한국과 일본의 초․ 중학교 국어교과서의 소설에 나타난 사회 문화적 특징 연구

Abstract

Focusing on novels included in the national language textbooks for elementary and middle school in Korean and Japan, this study aims to analyze their periods and background, gender difference of the authors and protagonists, and preferences in different generations. The study also aims to analyze the pattern of acceptance of other cultures, the values and moral principles revealed in the themes, and the viewpoints of the authors so that it could illuminate the social and cultural characteristics of the two countries. In addition, this paper pays attention to the differences between theelementary textbooks and the middle school textbooks. As for the national language textbooks for elementary school, both countries have many novels that deal with the themes of ‘collaboration, wisdom, love for family, and courage.’ They were similar in that there were a great difference of gender in the authors and protagonists, many works feature adolescents (especially boys), and omniscient authorial viewpoint is preferred. But Korean textbooks had a larger proportion of traditional novels that are related to classical works and themes concerned with the virtue of values and moral principles; however, they were short of nurturing creativity and students’ability to think. The number of novels in Korean textbooks was twice as many as Japanese textbooks while the length of novels was only about half of the novels in Japanese textbooks. Japanese language textbooks for the lower grades of elementary school had many novels that deal with animals and, mostly included purely literary works that stimulate imagination rather than represent specific values. While they had fewer themes on foreign cultures, they had diverse novels of other countries. As for the middle school textbooks. both countries showed great gender difference in the authors and protagonists than the elementary school textbooks. The middle school textbooks were also characterized by more novels of the‘first-person protagonist viewpoint’ and of contemporary authors. However, Korean language textbooks for middle school aimed at comprehension of the content as the objective of the lesson, and had more novels with clear-cut conclusion. On the other hand, Japanese language textbooks for middle school had more works of open-ended conclusion that stimulate imagination of the students. The reason might be found in the fact that Japan had been continuously working on developing texts for school textbooks.