This thesis investigates the phenomenon of making martyrs in the Protestant Church in Korea (PCK) especially the relationship between the institution and the designation. Tracing the historical development of ideology of martyrdom linguistically and semantically from the pre-Constantinian base-line, the writer points out that martyrdom is not a fixed or universal concept but is variously employed in different times, settings, and places to justify, legitimate and memorialise a death in a specific group and frequently for a specific reason or purpose. It may also be directly linked with the identity of one persecuted community setting a firm boundary between it and the hostile persecuting group. Furthermore, the designation of martyr is an intentional act which speak to the living not the dead. In other words, martyrdom is a part of the interpretive semantics of a particular death seen by particular lives for particular purposes. Martyrdom pertains to the politics of death, yet at the same time to the politics of the living. Martyrs for the PCK represent three major periods of Korean Protestants’ death-events: the late Chosun Dynasty (1866-1905), the rule of Japanese imperialism (1905-1945), and before and during the Korean War (1945-1953). Most Protestant Christians’ deaths occurred as a result of a clash between religion and the political power represented in each era. The PCK only started to ‘make martyrs’ by collecting and interpreting the first such deaths after 1926 and increasingly from 1983 onwards. However, their work of martyr-making has exposed PCK leaders to misusing the term, by including death after natural disasters and accidents. It is arguable that the situation in post-World War II Korea was such that the strands of anticommunism and ethnic nationalism profoundly influenced the historicity of the death-event. Martyr-making processes in the PCK context, therefore, functioned politically to define the persistently common enemy of communism and anti-nationalism, mobilizing Christians against them, and justifying creative martyr-making by its effect. Thus it will be argued that martyr-making is part of the power structure of the PCK: and power, any power, always has the potential to be wrongly used. To analyse the operation of PCK’s martyr-making more specifically, this thesis includes two case studies. The first is of Rev R. J. Thomas who is said to be ‘the first Protestant martyr in Korea,’ whose martyr status was tentatively designated in 1926 and elevated at the time of the 1884-1984 celebration of Protestantism in Korea. And the second is Rev Son Yang-Won, widely known as ‘the atomic bomb of love’ from 1948 when he adopted the killer of his two sons amid the ideological conflict between the leftist and rightist, whose reputation as the ‘martyr of love’ increased from 1950 immediately after being killed by communists in the early stage of the Korean War. The Thomas case uncovers the ethnic nationalistic tendency of the PCK’s martyr-making, and their anticommunist attitude in the treatment of Rev Son. In short, it will be argued that PCK leaders controlled the collective memory about deaths in the specific historical contexts to sustain their socio-political views, placing and displacing some death-events to commemorate some or intentionally exclude others, based as much on the ruling ideologies of South Korean society, mainly anticommunism and ethnic nationalism, as on the image of Jesus’ death. What this may mean for the PCK now and in future is briefly explored in the final comment.

Submitted by Marina Corrêa dos Santos (ma.mcsantos@yahoo.com.br) on 2018-04-23T20:33:01Z No. of bitstreams: 1 versãofinalcorrigida.marinasantos.pdf: 584755 bytes, checksum: c592224692cd47f340ce0553a7509aaf (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Carolina Lourenco null (carolinalourenco@fclar.unesp.br) on 2018-04-24T11:39:42Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 santos_mc_me_arafcl.pdf: 584755 bytes, checksum: c592224692cd47f340ce0553a7509aaf (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2018-04-24T11:39:42Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 santos_mc_me_arafcl.pdf: 584755 bytes, checksum: c592224692cd47f340ce0553a7509aaf (MD5) Previous issue date: 2018-02-27 / Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) / A presente dissertação é um experimento de conversa entre dois sujeitos: o pesquisador e o pesquisado. Ela parte de um questionamento acerca da significação social da existência singular do escritor Mário de Andrade, bem como, da posição de destaque ocupada pelo mesmo na memória artística e intelectual brasileira. Concebendo o pensamento como produto indissociável da sensibilidade do ser vivente, a vida como uma experiência social e singular e a memória como uma experiência viva, adentramos ao universo mariodeandradiano. Universo vasto e heterogêneo composto por múltiplos diálogos e múltiplas vozes dissonantes; vozes, por sua vez, que competem na construção da vida e no traçar do destino de Mário de Andrade. Ao percorrer alguns rastros (muitos deles autobiográficos) deixados pela sua existência, foi possível compreender que a consagração do homem público é resultado de um embate político e discursivo, do qual participam os seus contemporâneos, os que o antecederam, os que o sucederam e também ele próprio. Para mais, a (re)construção dos elos entre estes tantos fragmentos (auto)biográficos demonstraram que as contradições insuperáveis e os sucessivos desdobramentos de sua personalidade, tornam a sua vida uma questão ainda em aberto. De tudo isso conclui-se que, enquanto houver pesquisadores e pesquisas que se dediquem à compreensão da sua vida e de seu pensamento, Mário de Andrade não morrerá. E esse trabalho é mais uma das formas de mantê-lo vivo. / This dissertation is an experiment of conversation between two subjects: the researcher and the researched. It begins with a questioning about the social significance of the writer Mario de Andrade singular life, as well as, of the prominent position occupied by him in Brazilian artistic and intellectual memory. Understanding the thought as inseparable product of the subject's sensitivity, the life as a social and unique experience, we will enter on the Mario de Andrade's environment. A vast and heterogeneous environment composed of multiple dialogues and multiple dissonant voices; these voices, on the other hand, compete in the construction of life and in the destiny of Mário de Andrade. Observing some evidence during his life (many of them autobiographical), it was possible to understand that the consecration of the public man is the result of a political and discursive conflict between his contemporaries, his predecessors, his successors and also himself. Moreover, the construction and reconstruction of the links between these many biographical and autobigraphical fragments has shown that the insuperable contradictions and the successive multiplication of his personality, make his life an open question. So we conclude that as long as there are researchers and researches who dedicate themselves to understanding the life and thinking of Mario, he will not die. And that work is one way to keep him alive.