Modern Korea
colonization, war, and split
Modern Korea1,910 CE – 2,024 CE
01
The Annexation Era
thirty-five years as a Japanese colony
1910–1945
02
Liberation, Division, War
the 38th parallel, MacArthur, Inchon, the Chinese intervention, and the unfinished war
1945–1953
03
Park Chung-hee and the Miracle on the Han
from $80 per capita to OECD membership in three decades
1953–1979
04
Two Koreas Diverge
Park's Yushin, Kim Il-sung's Juche, Gwangju, and how the peninsula split
1972–1987
05
Democratization
a torture death, the June Movement, the IMF crisis, and Kim Dae-jung's Sunshine Policy
1987–1997
06
K-Wave and Globalization
from Winter Sonata to Squid Game — and the policy machine that made it happen
2000–2024
07
The North Korean Question
the famine, the bombs, the dynasty, and why the regime keeps not collapsing
1994–2024
08
The Twenty-First Century
Samsung, the demographic crisis, the impeachments, and a martial-law moment
2010s–2024