Abstract

Antagonism toward the Japanese Rising Sun flag is considerable in South Korea, and has often further complicated the bumpy relations between Seoul and Tokyo by reawakening and amplifying the pervasive anti-Japanism in the country. Despite its significant effects, however, there has been little research on the phenomenon. Against this backdrop, this study analyzes how the strong hostility toward the flag in South Korea has developed, largely through carrying out quantitative text analyses of local newspapers, to thus expand the research on anti-Japanism in the country. It reveals, surprisingly, that discourse on the Rising Sun flag in South Korea is a recent development, which has become prevalent since the early 2010s only. It argues as well that the aggravation of South Korea–Japan relations since that time, together with the Rising Sun flag's strong image among Koreans as a prime symbol of Japanese militarism, have been behind this development of South Korean animosity toward the flag. Accordingly, this research sheds new light on how the two nations' contemporary bilateral relations affect anti-Japanese sentiment in South Korea, and also on the roles of symbols in this process, to thus offer a novel analysis of the recent development of anti-Japanism in the country.