1. Reexamining Jeju Culture through the Lens of Serendipity

The twenty-first century is the age of culture.[1] As diverse cultures encounter one another, new cultures pour forth without restraint. Huntington's dictum that ‘culture matters’ already resonates deep within our lives, and our lives enjoy, produce, and consume culture within the frame called culture. Culture has various characteristics. In particular, although culture includes what is common to humanity, it reflects one's own identity even before that. Only when one's own identity is expressed can a culture become a genuine, refined culture rather than a mere imitation. In this respect, Jeju Island possesses, unlike other regions, a culture that is at once the same as and different from Korea, and different from and yet the same as it.

Looking back on the past history of Jeju Island, it was a history of hardship and trial. At one time it was ruled by the Yuan dynasty, during the Joseon dynasty it became a place of exile for the gravest offenders, and under Japanese colonial rule it became a Japanese military base. Such circumstances drove Jeju's native inhabitants to choose Japan—a land of contempt—over the mainland. In other words, Jeju Island became a place abandoned by both the self and others.

However, this Jeju Island has changed. The island's insularity, its natural and geographical conditions, the geopolitical position of the Korean Peninsula, and, added to these, the demands of the contemporary age have converged to bring it an attention unseen in its past history. Economic affluence and leisure in life brought Jeju Island to mind in connection with the environment and well-being culture; the rise of the information age liberated the island—isolated by the geographic space of the sea—into a Jeju that communicates with the world; and globalization drew people of diverse nations to Jeju Island. Moreover, the development of science and technology, including transportation and communication, transformed a barren place into a pleasant and livable island. For those exhausted by fierce competition and a harsh daily life, Jeju Island emerged as a space of rest amid isolated nature. Accordingly, Jeju Island and its culture, which evenly meet the demands of the age, are increasingly coming to the fore.

Meanwhile, various studies have been conducted to examine the cultural value of Jeju Island. However, just as social systems tend toward uniformity as they develop, the ways of reading society are also apt to proceed on the basis of uniformity or established theory. Moreover, if one only follows what already exists, one is prone to the error that arises from the ‘path dependency’ that we are all liable to commit. This paper therefore sought to view Jeju culture in a way different from existing research methods. What is meant by ‘new’ here is not that the theories used to approach Jeju culture are new, but that the approach itself is new. These theories have already been introduced and studied in other research. Nevertheless, it is expected that the composite application of theories grounded in philosophy, literature, and sociology will convey a new perspective and viewpoint, unlike existing research.

To this end, first, an approach through ‘existence and structure’ was attempted, as a starting point for analyzing existing Jeju culture and creating a creative culture. We habitually cling to phenomena alone, often forgetting the essence. Here, the importance of essence was emphasized. An existential approach can lay the groundwork for a subjective and creative culture centered on I, Here, and Now. This is not a matter of viewing things from another standpoint but of thinking from the very condition in which one is situated as it is. One must view oneself objectively, analyze scientifically, and think rationally. From the standpoint of existence, the self that one believes one knows best is to be known accurately through the work of reflection. For, ultimately, every culture begins with reflection on the self. And within this, structural problems must be considered as one encounters other cultures, other people, and other eras. Of course, even from the existential standpoint, structural problems are not without influence, since it is impossible for existence to exist purely without any influence whatsoever. Moreover, if we consider the difference between ‘I’ and ‘we,’ we come to regard ‘I’ and ‘we’ as a ‘structural relation.’ This is because ‘relation,’ which is unimportant in ‘I,’ becomes, in ‘we,’ the link that connects me and you.

On the basis of the analysis through existence and structure, an attempt was made to expand culture using empathy and analogical thinking. Once reflection on one's own culture is complete, diverse reinterpretation and expansion of that culture are needed, and it was judged that empathy and analogical thinking could serve usefully as one of the methods for this. In other words, analogical thinking and empathy were seen as necessary for the expansion of one's own culture as found through existence and structure. Analogical thinking resembles the correlative thinking emphasized in Chinese philosophy. It is also related to what is called associative thinking. Logically, it is close to inductive reasoning and thus resembles the Eastern mode of thought. Analogical thinking is used extensively in literary works, poetry in particular. The allegory (寓言) most frequently used in the ancient Chinese philosophical text *Zhuangzi* likewise lies along the same line as this mode of thinking. What matters is that this mode of thinking, together with the empathy that developed in the East, can be used in tandem for the expansion of culture. This, for example, is also important for the production of ‘storytelling,’ a term frequently invoked in the contemporary culture industry, because analogical thinking and empathy make it easy to create storytelling on the basis of the similar feelings people share, and to share it together. Although various methods are possible for the expansion of culture, this paper focused on empathy and analogical thinking with respect to Jeju's history and geography, and sought to apply storytelling to expand Jeju culture.

