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Examining Cold War Culture through High School Baseball Tournaments in South Korea

Younghan Cho 1

1한국외국어대학교 국제지역대학원 한국학과

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ABSTRACT

This article examines the characteristics of the Korean Cold War culture through the lens of the high school baseball tournaments, which emerged as popular national sporting events in the 1970s. By tracing the revival and growing popularity of high school baseball tournaments after liberation and division, this article examines how the Korean Cold War culture was shaped under the dual influence of the U.S. and Japan. The rise of baseball as a national popular pastime reflects the shifting power from Japan to the U.S. in South Korea and East Asia in the process of the construction of Cold War networks. Simultaneously, the growth of Korean baseball was driven by the active participation of Korean government, baseball officials, players, spectators and fans. High school baseball fostered a specific sense of national identity in South Korea, one that was both postcolonial and divided, and one that became a significant component of Cold War culture. Ultimately, this article argues that Cold War Korean baseball, epitomized by high school tournaments, symbolically represents the dynamism and uniqueness of Cold War culture, shaped through negotiations with the dual influences of the United States and Japan and sustained by the relatively voluntary passion and participation of the Korean people during the developmental regimes.

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* References for papers published after 2024 are currently being built.

This paper was written with support from the National Research Foundation of Korea.
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