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Tei Taikin on nationalism and Koreans in Japan
The wrongs of "Zainichi" victimhood and the rights of naturalization
First posted 15 February 2006
Last updated 13 June 2022
Tei Taikin Chung 1978 • Kawamura and Chung 1986 • Chung 1992 • Tei (Chung) 1995 • Tei (Chung) 1998 • Tei (Chung) 2001 • Tei (Chung) 2002 • Tei (Chung) 2003 • Tei (Chung) 2004 • Tei 2006 • Tei and Furuta 2006 • Tei 2010 • Kobayashi 2011 • Tei 2011
Tei Taikin has been a good friend for over thirty years, and I count myself as one of his critical fans. This article consists of a very general sketch of Tei's family, and an annotated list of his books and selected articles. Some works receive more commentary than others. None have been given color ratings according to the scheme I developed for the Bibliographies section of this website, long after I began this overview as part of the Korean issues in Japan feature in the Nationalism section, where Tei's works shared space with other works on or reflecting nationalism in Japan and Korea. I moved the part on Tei's works here when I decided to dedicate the Korean issues feature to Ken Kanryō comics and related books.
Tei Taikin
Tei Taikin is the strongest proponent in Japan of naturalization as a means of securing rights to fully participate in Japanese society as a Japanese. He is also a prolific critic of ethnonationalism in both Korea and Japan, and of "Zainichi" victimhood advocacy.
No other writer in Japan today has contributed more to the forging of an objective (as opposed to ideological) understanding of Korean and Japanese nationalism and their continuing consequences for, and effects on, Koreans in Japan than Tei Taikin, who used to also write as Chung Daekyun. Several of Tei's most important titles have been brought out in the paperback series of two major publishing houses.
Tei has also contributed numerous articles to newspapers, magazines, and other books. Some of his own books are compilations of articles published in periodicals, while others were originally written as books.
Tei's books -- unlike those of Kang Sang-jung, which have helped popularize the Zainichi victimhood that Tei opposes -- have not been the kind that TV talk shows like to hype into bestsellers. His views, however, are slowly but surely affecting public understanding of Korea-Japan relations when Korea was part of Japan, and the legacy of migration -- most voluntary, some forced -- from the Korean peninsula to the prefectures.
Tei has also been the leading proponent of naturalization. Defining "Zainichi" as Korean aliens who are recognized as Special Permanent Residents, he argues -- correctly, I believe -- that remaining Zainichi is to maintain a legal status tied to the past, rather than a status tied to the present and the future. Remaining Zainichi is to be a national of a real foreign country (most likely the Republic of Korea but possible one of about 50 other countries) or a fictitious country (Chōsen) -- while legally domiciled in Japan. Practically all Zainichi have been born and raised in Japan, are are linguistically, culturally, and socially most familiar with Japan, but remain politically, and are most likely politically and otherwise estranged from their countries of nationality. Naturalizing means becoming a full member of the country in which one was probably born and raised and knows as a native, where one is most comfortable and prefers to live.
Tei received a BA from St. Paul's University in Tokyo and an MA from the University of California at Los Angeles. He taught Japanese at universities in Korea from 1981-1995 while continuing his research and writing on Korea-Japan relations and ethnicity, and has been a professor at Tokyo Metropolitan University since 1995.
I first met Tei in 1975, when he called himself Chung and also Saitō -- his mother's original family name. We have kept in touch over the years and he, more than anyone, has inspired my current views of ethnicity, nationalism, and the importance of Japanese nationality as a mark of membership in Japan's sovereign, democratic, civil, raceless nation.
Tei's family background
Forthcoming
Tei's struggle with naturalization
To naturalize in Japan, or not, is a question every alien in Japan is in a position to ask after residing in Japan long enough to feel that Japan is where one belongs. Practically all aliens who have lived in Japan for several years, and have established their lives in Japan, are legally qualified to apply for permission to naturalize. And practically all aliens determined to naturalize, if willing to submit to the not especially difficult naturalization procededures, will be be approved for naturalization and become Japanese.
