Ten Thousand Things

"Ten Thousand Things" is a Buddhist expression representing the dynamic interconnection and simultaneous unity and diversity of everything in the universe.

Kansai's Multicultural Spaces, Higashi-kujo Madang (Korean Outdoor Theater) in Kyoto

Posted June 8, 2006 by Jean Miyake Downey

The oldest spaces in Kyoto are multicultural, with Korean roots, starting with the Hata and other Korean immigrant families who founded the city when Emperor Kammu moved the capital there during the 7th century.

Much of the ancient Korean and other multicultural Silk Road connections brought by Koreans, Chinese, and Nara-era Japanese transcultural travelers have become obscured for the ordinary observer.

The trained eye of the art historian, however, easily sees the multicultural legacies of Kyoto. And, we're now living in a time when more and more ancient sources of Japan's rich heritage are being uncovered and the puzzle parts of interrelated histories in Kyoto and Japan are being pieced back together in contemporary frameworks.

Anthropologist Bruce Caron, formerly a Kyoto resident and KJ contributing editor [see KJ#27, "Heritage Management for Kyoto: History, Place, and Festivity"; KJ#45, "The Festival as a Building"] sees Kyoto's multicultural history as the history of the migration of people, not just the migration or "borrowing" of ideas, as Japanese multicultural exchange has often been framed:

Sansom (1958) is fairly generous in his description of the cultural impact of early immigrants from Korean and China. “Such people,” he noted, “entered Japan in large numbers, if we are to believe the native chronicles, which record the arrival of hundreds of households of ‘men of Ts’in’ and ‘men of Han’...” (ibid 38). He is talking about a later migration from around 400-700 CE, and he goes on to say:

“...by the sixth century they were firmly established and were without a doubt a most important, perhaps the most important, element in the composition of the Japanese people, if we exclude the mass of agricultural workers. Their contribution to the growth of civilized cultural life was indispensable..."

Resident-Korean historians in Kyoto recount the arrival of Korean clans in the Kansai area before and during the pre-Kyoto (pre-Heiankyo), Nara period (646-794). Various notable clan names have corresponding Korean names, usually from Paekche. And no clan was more notable, and more notably Korean than the Hata clan of Kyoto.

Another longtime Kyoto resident, KJ's PR guru Eric Luong, a Zen art history scholar (and a multiple artist who writes renku with his wife, Mari, at this beautiful renku blog), shared information with me about the mainland Asian roots of Zen art in Japan. He also told me about Kansai's memorializing its historical Korean roots at this webpage, "Recollections of Backje (Paekche) culture: Japanese-Korea Grassroots Exchanges at Work:"

About 1300 years ago, when the Japanese Imperial Court was ensconced in the then capital of Otsu, a flow of people from Backje, a part of the Republic of Korea at present, sojourned by sea to Japan. These visitors to Japan, which represented the cultural elite, transmitted the latest cultural and scientific advances to the Land of Omi, the ancient name of Shiga Prefecture.

Among these distinguished figures was Gwisiljipsa, a high official who channeled his considerable energy into serving Emperor Tenchi in various ways, especially training government officials. He was a great contribution to the Japan of that day.

In Shiga Prefecture, the historical legacy of the Backje people has survived in various forms. In Ono, in the town of Hino, there is a small shrine called Kishitsu Shrine named after the afore-mentioned Backje official. A gravestone with the encarved words “Gwisiljipsa” was discovered behind the main shrine. This grave marker, an octagonal jeweled pillar made of black mica granite, is majestically enshrined in a stone cave...

In 1990, the Town of Hino established sister ties with Eunsan ward. At present, there are many sister tie-ups with various self-governing regions of Korea; however, direct links with the smallest self-governing entities, the ward (myeon) with towns and villages of this country are limited to a mere three. This sister connection has resulted in the dispatch of 18 delegations from Hino, and 17 from Eunsan...