Finally, the creation of Jeju culture through serendipity was examined. Naturally, applying the above methods entails a degree of overreach: the overreach of approaching the analysis, expansion, and creation of Jeju culture through separate theories, and the overreach of applying these to a specific regional culture. Nevertheless, as mentioned earlier, this attempt is made with the significance of seeking new possibilities.

1) Analysis of Jeju Culture through Existence and Structure

Contemporary culture is deeply related to the concept of existence. In particular, that contemporary people pursue existence is evident in psychopathology. In psychopathology, the way to grasp the word that characterizes a person's mental state is generally found not in the word that person likes most, but in the word to which that person shows the most negative reaction. Such a negatively preferred object is termed ‘trauma.’ In the same context, the word that characterizes an age can likewise be found not in the word that age prefers most, but in the word most repressed, most negated, in that age. If we consider postmodern philosophy, which began with ‘anti-existentialism,’ then today's word can be said to be ‘existence.’ Today, the concept of ‘existence’ plays a role like ‘trauma’ in psychopathology—something that, however much one wishes to forget it, continues to linger in memory, and from whose influence one can never escape.[2]

In this respect, Jeju culture has a characteristic that can offer contemporary people, who seek I, Here, and Now, an answer to structural existence. The countless hardships that Jeju culture passed through in the course of its formation contain something that offers an answer to those today who wish to break through their own hardships. The value of Jeju culture, which sought success amid difficult hardships, can be revealed in that it can offer a solution to the problem of existence sought in contemporary culture.[3] The concept of existence—a non-substantialist problem-solving framework that resolves problems from the situational standpoint of I, Here, and Now, without any substantialist presupposition whatsoever—played a great role in Europe, which had only the two problem-frames of liberalism and dialectical materialism, in resolving the new problems that arose from the crisis Europe faced at the time.[4]

If practicality is approached through the concept of existence as I, Here, and Now, practicality comes to have highly diverse interpretations. In the twenty-first century, practicality and the concept of existence are concepts that can coexist, but when the twentieth-century concept of existence first emerged, existence began as a concept opposed to positivism and pragmatism. The anti-practicality of the concept of existence discovered in the twentieth century became the motive force (動因) behind the rise and fall of existentialism. In an age dominated by the economic view of the human being as a self-interested creature, the anti-self-interested, anti-practical nature of existence made existentialism the darling of the age. But now that existentialism has receded, in retrospect, the very anti-practicality that drew attention to existentialism became the very reason for its disappearance. The difference between the twentieth-century concept of existence and the twenty-first-century concept of existence, as seen through I, Here, and Now, is that, unlike the twentieth century, the twenty-first century requires a concept of existence that embraces practicality as well.[5]

On the basis of existence centered on I, Here, and Now, we ought to examine Jeju culture. For example, Encyclopaedia Britannica, once famous in the world market as a byword for dictionaries, suffered difficulties owing to the rise of internet dictionaries.[6] Even this Britannica was ultimately able to find a new breakthrough after examining itself centered on I, Here, and Now. Britannica gave up its paper dictionary business and sought out and cultivated its own strengths. It found the answer to its problem precisely in existence centered on I, Here, and Now, and in the structure that expanded from it. The analysis of ‘I’ through existence and structure ultimately gave Britannica a clear presentation of its own identity and role. In other words, the fact was that Britannica was not a company that sold thick paper dictionaries, but a ‘company that sells the premium-grade knowledge that people demand.’ And through this, firm trust has been built up among a great many people. Furthermore, ‘here’ and ‘now,’ as a digital rather than analog society, require Britannica's authoritative knowledge and information. Britannica thus entered and developed within the online education market, the point where these converge.

The case of Jeju Island's culture is the same. First, self-analysis is needed from the existential and structural aspects centered on I, Here, and Now. In this respect, the existential and structural characteristics of Jeju Island that we may consider are as follows.

