Description: "The Choson State (1392-1910) is typically portrayed as a rigid society because of its hereditary status system, slavery, and Confucian gender norms. However, The Emotions of Justice reveals a surprisingly complex picture of a judicial system that operated in a contradictory fashion by discriminating against subjects while simultaneously minimizing such discrimination. Jisoo Kim contends that the state's recognition of won, or the sense of being wronged, permitted subjects of different genders or statuses to interact in the legal realm and in doing so illuminates the intersection of law, emotions, and gender in premodern Korea"--From publisher's website.
Brief description: Jisoo Kim is Korea Foundation Associate Professor of History, International Affairs, and East Asian Languages and Literatures and director of the Institute for Korean Studies at George Washington University. She is the author of Emotions of Justice: Gender, Status, and Legal Performance in Choson Korea (University of Washington Press, 2015), winner of the James B. Palais Prize (Association for Asian Studies).
Review Quotes:
"In this original and thought-provoking study of Choson Korea's legal practices, Jisoo M. Kim offers a multilayered analysis of petitions submitted by women of both elite and non-elite status throughout the dynasty. . . . The Emotions of Justice will be a crucial text when teaching this period in Korean history and should attract a wide interest also from scholars of cognate disciplines."
--Anders Karlsson "Journal of Asian Studies"