This book features the English translation of the personal life stories of nine former Korean 'Comfort Women,' collected through directly collected oral testimonies. Each testimony is provided with the interviewer's observation notes providing poignant contextual information. The preface and two appendices provide theoretically informed guides for the educational usage of the testimonies, as well as reports on the fieldwork methodology used for the collection of the oral histories.

This book features the English translation of the personal life stories of nine former Korean 'Comfort Women,' collected through directly collected oral testimonies. Each testimony is provided with the interviewer's observation notes providing poignant contextual information. The preface and two appendices provide theoretically informed guides for the educational usage of the testimonies, as well as reports on the fieldwork methodology used for the collection of the oral histories.

Through South Korean filmic and literary texts, this book explores affect and ethics in the healing of historical trauma, as alternatives to the measures of transitional justice in want of national unity. Historians and legal practitioners who deal with transitional justice agree that the relationship between historiography and justice seeking is contested: this book reckons with this question of how much truth-telling from a violent past will lead to healing, forgiving, forgetting and finally overcoming resentment. Nuanced interpretations of South Korean filmic and literary texts are featured, including Park Chan-wook's Oldboy, Bong Joon-ho's Mother and literary texts of Han Kang and Ch'oe Yun, whilst also engaging the ethical and political philosophy of Levinas, Hannah Arendt, and others. Also offered is new and extensive research into the hitherto hidden history of thousands of North Korean war orphans who were sent to Eastern European countries for care. Grappling with the evils of history, the films and novels examined herein find their ultimate themes in compassion, hospitality, humility and solidarity of the wounded. Healing Historical Trauma in South Korean Film and Literature will appeal to students and scholars of film, comparative literature, cultural studies and Korean studies more broadly.

Through South Korean filmic and literary texts, this book explores affect and ethics in the healing of historical trauma, as alternatives to the measures of transitional justice in want of national unity. Historians and legal practitioners who deal with transitional justice agree that the relationship between historiography and justice seeking is contested: this book reckons with this question of how much truth-telling from a violent past will lead to healing, forgiving, forgetting and finally overcoming resentment. Nuanced interpretations of South Korean filmic and literary texts are featured, including Park Chan-wook's Oldboy, Bong Joon-ho's Mother and literary texts of Han Kang and Ch'oe Yun, whilst also engaging the ethical and political philosophy of Levinas, Hannah Arendt, and others. Also offered is new and extensive research into the hitherto hidden history of thousands of North Korean war orphans who were sent to Eastern European countries for care. Grappling with the evils of history, the films and novels examined herein find their ultimate themes in compassion, hospitality, humility and solidarity of the wounded. Healing Historical Trauma in South Korean Film and Literature will appeal to students and scholars of film, comparative literature, cultural studies and Korean studies more broadly.

"Dangerous Women" addresses the themes of Korean nationalism and gender construction, as well as various issues related to the colonialization and decolonialization of the Korean "nation," Leading scholars discuss how Korea, as a result of years of foreign domination, can still be seen as an "imaginary" and "gendered" nation--as a metaphor, even, for Korean women both there and abroad. Together, these essays explore the troubled category of "woman," placing it in the specific context of a marginalized and colonized nation.
Yet Korean women are not configured here merely as metaphors for an emasculated and enfantilized "homeland." They are also shown to be by-products of a problematic gender construction that originates in Korea, and extends even today to Korean communities beyond Asia. Representations of Korean women still attempt to confine them to the status of either mother or prostitute: "Dangerous Women" rectifies that construction, offering a feminist intervention that might recuperate womanhood.

Addressing the themes of Korean nationalism and gender construction, as well as issues related to colonialisation and decolonialisation of Korea, leading scholars discuss how Korea can still be seen as an 'imaginary' and 'gendered' nation.