First, Jeju Island is an island. Islands are isolated. The Galápagos Islands, which influenced Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, are an archipelago of nineteen islands located 1,000 km from the American continent. Because of their isolation, diverse organisms could be preserved as they were. However, once the Panama Canal opened, the islands drew military attention and were used as a key strategic point during the Second World War. Jeju Island was abandoned—used as a place of exile in ancient times, and as a place to leave in the modern era. In the contemporary era, it has been transformed into the paradise people seek. The characteristic of paradise is severance. Severance is an active and voluntary act, while isolation is a passive one. The difference between a prison and a monastery is likewise that the former is isolation, the latter severance. Because severance is active, it carries a grateful heart and pursues happiness. Isolation carries a complaining attitude and regards itself as unhappy. What was once Jeju Island's isolation as an island, like the Galápagos Islands, has now become an advantage, attracting the interest of people seeking voluntary severance and wishing to enjoy the results preserved through isolation. This is the greatest existential and structural characteristic Jeju Island possesses.

Second, there are Jeju Island's natural conditions, which are interpreted differently, as either blessing or calamity, depending on circumstance. Measuring 73 km east to west and 31 km north to south, Jeju Island consists of the 1,950-meter Mt. Hallasan at its center, 368 oreum (parasitic volcanic cones), and some 160 lava caves. It is rare to find so many caves and oreum on so small an island. The climate is warm, with an annual average temperature of 14℃, and because of Mt. Hallasan, temperatures vary with altitude. Amid natural conditions different from the mainland, Jeju Island created its own exotic atmosphere and culture. Jeju Island was mostly barren land composed of dark brown volcanic ash soil, but through the efforts of Jeju's native inhabitants and the passage of generations, it underwent a transformation as dramatic as mulberry fields becoming a blue sea (桑田碧海). And within this, its natural conditions turned from calamity into blessing.

Third, Jeju Island is directly affected by the geopolitical position of the Korean Peninsula. Located at Korea's southernmost point, Jeju Island lies at the center of Korea, China, and Japan, serving as a strategic hub connecting Russia and China, and Japan and Southeast Asia. For example, in the closing days of Japanese colonial rule, Jeju Island's importance as a military strategic point in the Far East was so great that Japan stationed about 70,000 troops—half of the Japanese forces deployed on the Korean Peninsula—on Jeju Island, making it a final bastion for defending the Japanese homeland.

Jeju culture has changed in diverse ways owing to these three existential and structural characteristics above. If the first and second emphasize the existential aspect, the third emphasizes the structural aspect. Each possesses a very distinct character. Through these, Jeju Island has been able to exist as Korea's smallest province (道) and yet its largest island (島), while maintaining its own distinctive character.

At times these three motive forces became the foundation for the development of Jeju culture, but at other times they cast a dark shadow over Jeju Island and Jeju culture. Until not long ago, it is said, many households in Jeju Island had Japanese-made elephant-brand rice cookers far more often than households on the mainland. The reason given is that many people on Jeju Island have siblings and relatives in Japan. In the past, it is said, people from Jeju Island crossed over to Japan—a land where they suffered even greater contempt and disdain than on the mainland—simply to make a living. In ancient times, Jeju was merely a remote island, geographically distant, used as a place of exile. Consequently, people of Jeju in the past could not help but have a relatively low sense of pride in their own culture.

Added to this, dark tourism, which takes historical wounds such as the April 3rd Incident as an object of tourism, once became, together with beautiful natural scenery, one of two icons by which people remembered Jeju Island.[7] Of course, this has since been considerably diluted, but although dark tourism can become a characteristic of Jeju Island, there were limits to making Jeju a sustained, world-class tourist destination through dark tourism alone. A world-class tourist destination is a destination of triumph and joy rather than of dark tourism. Visitors are moved not only by beautiful nature at their destination but even more by the culture that puts that nature to wise and beautiful use. In reality, the value of Jeju Island is expressed more through its history and culture, which are far more excellent than dark tourism, yet some still remember Jeju's culture through the image of misfortune and sorrow, like a culture of han (恨). In the past, some residents of Jeju Island lacked confidence and self-respect, perceiving their own culture not as a subjective culture of their own but as a culture of fusion and colonization introduced from outside. In some respects, Roman culture and Chinese culture were cultures of colonization even more than Jeju culture, and cultures of reception and fusion that incorporated even more from outside. Now, Jeju must find its own pride and self-confidence on the basis of ‘I, Here, and Now.’ Only then can Jeju culture develop.

