Book by Park Sungyong, Yeungnam University Professor Emeritus, Selected as "Excellent Academic Book" by the National Academy of Sciences of Korea

It was announced on July 24 that "Given Space and Reconstructed Social Space: A Historical Anthropological Study of Cheongdo Lineages," authored by Park Sungyong, Professor Emeritus at Yeungnam University (President Choi Oechul), has been selected as an Excellent Academic Book in the "2025 Excellent Academic Book Selection and Support Project" organized by the Ministry of Education and the National Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Korea. This book, published by the Yeungnam University Press and Culture Center, has been recognized for systematically compiling the results of historical anthropological research on local spaces.

"Given Space and Reconstructed Social Space," which was selected as an Excellent Book this year, analyzes the historical practices and socio-cultural spatial constructions of lineages in the Cheongdo region. The author, a cultural anthropologist from Cheongdo, based the book on over 30 years of accumulated fieldwork and records.

Cover of the book "Given Space and Reconstructed Social Space" by Sungyong Park, Professor Emeritus at Yeungnam University, selected as an Excellent Book by the National Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Korea

The book provides a detailed account of the formation of the cultural politics of "yangban-ness" within the local community, including the competition and prestige politics of yangban families who inherited the Toegye and Nammyeong schools and the Nam-in and Noron traditions, marriage alliances and friendships, changes in the Confucian landscape, and the political nature of place-naming. In particular, it explores the multilayered relationships and practical strategies of lineage society, drawing on various clan genealogies, old documents, family registers, oral histories, and rituals at Confucian academies and clan shrines, while also examining the complex changes in local spaces over time.

The book meticulously documents the patterns of lineage branches centered on the Cheongdo region, the formation of Confucian cultural landscapes, the social hierarchy and distinction of place names, and even the procedures and social meanings of traditional funerals such as Yurimjang, which have rarely been studied. Through this, it seeks to clarify the dynamism and differentiation of local social spaces that were reorganized through the modernization process after the late Joseon period, as well as the underlying practical ethics.

Professor Emeritus Park Sungyong served as a professor in the Department of Cultural Anthropology at Yeungnam University, as well as director of the university museum and dean of the College of Humanities. He continued his research as a visiting professor at institutions such as the University of London, University of Cambridge, and the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences in Paris. Through works such as "Economic Exchange and Social Relations" and "A Study on the Living Spaces and Social Organization of the People of Dokdo and Ulleungdo," he has continued research on the spatiality and material culture of Korean society.

The Excellent Academic Book Selection Project by the National Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Korea is a system that selects books of high academic value in four fields?humanities, social sciences, Korean studies, and natural sciences?every year to promote research in basic academic disciplines. The selected books are distributed to university and public libraries nationwide and are used as resources for research and education by future generations of scholars.