Scott was born in Northridge, California January 6th, 1968. He grew up in Castro Valley, California until the family moved to Salt Lake City in 1978. Scott graduated from East High School. He served an LDS mission in South Korea. Scott earned his B.A. in English Literature from the University of Utah and his M.A. in Korean Literature from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. It was there was he was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship and he earned his Ph.D. in Modern Korean Literature from Harvard University. Scott was awarded the position of Assistant Professor of Korean at the University of Washington where he was a recipient of a Daesan Foundation Grant for translating Korean Poetry. Scott was first and foremost a teacher and a writer, a lover of words with a gift for translating poetry, teaching and deeply understanding critical theories and had a great passion for philosophy. He died from pancreatic cancer at 38 years old.