Procedures are generally easier for foreigners born in Japan and for foreigners with a Japanese parent. But they are typically easiest for foreigners who reside in Japan as Special Permanent Residents, referring to a legacy population of prefecturally domiciled Taiwanese and Chosenese who lost Japan's nationality on 28 April 1952 when Japan formally lost Taiwan and Chōsen, and their descendants if born, raised, and domiciled in Japanpopulation former Japanese nationals of aliens who either a population of that originated on of Japan, meaning people who were residing in the prefectural Interior of the Empire of Japan and enrolled in a Taiwan or Chōsen household register, or (2) a descendant of such a person who was born and raised in Occupied Japan to a on or after 3 September 1952 and before 27 April 1952, and (3) lost Japan's nationality on or before 2 September 1945, remained in Japan, and lost Japan's nationality on 28 April 1952 when Japan lost Taiwan and Chōsen and raised in prefectural Japan, continually domiciled in Japan' prefectures, and who (1) were born Japanese but lost Japan's nationality in 1952 when Japan lost Taiwan and Chōsen, or (2) were born aliens to daliensborn and raised in Japan to parents or who lost Japan's nationality in 1952 were descendants of such former Japanese.
Tei Taikin qualified as
approvpractically all will , is a choice every alien who has resided in Japan for several years andTei's bout with naturazlForthcoming.
Tei's mother, Saitō Ai (斎藤アイ 1909-2003), was born in Iwate prefecture, in the Naichi (Interior) jurisdiction of the Empire of Japan. When his parents married in the 1940s, she entered his father's Chōsen register, and as an effect of this status migration from a Naichi to a Chōsen register became Chosenese, as did their three children under the family lineage rules that applied to territorial registers.
The entire family, including Tei's older brother (1944-2000) and younger sister (b1950), lost their Japanese nationality the day the San Francisco Peace Treaty came into effect in 1952. When Tei's mother naturalized in 1985, she wrote in a letter to him -- "Yesterday I returned my Gaitō (Alien Registration Certificate), and was liberated" (Tei 2006, page 63).
In 1960, Tei's mother and her children had to go to the Sendai Family Court to confirm whether they wished to remain in Japan or go to ROK with Tei's father. The day they appeared for the hearing, Tei recalls, they encountered a skirmish between police and demonstrators protesting the talks then resuming between ROK and Japan. His father, he believes, was also in Sendai at the time, but he did not see him. The last time he saw his father in Japan was a few months earlier, when his father, having decided to return to Korea, called a taxi, something unheard of in their family, which he had never done, and he pressured the children to go with him. They resisted, and Tei thinks someone might have reported the commotion, because the police came to intervene in the domestic feud as the neighbors looked on from a distance. Looking back on what he counts among the more nightmarish experiences of his youth, Tei now thinks that the situation was probably the most painful for his father. But at the time, he took a little joy in seeing his father in such misery. (Tei 2006, pages 56-57)
The artifacts of legal status
Writing with the emotional detachment of a good novelist dramatizing his own life, Tei does not wax sentimental or mince his words. His descriptions of his parents and siblings, and of his relations with them and ultimately with himself, are passionately honest.
Tei's family story is very personal and unique, as all such stories are for those who experienced them. Some elements of his family story are atypical of families generally, while others are common to families in similar circumstances. One of the commonalities in his family story is the manner in which the laws of the times affected the legal status of his parents and then their children.