To appreciate the value of Jeju culture, it is necessary to break free from the fixed frame of stereotypes about culture. In fact, upon closer examination, one finds that Roman culture and Chinese culture, too, are not composed solely of their own original, indigenous culture. Like Jeju culture, they contain much culture that flowed in from outside. The criterion for evaluation, therefore, needs to shift toward how well a culture makes external culture its own and puts it to use. When Jeju culture is evaluated by this revised criterion, it can move tourists as deeply as Roman or Chinese culture does. Until now, the response to tourists seeking out Jeju culture has been quite inadequate. In the past, Jeju culture presented itself only as a culture of sorrow, a culture to be hidden, which evoked in tourists the empathy of dark tourism but failed to evoke the empathy of hope. Most tourists want to draw vitality from a culture of overcoming hardship. This should now be actively turned to advantage in reverse. For example, Jeju Island has been evaluated as a place with many intelligent and loyal people. The intelligence of Jeju people owes something to the island's history as a place of exile for outstanding talents in the past, and the depth of their loyalty can be attributed to the ethics of a community that has endured over a long span of time. A negative fate gave rise to a positive result.

As shown in the film Jisil, Jeju Island has maintained a traditional community culture longer than anywhere else in Korea, and Korean traditional society possessed an extremely simple and honest popular sentiment (minsim). Although Jeju's popular sentiment is unaffected, this simplicity of Jeju's popular sentiment cannot be viewed as mere purity alone. The communal consciousness of Jeju can be regarded as a self-generated mode of survival born of the island's numerous experiences of foreign invasion. Indeed, even today, now that Jeju has become commercialized, Jeju's communal consciousness continues to exert influence even in elections through gwendang culture. All of this represents the sublimation of a shortcoming into a strength. In the end, strengths and shortcomings are like the palm and the back of a hand. They can change at any time amid shifts in existence and structure.

Jeju culture, foregrounding these existential and structural characteristics, can also grow into a model that subjectively accommodates foreign culture. In Jeju, such subjective accommodation appears most conspicuously in the Yi Jae-su Rebellion and the April 3rd Incident. Both the Yi Jae-su Rebellion and the April 3rd Incident have each been made into films and thereby become widely known to the general public. Looking at the Yi Jae-su Rebellion through the lens of film, Jeju Island is the place where the characteristics that Catholicism possessed during the age of imperialism are revealed most clearly.

Jeju Island in fact possesses a history and culture of overcoming hardship as intense as its scenery is beautiful. To this end, present-day people must be enabled to understand the value of the culture that Jeju has built up. And at its foundation lies the need to restore self-esteem regarding Jeju culture. Furthermore, tourism should be cultivated as gwang (光, "light"). Tourism is not, as in the Western sense, merely seeing and enjoying. It is seeking out and learning from gwang (光, "light" — brilliance). In other words, it is gwan (觀) — looking so closely as to see through, at those who have achieved shining accomplishments. Jeju must now change according to the demands of its era and place. For example, Jeju's tourism could transform into a tourism of healing that heals both me and you. It could also transform Jeju into an island of moral exemplars. In that way, Jeju could grow into one of the most ethical regions in Korea. This is possible because, unlike other regions, an island has long had the trait that there is nowhere to flee after doing wrong, and this can be realized by drawing on that trait together with Jeju's pristine nature.

In this way, Jeju is culturally special within Korea while also carrying diverse meanings. In addition, it is a place that has become widely known throughout the world for creating a new culture that coexists with nature. In the modern era, Jeju has been internationally recognized as a World Natural Heritage site, one of the New7Wonders of Nature, a Global Geopark, and a Biosphere Reserve. It has also hosted various international conferences and state summits, presenting an image different from the past. The existential and structural characteristics mentioned earlier — island, nature, and geopolitical factors — are working here in a positive direction.

