geography, the border dividing China and the land of barbarians was not clear. But in their concept since Song Dynasty gradually popped up the awareness of what belong to China and what doesn’t. Rulers during Ming Dynasty pursuing after centeralized government tried to evenly rule the whole territory of China by putting ‘unification’ up the front, in which process the border between China and what’s not got clearer. Various books of geography published in Ming Dynasty aimed to propagate and declare its governing ideology rather than convey practical knowledge of geography. Due to this, the geographic publications often expressed China through ‘imaginative geography.’ Household Encyclopedia made in Fujian Province is a commercial publication representing the later Ming Dynasty, in whose second part is placed ‘The Part of Geography,’ whose pictures and maps also show imaginative geography apart from the reality of Ming Dynasty. Its main text is largely divided into two parts, one of which introduces roads connecting major areas and the other of which introduces nationwide areas. The book shows that the whole territory of China was under the empire’s even ruling by showing government-made horse station routes, objective figures & statistics of its whole territory. At the same time, however, it implies rupture in the geography of unification. Unlike other geographic books published by the then government, it divides the empire-declared unified space of China by inserting items on things symbolizing individual places. This self-contradicting phenomenon may have resulted from the essential characteristics of commercial publications that had to satisfy all the elements; an imaginary China people aspired to have, geography of unification presented by the then government and reading for fun.

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