Tei's father, the novelist and critic Chŏng Yŏn'gyu or Tei Zenkei (鄭然圭 1899-1979 정연규), was born two years after Chosŏ became the Empire of Korea, and eleven years before the Empire of Korea joined the Empire of Japan as Chōsen. As an effect of the annexation, Tei, like other Koreans, became Chosenese subjects of Japan and as such Japanese.
was born in the Empire of Korea to a family that was considered Korean because they had a household register affiliated with a local polity within the country. Laws and regulations concerning household registration were strenghened As a child of parents in a household register affiliated with Chōsen, as Korea had been renamed when annexed by Japan in 1910, Tei was also a Chōsenjin (Chonesese, Korean) under Japanese law, hence a Japanese national. At the same time, under the status rules established by Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers in Occupied Japan, and under Japanese laws and ordinances affected by SCAP directives, he was "non-Japanese" of Japanese nationality for certain legal purposes until the nationality of Chosenese (Koreans) and Taiwanese (Formosans) could be determined by treaties between Japan and concerned states.In 1952, when Chōsen and Taiwan were formally separated from Japan's sovereign territory as a result of the effects of the San Francisco Peace Treaty, Chosenese and Taiwanese lost their Japanese nationality. Hence Tei and his family -- his father (born in Korea in 1899), his mother (born in Iwate in 1909), his older brother (born in Tokyo in 1944), and his younger sister (born in Iwate in 1950) -- became aliens of Chōsen nationality. This was a virtual rather than actual nationality, since the territorial "nation" of Chōsen had no state. Or, more precisely, the former Japanese territory of Chōsen had two states, ROK and DPRK, both of which claimed to be the sole legitimate government of "liberated Korea". In 1950, however, DPRK had invaded ROK, and in 1952 the two states were still at war. Talks between ROK and Japan in late 1951 and early 1952, to establish normal relations and resolve issues related to the status of Koreans in Japan, stalled, and though they resumed several times, the two countries did not sign a normalization treaty and status agreement until 1965. While Japan at this point recognized ROK as the sole legal government of Chōsen (in the Japanese version of the normalization treaty), the treaty did not resolve issues between Japan and DPRK, and the status agreement covered only Koreans in Japan who sought and confirmed their possession of ROK nationality.
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Chung 1978Chung, Dae-Kyun At the time he wrote this thesis, Tei was calling himself Chung, one of several romanizations of the Korean reading of the character read "Tei" in Sino-Japanese. Already experienced in community work with Koreans in Japan, he spent three years at the University of California in Los Angeles, where he conducted this very original study of people like himself in the United States. One litmus test of who you are is to plunge into another world and see who you make friends with. Do Koreans born and raised in Japan, where they are surrounded by Japanese and are like most Japanese in all but nationality, discover their "Koreanness" in Los Angeles? Do they meet Koreans from the Republic of Korea and suddenly feel at home? The answer to the second question is generally no -- most discover they have nothing in common with "real" Koreans and may not even be welcome in their communities. The answer to the first question is usually yes -- most find themselves mixing with, and socially and culturally most comfortable in the company of, and even most accepted by, Japanese. The conditions of friendship are not essentially different in Japan. Most Koreans in Japan I have met, among those who were born and raised in Japan, live pretty much in the mainstream of Japanese society, where they are not likely to meet or make friends with recent Korean migrants -- with whom, in any event, they are not likely to share anything in common except the general legal alienness that all aliens share as non-Japanese. Accepting the fact that most Koreans in Japan lack "Korean ethnicity" in any practical sense of the term -- meaning native language or naturally acquired cultural sociocultural traits -- is the first step toward liberation from the "Zainichi syndrome" (my expression) -- an obsession with "being a Korean in Japan" that causes some self-styled "Zainichi" to discrimate against themselves more than they may at times be discriminated against by some Japanese. |
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Kawamura and Chung 1986
川村湊、鄭大均 (チョン テギュン)
韓国という鏡
(戦後世代の見た隣国)
東京：東洋書院、1986年
334ページ
Kawamura Minato and Chon Tegyun [Chung Daekyun] (editors)
Kankoku to iu kagami
(Sengo sedai no mita rinkoku)
[(ROK) Korea as a mirror
(Japan's neighbor as seen by the postwar generation)]
Tokyo: Tōyō Shoin, 1986
334 pages, hardcover
The cover, spine, and colophon list Kawamura and Chung as the editors. The titles page lists Tanaka Akira, Kawamura, and Chung. The biographical profiles on the colophon list first Kawamura and Chung, then Tanaka, and finally Kawamura Ako, Kōno Eiji, and Nishioka Tsutomu.
