P'UNGSU: A Study of Geomancy in Korea

摘要

The title indicates a study of geomancy, not fengshui, but geomancy. The word choice is significant. Geomancy is characterized in editor Hong-key Yoon's earlier work, Geomantic Relationships between Culture and Nature in Korea (Taipei: The Orient Cultural Service, 1976), as "a unique and comprehensive system of conceptualizing the physical environment which regulates human ecology by influencing man to select auspicious environments and to build harmonious structures (i.e., graves, houses, and cities) on them" (1). In this edited volume, Yoon distinguishes his chosen subject from "fengshui," a Romanization of the standard Chinese pronunciation for "wind and water," otherwise known as "geomancy." The Korean pronunciation, "p'ungsu" is boldly capitalized in the title. Yoon does this for two reasons, both deeply implicated in the project at hand. First, he observes that fengshui has been popularized in the English-reading world through a welter of how-to manuals which promise that attention to the proper arrangement of structures and objects in space brings happiness, wealth, and auspicious real estate ventures. As Yoon and his colleagues abundantly demonstrate, the influence of geomantic ideas is more far-reaching, extending into many different domains of cultural practice, from literature to gardening. Second, the term fengshui carries the implication that geomancy is an exclusively Chinese project, overlooking the fact that Koreans, Japanese, and Vietnamese have made their own uses of it. "'Geomancy' does not favour any one particular nation in East Asia" Yoon asserts (16). The book is intended as an exploration of the particular historical inflections and cultural nuances that geomancy took when it reached the Korean Peninsula. P'ungsu is not an English-language introduction to how Korean geomancy works; that information is contained in Yoon's other writing and only the basics are provided here. Rather, the aim is to convey Korea's geomantic heritage, writ broad and large.