Your favorite Korean source?

By David Tizzard

Despite recently covering the topic of vegetarianism when much of the Peninsula celebrated Buddha's Birthday, I remain very much an omnivore: Whether a piece of meat, fish, a radish or a root, it and the accompanying sauce will be devoured with little hesitation. My appetite for food and drink is veracious. The same, incidentally, could also be said of my reading habits.

While early travelers to these shores such as William Broughton and Hendrick Hamel produced travel-logs that would remain one of the few sources available to people both inside and outside the country for some time, these days the situation is vastly different. There is almost too much to read.

However, perhaps the President's recent decision to limit the working week to 52 hours might allow people more opportunity to lose themselves in text and word. And it needn't always be as weighty a tome as Theodore de Bary's 1995 'Sources of Korean Tradition'.

South Korea in 2018 is home to not only men's trousers of questionable length, weather patterns named after Thai rain gods, and airlines struggling to feed their passengers. It also houses an excellent commenteriat on the country and its idiosyncrasies.

And thus presented here is a small collection of sources on Korean politics that I feel are worthy of merit. They are presented in no particular order, nor do they necessarily present views that I espouse or subscribe to.

However, when combined they do provide a veritable taste sensation for those looking for something a bit spicier in their sauce, and constitute much of my weekly diet.

One: sthelepress.com. The first is a blog run by North Korean expert and professor of international studies at Dongseo University, B.R. Myers. It is not updated with any great frequency but each post that does appear will take a reader some time to digest if it is to be properly understood.

Myers asks a lot of his readers and is not in the habit of spoon-feeding those who might require some catching up. Whilst his successful novels The Cleanest Race and North Korea's Juche Myth deal largely with events in the North, the work here generally centers on domestic politics and what he perceives as the undercurrents of the social scene. Myers' links and use of first-hand Korean sources, as well as his pointed but thought-provoking views, make each blog post not only worthy of reading but also of discussing.

Two: The Blue House Chronicles. A recently-launched newsletter by the Korea Expose, it features the work of science journalist Mark Zastrow as he examines the goings-on in and around Cheongwadae.

While the early editions predominantly featured links back to its own sister publications, more recent versions have provided pathways to the original Korean commentaries which are digested and disseminated in bite-size form. Pleasingly, the publication is not adverse to the use of humor, as demonstrated by its rather colourful translation of the Liberty Korea Party's banner of apology in front of which its members knelt following their trouncing in the local elections.

Three: Peter Ward ― Twitter. An individual's twitter feed might not seem like the most highbrow of sources, but Peter Ward provides invaluable information online that few others either can or do. The Russian scholar Professor Andrei Lankov describes Peter as a "rising star" and their coordination together on a whole host of matters (including Peter typing most of the manuscript for Lankov's 2015 book The Real North Korea) can only be a positive thing for the field. Peter's feed provides daily explanations on the contents of the Rodong Sinmun, North Korea's leading newspaper.

In doing so, he drives straight at the material without having to go through other channels or mediums that might cherry-pick or omit certain sections. Instead, here, the headlines are covered as they appear, as are the rather more mundane and trivial elements on the inner pages.

Four: NK News Podcast. A source of audible content is always going to be welcome in this generation as people now consume information while they walk, work, and wait in-line at the store for four cans of larger and a packet of crisps, and one of the newest to emerge on the subject is a weekly podcast hosted by Jacco Zwetsloot.

While that name might sound a handful, the content is generally some of the more easily digested on what can often be difficult and esoteric topics. Recent guests have included the witty and effervescent Aiden Foster-Carter as well as the high level North Korean diplomat defector and author of the book "Cypher of the Third-Floor Secretariat", Thae Yong-ho.

Five: Andrew Salmon, Asia Times. Andrew Salmon is probably one of the more distinguished writers on the Korean Peninsula and wider Northeast Asian region that resides here in Seoul. His books on the Korean War and resulting British participation helped bring to life the valiant and tragic aspects of the conflict previously described as forgotten.

His contemporary writing however leaves no stones unturned and, in the Asia Times, he is seemingly given free rein to explore a variety of issues. Most notably he generally adheres to a journalistic tradition of providing three contrasting voices for each story and thus offers a comprehensive view of the topic at hand, including that of minority positions often lambasted or ignored elsewhere. You will also find his work appearing rather more sporadically here in the Korea Times.

The Korea Times does have a good selection of writers, some of whom I would certainly suggest reading when their work appears. No less the recent contributions of Yonsei professor Peter Paik which have intermarried the worlds of philosophy and literature to some of the many pertinent questions faced by citizens here today.

So while people around you may be eating less as the summer takes hold and thoughts of bikinis and beach bodies occupy the mind, do not forget that sauces can be replaced by sources. Use the above list to gain some intellectual weight and share your own recommendations when possible.

David Tizzard (datizzard@swu.ac.kr) is an assistant professor at Seoul Women's University and host of TBS eFM's cultural radio show "A Little of a Lot." The show can be heard every Sunday from 4 p.m.-6 p.m. on 101.3 FM or downloaded via online platforms such as iTunes and Podbang.?