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| Lonely Planet's "Korea," Insight Guides' "South Korea" and Dinobibi Publishing's "South Korea: Travel for Kids" / Courtesy of VANK |
By Park Han-sol
The Voluntary Agency Network of Korea (VANK), a civic organization working to promote understanding of Korean culture and history online, has pointed out multiple errors and distortions in several popular guidebooks about Korea published overseas, Thursday.
The organization indicated a few factual errors made specifically in the latest editions of Lonely Planet's "Korea," Insight Guides' "South Korea" and Dinobibi Publishing's "South Korea: Travel for Kids" released in 2019 that are being sold worldwide.
Some notable errors published in the guidebooks included statements such as "Taekwondo is a traditional martial art of Korea that has lasted for more than 2,000 years and was learned from the Tang Dynasty," (Insight Guides) and "Bibimbap is a rice and vegetable stew" (Dinobibi Publishing).
VANK clarified that taekwondo did not originate from China's Tang Dynasty (618-907), which isn't even 2,000 years old. It also stated that bibimbap is not a stew, but rice mixed with meat or vegetables and seasoning.
Other basic factual errors are in statements such as "Seoul, the capital of South Korea, is located in Gyeonggi Province," when in reality, Seoul Metropolitan City is an autonomous city separate from the surrounding province.
"South Korea: Travel for Kids" wrongly claimed Seoul hosted the Olympic Games in 2002, which is actually when Korea and Japan co-hosted the World Cup. Korea hosted the Summer Olympic Games in 1988.
VANK stated that it has detected 20 errors in Lonely Planet's guidebook, 32 in Insight Guides' book and 24 in Dinobibi Publishing's.
Because of the publishers' public credibility, the organization expressed concerns that overseas visitors with an interest in Korea may develop distorted perceptions of the country by consulting such materials.
The organization subsequently demanded that the three publishers issue a formal apology and make appropriate revisions to the books based on thorough consultations with experts.
"If it is a guidebook about Korea, publishers should at least receive a review of the authenticity of the contents to be described in the guidebooks by a Korean or a Korea(n) expert, and should carefully check the contents and provide accurate information," the organization stated in its online petition at change.org.
VANK earlier spotted more than 30 errors made in another well-known guidebook "The Rough Guide to Korea" and launched a petition at change.org.