The book begins with a roundtable discussion between Tanaka Akira, Kawamura Minato, and Chung Daekyun. Then come five artices, one each by Kawamura, Chung, Kawamura Ako, Kōno Eiji, and Nishioka Tsutomu. Chung wrote the afterword.
Chung's article is on "The national-language-ization and forbidden-language-ization of the Japanese language" in Korea.
All contributors were born after World War II except Tanaka Akira (1926-2010), a Korea specialist and translator at the Institute of Institute of Overseas Affairs [World Studies] at Takushoku University.
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Chung 1992
鄭大均 (ちょん・てぎゅん
日韓のパラレリズム
(新しい眺め合いは可能か)
東京：三交社、1992年
252ページ
Chon Tegyun (© Chung Daekyun)
Nikkan no pararerizumu
(Atarashii nagameai wa kanō ka)
[Parallelism of Japan and (ROK) Korea
(Is a new mutual view possible?)]
Tokyo: Sankōsha, 1992
252 pages, hardcover
This book was republished in a substantially revised edition in 2003 as Kankoku no nashonarizumu (韓国のナショナリズム) [Nationalism of Korea (ROK)] by Iwanami Shoten. See Tei (Chung) 2003 below for details.
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Tei (Chung) 1995
鄭大均 (てい・たいきん Chung, Daekyun)
韓国のイメ−ジ
(戦後日本人の隣国観)
東京：中央公論社、1995年
xii、239ページ (中公新書 1269)
Tei Taikin (Chung Daekyun)
Kankoku no imeeji
(Sengo Nihonjin no rinkoku kan)
[The image of Korea
(How postwar Japanese view a neighboring country)]
Tokyo: Chūō Kōron Sha, 1995
xii, 239 pages, paperback (Chūkō Shinsho 1269)
An expanded and updated edition of this book was published in 2010 (see below).
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Tei (Chung) 1998
鄭大均 (てい・たいきん Chung, Daekyun)
日本（イルボン）のイメ−ジ
(韓国人の日本観)
東京：中央公論社、1998年
vi、240ページ (中公新書 1439)
Tei Taikin (Chung Daekyun)
Nihon (Irubon) no imeeji
(Kankokujin no Nihonjin kan)
[The image of Japan (Ilbon)
(How Koreans view Japanese)]
Tokyo: Chūō Kōron Sha, 1998
vi, 240 pages, paperback (Chūkō Shinsho 1439)
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Tei (Chung) 2001
鄭大均 (てい たいきん Chung Daekyun)
在日韓国人の終焉
東京：文藝春秋
平成13年4月20日 第1刷発行
196ページ (文春新書 168)
Tei Taikin (Chung Daekyun, © Tei Taikin)
Zainichi Kankokujin no shūen
[The end of Koreans in Japan]
Tokyo: Bungei Shunjū
20 April 2001 1st printing published
196 pages, paperback (Bunshun Shinsho 168)
This is Tei's first book-length examination of the status and conditions of Koreans in Japan. As its title words "Zainichi" and "Kankokujin" signify in his usage, the book addresses mainly issues concerning aliens in Japan who are nationals of the Republic of Korea who qualify as Special Permanent Residents (SPRs).
SPRs constitute a shrinking caste, or descent group, of aliens domiciled in Japan. The progenitors of the group were the Taiwanese and Chosenese who were residing in Japan's prefecutral Interior on 2 September 1945 when Japan surrendered to the Allied Powers, ending World War II, and who remained in the prefectures. Only lineal descendants are born, raised, and remain in the prefectures qualify as members. And because for many years now, the death and naturalization rates have exceeded birth rates, the SPR caste is rapidly shrinking and will be all but extinct by the middle of the 21st century.