2) Expanding Jeju Culture through Empathy and Analogical Thinking

Jeju culture can seek cultural expansion through empathy and analogical thinking. Contemporary society, unlike before, urgently needs empathy.[8] With the end of ideology, the distrust of human reason represented by postmodernism sought "empathy" as its alternative. Following the so-called collapse of materialism and the "linguistic turn" in philosophy, human empathic capacity, or phenomenological empathic feeling, long disregarded, came to be seen as transcending reason, or as a means of rediscovering the actual source of reason. Indeed, in the field of brain science as well, mirror neurons have been discovered that can empirically support empathy theory, and amid the development of the internet, phenomena explicable only through empathy theory have come to occupy the mainstream of social phenomena.[9] In humanities therapy, which extends the humanities into the domain of psychotherapy, empathy has likewise become a central theme.[10] In this age of loss, in this fatigued society, what we, famished, need is self-awareness and self-respect. And it will be reflection on the here and now in which I stand. This was the same problem faced by the Confucians (儒家) of the pre-Qin (先秦) period. And so they must have sought to resolve the problem by empathizing within I, Here, and Now. Empathy is thus the very ground of I, Here, and Now — that is, of existence and structure. Because of empathy, the grasp of existence and structure is given importance.[11]

The reason empathy has emerged as a keyword of cultural theory is that empathy is the source of the moral theory that forms the foundation of culture. Empathy became the foundation of moral theory because the West rediscovered that the root of Confucian culture lay in empathy.[12] In terms of empathy, Confucian culture is also found in Jeju.[13] Such empathy theory can be mutually complementary with analogical thinking and used for the expansion of culture. In this respect, Jeju culture today ought to be expanded around the theme of empathy. For example, Jeju's gwendang culture, centered on I, Here, and Now, can be regarded as the noblest part of Confucian culture as a culture of empathy.

Also, Jeju Island, which possesses the oldest history — one beginning with the eruption of lava — has its story of analogical culture begin from its very geopolitical position. Jeju rises prominently in the middle of the South Sea, and its culture begins from the analogical contrast between the lava eruptions of sea and land. Jeju culture, as seen early on in the story of Xu Fu under Qin Shi Huang, becomes culture through its beauty alone. Jeju is recorded earliest in the history books as the final destination of Xu Fu and his party, who set off in search of the elixir of immortality by order of Qin Shi Huang. The story of Xu Fu presents a model case of the analogical contrast between power and nature. Furthermore, the analogical contrast inherent in Jeju's nature demonstrates the cultural value of Jeju by itself alone. Jeju, through its nature alone, is composed of countless analogical contrasts that cannot be seen on the mainland. In this way, the expansion of Jeju culture through empathy and analogical thinking can be considered in various ways. This means that the diverse expansion of Jeju culture is possible in many respects.

Let us now think more concretely about expanding Jeju culture by applying empathy and analogical thinking on the basis of Jeju's geographical characteristics. For example, by adding feng shui (風水)-based storytelling to Jeju's topography, the whole of Jeju could be made into a single cultural heritage.[14] Jeju is famous for its Olle trails, but it can also be said that Jeju has paths of water and fire that embody an even greater natural wisdom than the Olle trails. This, of course, has already been discussed by several people. In this study as well, this was earlier presented in terms of paths of water and paths of fire, from the perspective of expanding Jeju culture through empathy and analogical thinking.[15]

Jeju culture can be diversely interpreted and expanded through empathy and analogical thinking. Beyond this, the breadth of Jeju culture can also be widened by finding and applying analogical thinking to the legends, myths, culture and history, and everyday culture bound up with Jeju's nature. Analogical thinking is a way of thinking in which, because the whole and the individual parts are composed of the same structure, one may think through that same structure whether understanding the whole or understanding an individual part. In this way, analogical thinking and empathy are among the methods by which the problems of structure and existence can be extended and applied. Analogical thinking is a characteristic of East Asian culture and, at the same time, a material well suited to grafting onto Jeju culture. The reason analogical thinking can be applied to expand Jeju culture is that, given the characteristics of Jeju's geopolitical position, analogical thinking stood out all the more, and also because Jeju, faced with the crisis of isolation, always had to deal with things from the standpoint of I, Here, and Now.

3) The Creation of Jeju Culture through Serendipity

The culture of Jeju can be analyzed, expanded, and created in various forms. The methods and processes of creation, too, are very many. Because creation is the making of something new, it cannot be viewed only within any single fixed frame. Among the many methods of creation, this study seeks to explore the creation of Jeju culture from the perspective of serendipity.

