Since February 2022, Martin Gehlmann is working as a research and teaching assistant at the Department of Korean Studies at Ruhr-University Bochum (RUB). Previously, he was working as a research assistant at the Institute of Korean Studies and the Collaborative Research Center 980 “Episteme in Motion” at Freie Universität Berlin from December 2014 to January 2022. He received his PhD in December 2020 for a thesis on Confucian Academies. His research focus is on East Asian educational history, institutional history in premodern Korea, Confucianism, and cultural heritage.

• East Asian Educational History
• Institutional History in Premodern Korea
• Confucianism and Education
• Cultural Heritage in East Asia

• 2026: “Korean Educational Exceptionalism and the Past. The Education in Korea Series” in: ASIEN 174/175 (2025), S. 44–74.
• 2025: “Outstanding Universal Confucian Value: Negotiating the Inscription of Nine South Korean Confucian Academies as World Heritage between China and UNESCO” in: European Journal of Korean Studies, Volume 24, No. 2. S. 45–74
• 2024: “Das Sarye p‘yŏllam 四禮便覽 (Handbuch der Vier Rituale)” in: Sammellust und Wissensdrang. Vier Jahrhunderte Asiatica in Berlin, ed. Achim Bonte, Berlin: Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin - Preußischer Kulturbesitz, 2024. S. 84–86.
• 2024: (as Editor with Vladimir Glomb) Beyond the State Examinations. Evaluations of Knowledge in Premodern Korea, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.
• 2024: “Assessing Basic Knowledge: Student Evaluation Examinations in Chosŏn Local Schools” in: Beyond the State Examinations. Evaluations of Knowledge in Premodern Korea, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. pp. 49–78
• 2021: “Practical Applications of the Liji. Rituals and Confucian Academies in Korea”, in: All About the Rites, ed. Anne Cheng, Stephane Feuillas, Paris: Hémisphères.
• 2020: (with Lennart Lehmhaus und Falk Quenstedt) “Performing Knowledge Economies: Changing and Exchanging Goods in Pre-Modern Ritual Communities”, in: Wissensoikonomien. Ordnung und Transgression vormoderner Kulturen, ed. Nora Schmidt, Nikolas Pissis, Gyburg Uhlmann, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. pp. 229-256.
• 2020: (as Editor with Vladimir Glomb and Eun-Jeung Lee) Confucian Academies in East Asia, Leiden: Brill.
• 2020: “Transmission of the White Deer Grotto Academy Articles of Learning in Korea”, in: Confucian Academies in East Asia, Leiden: Brill. pp. 252-287.
• 2018: (mit Vladimir Glomb) „1950-60년대 북한의 서원 연구 (North Korean Research on Confucian Academies in the 1950-1960s)”, in: Han'guk sŏwŏn hakpo, Volume 7 (2018). pp. 59-82.

• “Teaching the Basics. The Elementary Learning 小學 in Chosŏn Korea”, NAKPA 2026, Universität Hildesheim, 05. October 2026.
• “Korea as China’s Future. “Record of Things Heard and Seen in Korea 朝鮮聞見錄” (1918)”, Workshop EAF meets Sungkyunkwan, Sungkyunkwan University, Seoul, 14. September 2026.
• “An Hosang in Jena, Germany”, Koreans in Europe during the 20th Century, Charles University Prague, 5. May 2026 (online).
• “Education, Edification and Examinations. Confucian Learning in Chosŏn Korea”, Current Research on East Asia, Université Paris Cité, 29. January 2026.
• “Scenes from an Occupied Country: A Chinese Travel Record to Colonial Korea”, 2025 International Conference of Northeast Asian History Foundation: Traversing Korean History, Berlin, 31. October 2025.
• “UNESCO and Shared Cultural Heritage. Confucian Academies (書院) in China and Korea”, AKSE 2025, Edinburgh, 22. June 2025.
• “Preserving Korean Confucianism: Confucian Academies as UNESCO World Heritage”, Preserving Korea’s Cultural Heritage – Current Issues, Future Directions, Cluj-Napoca, 16. May 2025.
• “Meritocratic Feudalism: History of Education in North Korea”, Premodern Korean Studies in Europe Conference 2024, 26. April 2024.
• “Student Life during Chosŏn Times”, Nordic-Baltic Korean Study Days 2024, University of Copenhagen, 04. March 2024.
• “Building Confucian Education in Korea”, Confucian Heritage. Decoding Writing of Chosŏn Literati, Freie Universität Berlin, 8. December 2023.
• “Student Evaluation Examinations in Chosŏn Local Schools”, Chosŏn History Society, 11. May 2023 (online).
• “Schools and Students in Chosŏn Korea: Educational Standards and Realities”, AKSE EPEL Lecture, Charles University Prague, 13. May 2022.
• “To Transform from Archery and Horsemanship to Zou and Lu: Confucian Local Schools in Northern Korea”, AKSE 2021 La Rochelle, 30. October 2021.
• “Universal or Unique? Confucian Academies as Shared Cultural Heritage in China and Korea”, Medieval Cultural Heritage Around the Globe: Monuments, Literature, and the Arts, Then and Now (online), Binghamton University, 23. October 2021.
• “Being a Student in the Chosŏn Dynasty: Education and Knowledge of a kyosaeng 校生”, Beyond the State Examinations. Evaluations of Knowledge in Premodern Korea, Freie Universität Berlin, 22. October 2021.
• “Confucianism between China and Korea. The Case of the White Deer Grotto Academy”, AKSE EPEL Lecture (online), University of Bucharest, 19. May 2021.
• “Private Academy or State School? Dilemmas of Confucian Education”, AKSE 2019 Rome, 12. April 2019.
• “박영와 백록동서원규 (Pak Yŏng and the White Deer Grotto Academy Regulations”, Kim Il-Sung University International Conference on the Development of Science and Human Welfare, Kim Il-Sung University, 28. October 2018.
• “Rituals and Confucian Academies. The Role of the Liji in Korean Sŏwŏn”, All about the Rites: from canonized ritual to ritualized society, College de France, 22. June 2018.
• “白鹿洞書院在朝鮮 (The White Deer Grotto Academy in Korea), Yuelu Academy lectures series, Hunan University, 22. May 2018.
• “백록동서원규의 전송 (Transmissions of the White Deer Grotto Academy Regulations)”, International Conference for the 10 Year Anniversary of Korean-Chinese Confucian Academy Studies, Yeungnam University, 29. October 2017.
• “Transmissions of the White Deer Grotto Regulations in China and Korea”, Consortium of Korean Studies, University of California, Los Angeles, 10. June 2017.
• “Creating Valuable Heritage – Narratives of Confucian Academies (書院) in Korea and China”, Heritage as Aid and Diplomacy in Asia, International Institute for Asian Studies Leiden, 28. May 2016.