The terms of surrender signed on 2 September 1945 included the loss of Chōsen and Taiwan as parts of Japan. On this date, Japan provisionally lost own sovereignty, including its sovereignty over Chōsen and Taiwan. And it lost its control and jurisdiction over these territories when surrendering the northern part of Chōsen to USSR forces on , the southern part to US forces on 8 September 1945, and Taiwan to ROC forces surrendering Taiwan to ROC forces on 25 October 1945.
Sovereignty was formally lost on 28 April 1952 when terms of the San Francisco Peace Treaty came into effect. provisionally lost its sovereignty, and control anAnd because Japanese nationality is territorial, the separation of Taiwan and Chōsen from Japan meant the separation of Taiwanese and Chosenese from Japan's nationality.On Taiwanese and Chosenese lost Japan's nationality on 28 April 1952 on account of Japan's loss of Taiwan and Chōsen, and (2) their lineal descendants, whether (a) those who were born and remained in the prefectures as Japanese between 3 September 1945 and 28 April 1952 and also lost Japan's nationality, or or those who were born aliens in Japan on or after 29 April 1952.
Residentially qualified Taiwanese and Chosenese who lost Japan's nationality on 28 April 1952 acquired a special "Potsdam law" status called 126-2-6, which permitted them to reside in Japan indefinitely without acquiring a status of residence under the Immigration [Exit-enter-country] Control Law. Those born aliens during later years received various statuses created for their circumstances as descendants of 126-2-6 aliens.
In 1991, all statuses that stemmed from the loss of Japan's nationality in 1952 were consolidated under the present Special Permanent Resident status. SPR, like 126-2-6 and the Agreement Permanent Residence status that began in 1966 for qualified Chosenese who migrated to ROK nationality, is not part of the Immigration [Exit-entry-country] Control Law, which defines both visa and non-visa statuses for aliens permitted to reside in Japan, but is directly linked with postwar settlements. The formal name of the SPR law is "Special law concerning, inter alia, immigration [exit-enter-country] control of persons who based on the Treaty of Peace with Japan separated from the nationality of Japan".
However, (1) Taiwanese and Chosenese residing in Japan's prefectures, who had been residing there from on or before 2 September 1952 when Japan surrendered, and (2) descendants born in the prefectures on or after 29 September 1945, if they remained in the prefectures , lost Japan's nationality on 28 April 1952. These nationality losers who qualified as members of the , and they became aliens with a special status accorded them under a so-called "Potsdam law". "Potsdam" alludes to 1945 Potsdam Declaration, which incorporated the terms of 1943 Cairo Declaration, which stated that "Formosa and the Pescadores" (Taiwan) would be "restored to the Republic of China", and "Korea" (Chōsen) would "in due course . . . become free and independent." Potsdam laws implemented actions that complied with enforcement of the terms of surrender. One such action was Civil Affairs A No. 438 notification on 19 April 1952, which stated that, Taiwan and Chōsen would be separated from Japan pursuant to the terms of the Peace Treaty, which would go into effect 9 days later, Taiwanese and Chosenese would be separated from Japan's nationality. A Potsdam law then defined a special status for nationality losers who had been residing in Japan since the end of the war or were born in Japan after the war born to suchto
. would eventually be restablished as a sovereign state.and "Korea" (Chōsen would be on 28 April 1952 when Japan lost Taiwan and Chōsen under the terms of the San Francisco Peace Treaty. The treaty reflected the terms of surrender it accepted on 2 September 1945, which in turn reflected stipulations in the 1943 Cairo Declaration and the 1945 Yalta Agreement. The SPR status, created in agreement that concomitant pursuant to the terms of the formally abandoned . The status is not defined by the nationality of the alien but by whether the alien had become an alien by losing was ha (1) legally residing in Japan's prefectures on 2 September 1945 as a national of Japan and remained in the prefectures, (2) was born tolost Japan's nationality on 2 28 April 1952, or (4) was born in the prefectures Japanwas once Japanese The caste originated on 2 September 1945 are aliens defined by their the historical loss of Japan's nationality represent about 50 nationalities. Most are nationals of Kankoku. Some are deemed nationals of Chōsen, now a legal fiction, the ghost of Japan's former territory of Chōsen, which is still an entity in Japanese law. A few are nationals of the Republic of China, or the People's Republic of China, and others are spread across the rest of the nationality spectrum.SPRs status, however, is not defined by Note that while most SPRs are Koreans in Japan, most Koreans in Japan not SPRs.