Serendipity is well worth newly considering in the creation of Jeju culture. The serendipitous characteristics of Jeju culture can be thought of as an extension of the island-ness, the natural conditions, and the geopolitical position of the Korean peninsula examined earlier in the discussion of existence and structure. And through an analogical approach, Jeju culture can be expanded, while through serendipity a more active kind of expansion — that is, creation — becomes possible.

As mentioned in the existential and structural analysis of Jeju culture, island-ness carries both the character of isolation and the character of easy outward advance. When culture flourishes, easy outward advance makes it the center of world culture, but when culture stagnates, it becomes isolated alone and fails to draw the surrounding gaze. Before and after such events, elements of chance are present, and whether success as serendipity is achieved depends on how these are made use of. The same holds for the fact that, while rooted in Korea's peninsular culture, Jeju shares in Japan's maritime culture and China's continental culture along its borders. Here too, depending on what capacity one's own culture possesses, the position and evaluation of Jeju culture can differ.

Looking back at Jeju culture in the past, one finds a cultural resilience that made use of contingency. Jeju has historically continued to exist by resolving many problems. For example, Samdasu, the Jeju water that many people now enjoy drinking, is yet another reversal drama that overcame the limitation of Jeju as an island lacking drinking water. And here too there exists another instance of serendipity.[16]

The current promotion of electric vehicles is likewise a creative approach that maximizes the characteristics of Jeju examined above. If it is linked, in the past, to the long-standing culture of the Jeju pony, and expanded, in the future, into pollution-free vehicles, a pollution-free city, and an environmental capital, this could become yet another instance of serendipity.

An English-specialized city or international schools are likewise another instance of serendipity to be found in Jeju's condition of isolation and openness. Going further, Jeju should be developed from an isolated island into an actively open one, equipped with the infrastructure to grow into an international city.

On the other hand, what is to be found in the shift from backwardness to development is the active use of Jeju's pristine natural environment. Where in the past the natural environment was a factor that kept Jeju culture and Jeju society backward, it must now be made the driving force of development. As in the "Jeju Black-Dragon Ten-Thousand-Ri Stone Walls" (제주도 흑룡만리 돌담밭), Jeju has a track record of skillfully overcoming its pristine natural environment in harmony with nature. The sincere and outstanding pioneering spirit of the Jeju people cultivated the stone island, and the stones that emerged from this cultivation were piled up like walls. And these, once connected, formed a magnificent spectacle resembling a black dragon come down to rest.[17] Each step of this process proceeded not so much by necessity as by chance events, yet through humanity's necessary effort and attitude it demonstrated serendipity — creative success.

Jeju Olle, too, can ultimately be seen as having arisen from the contingency of an island — a plan to make the fullest use of an isolated island, a limited space with no further room to advance outward, while also possessing its own boundary within "boundary," able to mark off the boundary between sea and land, between nature and humanity, between the artificial and the natural.[18] Because Jeju, unlike other places, has its pristine natural resources well preserved in harmony with its people, this pristine natural environment will become yet another precious treasury of resources to lead Jeju's future.

Also, being an island, Jeju has many women, and this fostered a culture centered on women. For example, Kim Man-deok, though a commoner in status, became a woman who rendered great service to the nation through donation — a first in Korean history. This should now be developed even more creatively. Since Korea's development, too, ultimately depends on making use of women, this could be creatively put forward through Jeju culture. Also, as is called gwendang culture, Jeju formed a culture in which community was most highly developed.

From the "culture of respect for women" and "Olle," to the recently discussed "English-specialized city," "environmental capital," and "city of healing and clean living," together with the "use of electric vehicles" that concretely puts these into practice — most of Jeju culture is not only a culture that overcame the hardships of nature but also a culture that overcame the hardships of humanity and society. That is, it is a culture in which there exists a "serendipity" that added a reversal and led to success. The world today faces problems similar to those Jeju has confronted, and in this respect, the process by which Jeju culture has resolved its problems need not be remembered only as pain and wounds, but can offer many lessons to people around the world. Therefore, serendipity, which turned contingency into creative success, can become Jeju culture's new hope. Moreover, for diverse instances of serendipity to emerge, an open culture and a cultural capacity for embracing diverse contingencies and mistakes must be respected. In this respect lies a strength of Jeju culture.