The Town of Hino International Friendship Association, the driving force behind many of these exchange activities, has helped convert the feeling toward Korea from one of “a nearby, faraway country” to “a really near country.” The association insists it wants to sustain these strong efforts to further forge these bonds in the future.

Tragically, a later group of forced wartime immigrants from Korea and their descendants did not experience the welcome that their ancient predecessors did.

Caron's website, "Community, Democracy, & Performance: The Urban Practice of Kyoto's Hidashi-Kujo Madang: is dedicated to the creative, political and emotional empowerment of the thousands of ethnic Koreans, who live in Kyoto, and are struggling to overcome decades of political, cultural, and creative oppression. The site has many great articles on their history and the role of Madang Nori (outdoor performance) in inspiring and supporting their affirmative and inclusive personal and social change.

The website has a link to the Japanese-language website of the ongoing (every November) Hidashi-Kujo Madang with recent photos of performances and wonderful masks.

Madang Nori sprung up in Korea about three decades ago. This fusion art form combines traditional features from mask dance, pansori and old-time clown performances with contemporary themes. The genre has gained widespread popularity in its brief existence, achieving both artistic and commercial success.

Caron's site is multimedia, with great videos of the first Higashi-Kujo Madang in 1993, including the first procession of the Han-Madang dance troupe heralding the madang. I found the percussion, dance movement, and banner-waving deeply moving and powerful.

Another video of the "Madang Children’s Parade" <>was similarly beautiful and powerful:

Children from the Catholic-run preschool in Higashi-kujo, Hope House (kibou no ie), show their colorful Korean costumes, and dance in a courtly style to drums.

There was also a moving interview with a Filipina NGO organizer from Tokyo on "Being Filipina in Kyoto:"

At a forum on the traffic in women at the Kyoto YWCA in 1993, a Filipina NGO organizer from Tokyo discusses the problems that the sex industry creates for all Filipinas who live in Japan. The Higashi-kujo madang's inclusion of a Filipina in the neighborhood stands as a counter example of the potential for multicultural understanding in Kyoto.

The Kyoto Korean community's embrace of this activist reminded me of how members of ethnic minority in the United States, who share a common experience of oppression, instinctively relate to others outside of their ethnicity. That's how the Asian-American identity arose, as a political identity, banding together Asians from very different cultures, with often not much in common, except the experience of anti-Asian discrimination.

I actually see this as a one good but painful outcome of the struggle with prejudice and marginalization -- one grows up knowing how the "Other" throughout the world feels and, thus, has the capacity to relate to those who are excluded from the mainstream, for whatever reason.

Another video, "History of the Madang Geki" tells the story of the transnational migration of Korean student protest theater (madang guk) with its counter-colonial position on modernization and urbanization in Korea into Japan:

The processes of urbanization were seen to include, at their core, metropolitan practices and desires that ignored and debased (or disembedded) local, small-scale social practices in favor of those imported from the U.S. and Japan. And the availability of cheap goods and commodities on the international market jeopardized the livelihoods the farmer and the artisan, and worked against organized labor. But madang plays did not (as Japanese television announced, and as Yan [1988, and personal communication] asserts) start in villages, but rather on university campuses.

The "Toitsu Madang Street Drama" poked at neo-colonial forces in Korea:

The video shows the main character dressed as Uncle Sam, bringing peace and cheap rice to Korea, with the help of capitalist businessmen from Japan. The local citizen (dressed in a yellow shirt with the word bunmin (civilian) written on it, is pulled between the glitter of Uncle Sam's promises, and the money dangled in front of him by the businessmen.

Caron ends his series of videos with commentary on the role of grassroots street performances in building authentic community and in protesting injustice. He notes that state police forces are well aware of the power of performance in protest, thus seek to domesticate (Kyoto) or eliminate them altogether (Rangoon).

He contrasts genuine and spontaneous performance fusions that bring together ethics, politics, and the arts with how the modern state spectacle, manufactured to reinforce an "us versus them" worldview, that controls and manipulates citizens from inside their own minds.

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