ABSTRACT
Ethnic nationalism in South Korea was never dynamic in the late 1950s, although Rhee partly utilised his career and fame as a fighter for independence. The government-led nationalist drive ultimately intended that museum collections be considered “ethnic national cultural objects.” The discourse on ethnic national culture as a political slogan began to influence the interpretation and narratives of Korean material culture. Beginning in 1967, the government began to increase the budget of the national museum. The success of the first five-year-long economic development plan (1962 to 1966) gave the government a chance to drastically increase investment in the cultural sector. The government pushed forward a series of construction projects for local branch museums in Buyeo, Gongju and Gyeongju from 1966 to 1975. Economic growth since the 1960s had created a new demand for cultural consumption from the early 1970s.
