Tim Warnberg’s Legacy Deserves Notice: Part I 

By Dr. Marcy Tanter 

“Does anyone know the name of that guy?” 

“Which guy?” 

“The one in the plaid shirt.” 

“Oh, that’s Tim. Tim Warnberg.” 

In the summer of 2017, I was a visiting professor at Chonnam National University. I taught an English literature course in their international summer school program. While I was there, I heard about the Gwangju Uprising for the first time and did some research to learn about it. One of the first photos I came across is the (I learned later) famous one that shows five men carrying an injured man on a stretcher.  

I was struck by the fact that the man in the middle of the photo is obviously Caucasian, and I wondered who he was and what he was doing in the middle of the Uprising. Especially curious is the fact that he is wearing plastic sandals instead of shoes, and the man in front of him seems to be barefoot. They must have dropped everything to carry the stretcher and get the injured man to the hospital. I found out later that this was Tim Warnberg. Tim was a 24-year-old American Peace Corps volunteer who lived in Gwangju and worked at Chonnam University Hospital as a Hansen’s Disease case worker. During the Uprising, he remained in the city to help take care of the citizens.¹ Tim was selfless during that time, doing all that he could to aid the citizens, and he has long been recognized for his contributions. There is no question that Tim played an important role in Gwangju before, during, and after the Uprising. The more I learned about him, and the goodness of the other PCVs who stayed to help the Gwangju citizens, the more I wanted to meet him and express my appreciation.  

As I asked questions about Tim, I discovered that he had passed away in 1993. Unfortunately, Tim succumbed to a virus after years of treatments that saw him improve and then decline. Remarkably, despite being ill, Tim worked on a Ph.D. at the University of Hawaii under the direction of famed translator and critic Marshall Pihl (1933–1995). His dissertation topic was a translation of sijo poems by Jo Jeong-hyeon called Midnight Earth [자정의 지구 (조종현시조집)]. In addition to the translation for his dissertation, Tim was involved in translating Cho Se-hui’s story “Space Travel,” part of his novel The Dwarf. In 1989, Pihl noted that Tim was working on the translation (215), (Pihl) but I cannot find any further reference to it. Bruce and Ju-Chan Fulton brought out their own translation of The Dwarf in 2006; Professor Fulton told me he has no knowledge of Tim’s work on “Space Travel” (2022). One translation that Tim worked on that has been published and acknowledged: He assisted Professor Judy Van Zile with her book Perspectives on Korean Dance (2001). The exact passages he translated are not marked, but Professor Van Zile notes his help in the introduction to the text (xxii).  

Aside from his translation work, Tim Warnberg published the first foreign account of the Gwangju Uprising. Appearing in volume 11 of the journal Korean Studies, “The Kwangju Uprising: An Insider’s View” was and continues to be an often-cited, invaluable testimony. Scholars and others who research the Uprising, Korean democracy, the Korean student protest movement, resistance to Chun Doo-hwan’s government, and other related areas, consult Tim’s article often. The article has been assigned on syllabi at Cornell University (Choi) and SUNY Albany (Kwon); the article is listed as a resource for American 11th- and 12th-grade students in the Korea Society’s curriculum guide for high school teachers who are teaching the Uprising (Milkes). From the research I have done, it seems that Warnberg is cited in more than a hundred books and articles, and in multiple master’s theses and Ph.D. dissertations. His work is far-reaching and significant in myriad ways.  

To honor Tim and publicly recognize his contribution to Korean studies, one of his friends, after discussions with Tim’s family, suggested that we petition to have doctorates awarded to Tim posthumously, one for this translation work and another for what he accomplished during and after the Gwangju Uprising. I jumped at the chance to help with this effort because I think Tim deserves it – not only for his unselfish aid rendered during the Uprising, but also for his unwavering belief in the Korean people and Korean democracy. He was devoted to bringing Korean culture to the world outside of Asia through his translation work, and he was devoted to the people of Korea with all his heart. Part II of this article will appear once we know whether the petition was successful. Wish us luck! 

Footnote 

¹ Tim’s friend and fellow PCV, David Dolinger, stated: “…based upon what we had witnessed … it was important for us to stay [in Gwangju] and make sure that our Korean friends were safe.” 

Sources 

Choi, E. (2012). Asian 2218: Introduction to Korea. [University course syllabus]. Cornell University. https://studylib.net/doc/7598726/asian-2218-syllabus–fall-2012- 

Dolinger, D. (2010, June 12). Comment on blog post. In M. VanVolkenburg (Ed.), Gusts of Popular Feeling. http://populargusts.blogspot.com/2010/06/park-chung-hees-act-of-terrorism.html 

Fulton, B. (2022, April 19). Personal email to author.  

Pihl, M. (1995). The nation, the people, and a small ball. In K. Wells (Ed.), South Korea’s minjung movement. (pp. 210–222). University of Hawaii Press.  

Kwon, P. B. (2019, Spring). AEAK 389/AHIS 389: History of Modern Korea [University lecture]. SUNY Albany.  

Milkes, E. (n.d.). The Kwangju Uprising. The Korea Society. https://www.koreasociety.org/images/pdf/KoreanStudies/Curriculum_Materials/LessonsbyTopic/History/The_Gwangju_Uprising.pdf  

Van Zile, J. (2001). Perspectives on Korean Dance. Wesleyan University Press. 

Warnberg, T. (1987). The Kwangju Uprising: An insider’s view. Korean Studies, 11, 33–57. 

The Author 

Dr. Marcy Tanter teaches at Ranger College and for the Dallas School District in Texas. The Gwangju Uprising is currently her main research focus, especially the American involvement. She was a Fulbright scholar at Dongguk University in spring, 2018, and she is an international education advisor for the May 18 Foundation. She has participated in the Gwangju Democracy Forum and has delivered lectures at the GIC.