Creating Learning: A Korean Drummer’s Lifelong Quest to be the Best

Abstract

In this article, the author interrogates how one famous Korean traditional drummer Mr. Myong-hwan Kim's lifelong learning is affected by the sociocultural and historical context as it contributes to the construction of his life. This article analyzed an oral history book that contains Mr. Kim's interview narratives since he died 20 years ago. Instead of systematic coding and theme generation, the author wrote four different notes (analysis note, research journal, transgressive data note, and additional data note) as methods of inquiry. For the research finding report, the author adopted imaginary e-mail exchanges between Mr. Kim and himself with a figuration of creating. The article illuminates how Mr. Kim's life is interwoven with the historical evolvement of modern Korea in terms of his relentless effort to be the best drummer of his time. Imaginary e-mail exchanges opened up multiple writing spaces between the researcher and the researched, past and present, fiction and nonfiction, and facts and emotional responses.

Situated knowledge and the EU sugar reform: a Caribbean life history

“…Resonating with efforts to attend to ‘in the field’ neoliberalism and the embodiment of agrofood relations, this paper explores the historical embeddedness of the European sugar regime in the life of one particular Caribbean small farmer. Charting the experiences of one person can be a uniquely insightful process, as has been well demonstrated by oral historians and other social scientists (Mintz ; Perks and Thomson ; Joong Kang ; Biehl ). The particular life history charted here offers a useful position from which to critique the European Union (EU) sugar reform.…”