ARTICLES
Environment, Ecology, and Interaction in Japan, Korea, and the Russian Far East: the Millennial History of a Japan Sea Oikumene
C. Melvin Aikens, Irina S. Zhushchikhovskaya, and Song Nai Rhee, 207
Encircling the Sea of Japan, or East Sea in Korean terms, is a north-temperate landscape that includes thousands of miles of deeply indented seacoast, mountains, and plains, all covered by variously mixed woodlands. The Japanese archipelago comprises its eastern edge, fronting the Pacific Ocean, while the great Amur-Ussuri-Sungari riverine plain forms its far west. We perceive the region comprised by modern Korea, Japan, and the Russian Far East as a “Japan Sea Oikumene,” and review culture-historical and environmental evidence to show that—contrary to earlier historical and archaeological impressions—the region has a long-lived ecological and technological unity as a distinctive “cultural world” that can be traced continuously from late Pleistocene into recent times.
Continue reading “Asian Perspectives, vol. 48, no. 2 (2009)”
