著者

朴 庾卿

出版者

法政大学大学院 国際日本学インスティテュート専攻委員会

雑誌

国際日本学論叢 = Journal of international Japanese-studies = 国際日本学論叢 = Journal of international Japanese-studies (ISSN:13491954)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.8, pp.27-50, 2011-03-22

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There is no other animal than cats which have a clear difference in imagebetween Korea and Japan. When we turn to "classical literature" with thefeatures of "oral literature" in mind, we will notice the widening gap betweenthe two countries. In Japan, cats are described from two viewpoints, namely,court culture and popular culture. In the former, cats are taken as elegantpets. In the latter, however, they are supposed to be mysterious, describedas the two-tail "nekomata" or the metamorphic cat on the one hand and theyare familiar animals as symbolized in the beckoning cat on the other. But inKorea, cats are not taken as themselves, they are mainly utilized as icons to"criticize" or "ridicule" according to "mores."Through the comparison, it can be said that the difference in the image ofcats between the two nations derives from the difference in religious andhistorical background.In Japan this image seems to have been fixed duringthe Edo Era, based on the history since the Heian Era. Korea, on the otherhand, was in the background of the Joseon Dynasty Period. Particularly, inJapan, the "personification" and "deification" of developed through the"faddish gods", the pet boom, and the Kabuki featuring cats during the EdoEra. In Korea, during the Joseon Dynasty when Confucianism was theformal religion, absolute significance was placed on "mores" (Confucianvalues). Therefore, the behavior of cats was also put to moral judgment, andcats were chosen as objects of criticism. This seems to have formed thenegative image of cats.