This is Randi Hacker with another Postcard from Abroad from the KU Center for East Asian Studies.

Since the 1920s, when Japan put Korea under colonial rule, the body of water between the two countries has appeared exclusively as the Sea of Japan on maps and in textbooks. This does not sit well with the Koreans who prefer to call it the East Sea, it being east of Korea. When there’s an international dispute in the neighborhood, who do you call?…the Korean-Americans of Virginia, that’s who. This lobbying group introduced a bill to the state legislature that put the decision to a vote. Despite threats from Japanese businesses to pull investments from the state, the delegates voted to have the name East Sea appear alongside Sea of Japan in all new school textbooks. Next on the docket: Voting to reunite the two Koreas, perhaps. Show of hands…

From the KU Center for East Asian Studies, this is Randi Hacker. Wish you were here.