SPRs are aliens whose status of residence in Japan derives from membership in a caste whose loss of Japan's nationality concomitant with Japan's loss of Taiwan and Chōsen under the terms of the San Francisco Peace Treaty, effective from 28 April 1945. , reflectinunder the of general surrender agreed to on 2 September 1945, which were reflected in the San Francisco Peace Treaty, signed on 9 September 1951 and effective from 28 April 1952. from post World War II settlements territorial settlements that caused the progenitors of the SPR population to lose Japan's nationality defined their loss of Japan's nationality orby membership in a population that originated in Occupied Japan on 2 September 1945, from the Taiwanese and Chosenese who were then residing in the prefectures and remained, and from their prefecture-born descendants who remained. SPRs constitute a caste because dmembership is a matter of lineagedefined by 2 qualities -- (2) It is, in the prefectures.prefecturalInterior. the form of residents (1) separation from Japan's nationality through effects of the San Francisco Peace Treaty on 28 April 1952, and (2) continuous residence in Japan's prefectures . SPRs are either people who themselves lost Japan's nationality on this date, or who were born in Japan after this date as the lineal descendant of a nationality loser. Intheir birth in Japan on or after 29 April 1952 as a lineal descendant of someone who lost Japan's nationality on 28 April 1952this date -- provided that they were residing in Japan's prefectures on or before 2 September 1945 and have remained continusouly domiciled in Japan, or have continuousy resided in Japan since their birth in Japan on or after 31945Japan's prefectures. a nationality loser. the day Japan surrendered to the Allied Powers, ending World War II, and remained in Occupied Japan, and their descendants born in Japan's prefectures on or after 29 September 1945, and who lost Japan's nationality from the effects of the San Francisco Peace Treaty on 28 April 1952, and (2) descendants of such nationality losers who were born in Japan on or after 29 April 1952 and remained continuously domiciled in Japan (3), and (4) became nationals of the Republic of Korea when it became possible to do so their descendants born and continuously domiciled in Japan on or after 29 April 1952, and (4) are registered in Japan as aliens of Republic of Korean nationality. The maintenance of Korean nationality into second, third, and later generations is partly an anomaly of both Japan's and ROK's nationality laws. But it also reflects an attitude toward nationality that doesn't make sense in light of the fact that most Koreans in Japan are so totally integrated into Japan's mainstream that it makes no point not to be Japanese.The title reflects Francis Fukuyama's "The End of History and the Last Man" (1992). The number of Koreans in Japan who are categorically "Zainichi Kankokujin" -- by virtue of their treaty-accorded "special permanent residence" status -- is rapidly shrinking through death and naturalization, and the fact that most Koreans marry Japanese and their children are able to acquire Japanese nationality at time of birth. So it is only a matter of time before there will be no significant population of such what I call "legacy Koreans" in Japan.
