7th Annual Korean Studies Writing Prize Awarded
Sungmoon Lim (BA '18 Urban Studies) has been awarded the 7th annual Korea Program Prize for Writing in Korean Studies, for her paper "Urban Design in the Age of Globalization: An Analysis of the Global Reception of Seoul’s Cheonggyecheon Stream Restoration Project."
Lim’s paper is “superb," Professor Shin says. “[Her] work is original and ambitious and her thesis will make an excellent contribution to various fields and sub-fields, including urban studies, globalization, and Korean studies.”
In Lim's own words: "While the fields of urbanism and international relations are inherently intertwined--and increasingly so, as the world becomes more urbanized--for the majority of my time at Stanford, I've treated the two as separate fields of study. For my senior thesis, I wanted to pursue a research study that fused the two together. By using Seoul's Cheonggyecheon Stream Restoration Project as a case study, this thesis explores the relationship between globalization and urban design, concluding that though globalization propagates the spread of general urban design concepts, once spread across borders, those urban design concepts become localized, taking on an identity and interpretation specific to its region. These findings set the stage for further research, particularly as it relates to themes of nationalism and localism in a progressively globalizing, urbanizing world. The research and writing process for this project was incredibly rewarding, as I was able to challenge my own biases of how globalization and urban design theory functions, learning more about my birth city and its rise to its urban design capital status in the process."
Sponsored by the Korea Program and the Center for East Asian Studies, the writing prize recognizes and rewards outstanding examples of writing by Stanford students in an essay, term paper or thesis produced during the current academic year in any discipline within the area of Korean studies, broadly defined. The competition is open to both undergraduate and graduate students.
Past Recipients:
6th Annual Prize (2017)
5th Annual Prize (2016)
4th Annual Prize (2015)
3rd Annual Prize (2014)
2nd Annual Prize (2013)
1st Annual Prize (2012)