It has been widely held that Chinese culture was the forerunner in the East Asian civilization. Yet, gone is the age of such pro-Chinese historians—heretic scholars, led by professor Kim Che Soo (Japanese language and literature), challenge the mainstream viewpoint. Professor Kim denies China’s pivotal role in shaping East Asian culture, proposing Altai culture as the origin of East Asian culture.

Altai culture refers to nomadic civilization thriving in central Asian region. It was influenced by Mesopotamian culture, and triggered the advent of Yoha culture in turn. Yoha culture, according to Professor Kim, is the origin of Korean culture. He says civilization has spread eastward, from Mesopotamia, via Altai, to Yoha. And why eastward? He explains with linguistic evidence. Altai means gold, or golden sunrise in Assurian language, an ancient language perished long time ago. As the name implies, Altai culture was largely east-oriented.

As his well-rounded, global scale research testifies, he strongly opposes regionalism, a traditional approach in the field of history. Rather than focusing on parochial details of each regional history, he proposes to overview the inter-regional interaction. His novel reinterpretation of Dangoon mythology based on his theory, is also quite plausible. His research is the mixture of science and history, undaunted hypothesis and fact-based investigation. That is why his book, “On Altai Civilization” is beyond reaffirming west-east interaction. 

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