In this respect, the analogical emotion possessed by Jeju's nature, cited as an example earlier, can also be extended, on the basis of contingency, into history. It can be interpreted that the history of Jeju, unlike mainland culture stained by human glory and disgrace, moves tourists through the analogical purity possessed by nature. History has existed not only through necessary elements but through elements of chance as well. If we view history not solely as necessary effort but together with elements of chance, diverse creative materials come to light, and today's difficulties can be turned into positive creative energy.

In Jeju's historical vicissitudes there exist elements of empathy and analogical thinking grounded in contingency, as can also be seen in the Sambyeolcho of the Goryeo dynasty. Jeju's history—resisting the Mongols for an unusually long time, unparalleled anywhere in the world, and aiding the Sambyeolcho—resonates broadly with humanity, extending beyond Jeju itself. Upon entering the Joseon dynasty, Jeju came to embrace Neo-Confucianism, a more disciplined cultural system. Although it is said that Confucianism stripped away all the freedom that the former maritime kingdom had once enjoyed, Confucianism also showed Jeju an opportunity to create a new culture. Jeju became an island capable of serving as a model of the Great Unity society, the ideal society of Confucianism. Through the Japanese colonial period and the Korean War, Jeju endured many painful memories, and Jeju suffered heavy blows as well. Jeju has at last overcome the most painful parts of the modern era and is now becoming a region that draws the attention of the world. Jeju's history has become the most Korean of regions, one that, like a gathering place of world culture, has even overcome the suffering inflicted by the Korean mainland. Because of Jeju's characteristic isolation from the mainland, the island's historical vicissitudes showed, unlike the mainland, a pattern in which glory and suffering alternated in extremes. On the basis of the history of Jeju culture, we can imagine ever more diverse acts of creation of Jeju culture through serendipity.

Nor is this all. If we more actively seek the creation of Jeju culture through serendipity, what appears to be chance can be reborn as creative necessity. The culture preserved in Jeju is connected all the way to distant Europe, and it also shows humanity how it should prepare for the future. According to theories that have historically come to light, humanity's first civilization arose in the Altai region, from which successive waves of ethnic migration are said to have produced today's world civilizations.[19] Among the peoples said to have migrated from the Aral region are the Aryans, who are said to have invaded India; the Sumerians and Egyptians, who are said to have built the Sumerian civilization; and the Arabs, who created Islamic culture. There are also said to have been the various peoples of China and Northeast Asia. Because they lived together for a long time in a shared culture in the Aral region in connection with floods, even after dispersing they are said to have come to live with similar cultures. The commonality of world culture, which becomes ever more apparent in the age of globalization, further enriches and verifies the hypothesis of dispersal from the Aral region.

The world, however, is curious about what kind of culture the early cultures that dispersed from the Aral region possessed. In this respect, Jeju Island is a place equipped with elements capable of attracting people and with the conditions to sublimate this into serendipity. This is because Jeju, isolated as an island, has had the opportunity to preserve an archetypal culture, and possesses, within its existential and structural circumstances, analogical factors that allow it to empathize with other regions. One of the possibilities through which tourists from around the world can feel the greatest empathy when they come to Jeju is precisely this analogical element inherent in the archetypal nature of Jeju culture. The empathy and problem-solving capacity that Jeju possesses can also be seen as the result of a latent archetypal culture. Tourists feel deeply moved when they encounter Jeju's archetypal culture. Because Jeju retains one of the world's few creation myths, and because Eurasia still preserves many forms of shamanism and folklore, Jeju is able to present to the world, in diverse ways, an account of how humanity began.

For a long time, the culture of Jeju Island was regarded as being at the level of a primitive culture. However, because of its characteristic isolation, Jeju has preserved cultures old enough to be called a museum of the world's ancient cultures, and depending on one's perspective, it can be seen as possessing the most advanced heritage in both history and folklore. For example, the creation myth of 'Grandmother Seolmundae' represents Jeju Island. And there are not many places in the world where a creation myth of heaven and earth exists. There is a widespread desire to know the origin of oneself, but stories to support such a desire are not found everywhere. Jeju culture, as an archetypal culture, passed through Seobok and reached its heyday as the Tamna Kingdom in the Silla era of Jang Bogo. Like the Jeju Island that is developing today, Tamna boasted the culture of a maritime kingdom. Tourists in Jeju may be moved not only by Jeju's natural environment but also by the wisdom of the Tamna Kingdom.