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Tei (Chung) 2002
鄭大均 (てい たいきん Chung Daekyun)
韓国ナショナリズムの不幸
(なぜ抑制が働かないのか)
東京：小学館、2002年
221ページ (小学館文庫 476)
Tei Taikin (Tei Taikin, Chung Daekyun, © Chung Daekyun)
Kankoku nashonarizumu no fukō
(Naze yokusei ga hatarakanai no ka)
[The misfortunes of Korean nationalism]
(Why suppression doesn't work)]
Tokyo: Shōgakukan, 2002
221 pages, paperback (Shōgakukan Bunko 476)
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Tei (Chung) 2003
鄭大均 (てい たいきん Chung Daekyun)
韓国のナショナリズム
東京：岩波書店、2003年
vi、295ページ (岩波現代文庫 学術 109)
Tei Taikin (Tei Taikin, Chung Daekyun, © Taikin Tei)
Kankoku no nashonarizumu
[Nationalism of Korea (ROK)]
Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 2003
vi, 295 pages, paperback (Shōgakukan Bunko Gakujutsu 109)
This book is a substantially revised edition of Nikkan no pararerizumu (日韓のパラレリズム) [Parallelism of Japan and Korea (ROK)], published in 1992 by Sankōsha. See Chung 1992 for details.
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Tei (Chung) 2004
鄭大均 (てい たいきん Chung Daekyun)
在日・強制連行の神話
東京：文藝春秋
平成16年6月20日 第1刷発行
201ページ (文春新書 384)
Tei Taikin (Chung Daekyun, © Tei Taikin)
Zainichi: Kyōsei renkō no shinwa
[The myth of Zainichi as forcibly brought]
Tokyo: Bungei Shunjū
20 June 2004
201 pages, paperback (Bunshun Shinsho 384)
Over the past two or three decades, a number of researchers have debunked the myth -- commonly reported as fact in mass media and books in Japanese and English -- that Koreans in Japan are the descendants of colonial subjects forcefully brought to Japan to work. Tei, however, has written -- if not the last word on the subject -- the most important overview to date.
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Tei 2006
鄭大均 (てい・たいきん)
在日の耐えられない軽さ
東京：中央公論新社
2006年8月25日発行
vii、194ページ (中公新書 1861)
Tei Taikin (© Taikin TEI)
Zainichi no taerarenai karusa
[The unbearable lightness of being (Korean) in Japan]
Tokyo: Chūō Kōron Shinsha
25 August 2006 published
vii, 194 pages, paperback (Chūkō Shinsho 1861)
This is a very moving book, in which Tei (born in 1948 during the Allied Occupation of Japan) shares many personal and frank thoughts about his father (born in Korea in 1899), his mother (born in Iwate prefecture in 1909), and his older brother (born in Tokyo in 1944) and younger sister (born in Iwate in 1950). He also revels a great deal about himself as he grew up and forged his own way in life, and as his experiences changed his perceptions of the world and who he was and wanted to be.
In the penultimate chapter Tei talks very candidly about his sister's law suit against the Tokyo Metropolitan Government (see review of Chong Hyang Gyun 2006). For the record, he was opposed to her suit. His arguments are at once powerful and, in view of how he phrases his criticism of his own sister, very poignant.
For a review of Chong Hyang Gyun's court case and book, see Chong v Tokyo, 2005 under "Aliens and the Constitution" in the "Elements of citizenship" section.
In the final chapter Tei narrates his own journey back to Japanese nationality through naturalization. In an earlier chapter he also talks about his mother's naturalization in 1985. When she married his father, she moved from her family register in Iwate prefecture to his register in Korea, so she too lost her Japanese nationality as a result of treaty settlements after World War II.
Tei's title is inspired by Sonzai no taerarenai karusa -- the Japanese title of Milan Kundera's The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1985). The Czech title is Nesnesitelna lehkost byti (1982, 1984), but the novel could not be published in Czechoslovakia, and apparently Kundera has not allowed it to be published in the Czech Republic.
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Tei and Furuta 2006
鄭大均 (てい たいきん)、古田博司 (ふるた ひろし) (編)
韓国・北朝鮮の嘘を見破る
(近現代史の争点30)
東京：文藝春秋、2006年
342ページ (文春新書 520)
Tei Taikin and Furuta Hiroshi, editors (© TEI Taikin, FURUTA Hiroshi)
Kankoku・Kita Chōsen no uso o miyaburu
(Kin-gendai shi no sōten 30)
[Seeing through the lies of Korea and North Korea
(30 contentious points of recent- and present-era history)]
Tokyo: Bungei Shunjū, 2006
342 pages, paperback (Bunshun Shinsho 520)
This book contains a general roundtable discussion between three commentators, and thirty shorter standalone articles about specific issues that reflect the shared view of the contributors that both the Republic of Korea (ROK, Korea) and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK, North Korea) are engaged in spreading falsehoods about the past, especially regarding Japan and its treatment of Korea and Koreans. All the articles are titled according the formula "If you're told 'Falsehood'" (「嘘」と言われたら "Uso" to iwaretara).