Nor is this all—diverse stories remain scattered throughout Jeju Island. If we only change our perspective and methods, we can make full use of the stories hidden deep in every corner. As mentioned earlier, Jeju Island is first recorded in the history books as the final destination of Seobok and his party, who were sent by Qin Shi Huang to find the elixir of immortality. The story of Seobok presents a model of analogical contrast between power and nature. Thus, while the recorded history of Jeju Island begins with Seobok, Jeju culture also contains one of the world's few creation myths, as well as the dol hareubang (stone grandfather statues), which resemble the moai of Easter Island. Going further still, creative imagination can trace Jeju's forgotten history back into an age of imagination.

As new artifacts are discovered, and as globalization gathers the world's information into a single place, Jeju's forgotten history is being recreated, again and again, not merely as imagination but as something plausible. In fact, this was not creation from nothingness (無) into being (有), but creation from ignorance (無知) and indifference (無關心) into being (有). Furthermore, the creative realization of this imagination will come to shine all the more brightly through the advancement of archaeology and anthropology. In addition, although Jeju Island today emphasizes only the UN-designated New7Wonders of Nature and its UNESCO triple crown, one may expect that, someday, its value as both the point of origin and the final destination of world culture will be re-illuminated.

Let us now reconsider what has been said above. Culture matters because it encompasses everything while reflecting everything. Moreover, the birth of new cultures, accelerated in the twenty-first century through encounters between people and people, region and region, has made the value of culture all the more important. Culture has now become a crucial topic that encompasses us and our era. The culture of Jeju Island is no exception. In Korea especially, the cultural value of Jeju Island is truly great. This is because Jeju, as Korea's largest island, possesses a distinctive culture that a peninsular nation cannot have. In modern society, the importance of Jeju culture is becoming ever more apparent day by day. At the foundation of all this lie the very factors discussed under existence and structure: the fact of being an island, natural conditions, and the geopolitical position of the Korean Peninsula.

Thus far, in order to analyze, expand, and create the culture of Jeju Island, we have analyzed Jeju culture through existence and structure, expanded it through empathy and analogical thinking, and considered the creation of culture through serendipity. Serendipity is grounded in contingency, but in fact the criteria for judging what counts as chance are ambiguous. And not everything that happens by chance yields good results. In the end, what matters is the right conduct and will of the actor. Although chance does not guarantee either success or failure, success requires effort and preparation that persist in the face of setbacks and failure. Imagination, too, is not cultivated simply by encouraging idle fancy; it arises out of a foundation of basic ability and preparation. Serendipity, prior to contingency, returns our perspective to something fundamental and ultimate. This is why existential reflection and structural analysis are necessary.

As a comprehensive framework for understanding Jeju culture, we should attend to relations rather than to substance. Jeju culture can also be understood through a relation-centered framework: subjective acceptance through the empathy of existence and structure, the emotion afforded by the analogical thinking of nature and history, and the search for creation through the contingency of serendipity. The sustainable emotion that tourists visiting Jeju may feel lies not so much in the nature that Jeju possesses in itself, as in the new relationship that the people of Jeju have established between nature and culture. A relation-oriented framework for understanding Jeju culture may become a new framework for understanding an increasingly complex culture.

The methods for analyzing, expanding, and creating culture are, as mentioned earlier, diverse. Existence and structure will function to solidify identity, while empathy, analogy, and serendipity will help Jeju culture adapt and develop amid the surging tide of change. Just as Darwin argued in *On the Origin of Species* that 'in the end, it is not the strongest species that survives, but the species that adapts to change,' in order to survive change, various attempts to study regional cultures, including Jeju culture, must be carried forward.

The culture of contemporary Jeju Island makes good use of the contradictory situation of isolation and openness. It is a fine example of TRIZ, which resolves problems through contradiction. Although isolated as an island, Jeju is not confined to isolation but rather takes the advantages of both isolation and openness through openness. It knows its own identity with certainty. Yet this has not always been the case. As mentioned earlier, historically, Jeju Island was an object to be abandoned and fled from. Now, in keeping with the self-identity forged through existence and structure, Jeju must respond to change actively, positively, and as its own subject. In this way, it must move beyond the long history of hardship and trial that has marked its past and advance toward a history of hope and joy.