Tei wrote the foreword and an article entitled "If you're told "Koreans in Japan are decesdants of '[people] forcibly brought [to Japan]'" (「在日コレアンは『強制連行』の子孫だ "Zainichi Korean wa 'kyōsei renkō' no shison da' to iwaretara). Furuta wrote the postscript and participated in the roundtable discussion on the "Mental structure of Korean and North Korean 'self-absolutism'".
All the favorite claims by historians and others who fall in step with the victimhood school that drives Korean ethnonationalism are addressed here. Here is a sample of other claims every bit as contentious as the "forcibly brought" claim countered by Tei Taikin.
Tanaka Akira
If you're told "Korea's nationalism is healthy"
Harada Tamaki
If you're told "The Japan-Korea union [annexation] is invalid [no effective]"
Nagashima Hiroki
If you're told "[Koreans] were deprived [robbed] of [their] ethnic [national] names by the create-family-name change-personal-name [measures]"
Araki Nobuko
If you're told "The Empire of Japan obliterated [expunged, erradicated] the Korean language"
Nishioka Tsutomu
If you're told "'Army attached comfort women" were taken [abducted] by the Japanese Army"
Tamaki Motoi
If you're told "Kim Il Sung and Rhee Syngman toppled the Empire of Japan with [their] resistance movements"
Asakawa Akihiro
If you're told "Japan has responsibility for the tragedy of the return [repatriation] movement to North Korea"
Tei Taikin
If you're told "Koreans in Japan are decesdants of '[people] forcibly brought [to Japan]'"
Harada Tamaki
If you're told "Keijō is a discriminatory word"
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Yosha Bunko scan |
Tei 2010
鄭大均 (てい・たいきん
韓国のイメ−ジ
(戦後日本人の隣国観)
増補版
東京：中央公論新社
1995年10月25日初版発行
2010年9月25日増補版発行
xiii, 266ページ (中公新書 1269)
Tei Taikin (© Taikin TEI)
Kankoku no imeeji
(Sengo Nihonjin no rinkoku kan)
Zōhoban
[The image of Korea (ROK)
(How postwar Japanese view a neighboring country)]
[(Revised and) enlarged edition]
Tokyo: Chūō Kōron Shinsha
25 October 1995, 1st edition published
25 September 2010, enlarged edition published
xiii, 266 pages, paperback (Chūkō Shinsho 1269)
Kobayashi 2011
Tei Taikin is featured with five other "new Japanese" who became Japanese through naturalization, in the following collection of in-depth discussions with Kobayashi Yoshinori, the creator of the "gomanism" manga series.
小林よしのり
新日本人に訊け！
帰化 < Naturalized in Japan >
ゴーマニズム対論集
東京：飛鳥新社、2011年5月16日
333ページ
Kobayashi Yoshinori
Shin Nihonjin ni kike!
[Listen to new Japanese!]
Kika [Natualization] < Naturalized in Japan >
Goomanizumu taironshō
[Gomanism discussion (argument) collection]
Tokyo: Asuka Shinsha, 16 May 2011
333 pages, paper cover
Kobayashi's purpose, in addition to drawing out why the discussaants wanted to be Japanese, is to disseminate their opinions about all manner of issues involving Japan, including the issue of whether nationality should be a requisite for political participation. See Kobayashi 2011 in the Bibliographies section for details.
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Yosha Bunko scan |
Tei 2011
Forthcoming.