Still Alive: South Korean Comfort Women of World War II Through the Lens of Documentary Film Open Access

Abstract

This thesis examines how documentary filmmakers have represented the history of the World War II "comfort women." "Comfort women" were young women, mostly kidnapped Koreans aged thirteen to twenty, who were forced to be sexual slaves for Japanese military brothels during World War II. Their ordeal became the focus of international attention in 1991 when the Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Slavery by Japan filed suit against the Japanese Government. Several feminist artists became politically involved in the "comfort women" issue and used their artistic work to portray their response to it and to oppose the ways in which it was being falsely historicized by the New Right movement in contemporary South Korea. My thesis explores how this marginalized history is represented by non-mainstream documentary filmmaking, comparing the artistic perspectives and approaches of Young-joo Byun's The Murmuring [Najeun moksori, 1995 South Korea], Habitual Sadness (1997), My Own Breathing (1999) and Dai Sil Kim-Gibson's Silence Broken: Korean Comfort Women (1999 USA). These documentary filmmakers develop collaborative relationships and artistic companionship with former "comfort women" and there destroy the typical hierarchy between the director and the subject in a manner that ultimately values the former "comfort women" as members of our society and lives.

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION...1

1 DOCUMENTING THE HISTORY OF THE "COMFORT WOMEN" AND SCREENING SURVIVORS...10

1.1 Representing Reality and Truth(s)

1.2 Documentary as Historiography and the History of the "Comfort Women"

1.3 The Ethics of Ethnography and the "Comfort Women" Movement

1.4 Journalistic and Anthropological Documentaries: Comfort Women and Senso Daughters

2 DRAMA WITHIN DOCUMENTARY: SILENCE BROKEN...29

2.1 Sharing Herstory of Dai Sil Kim-Gibson with Korean "Comfort Women"

2.2 Silence Broken within the Context of Documentary

2.3 Korean American Representation and the Reconstruction of the "Comfort Women" Story

3 BREAKING BOUNDARIES: NEW MODES OF DOCUMENTARY FILMMAKING THROUGH THE LENS OF DIASPORIC DAUGHTERS AND SURVIVORS...42

3.1 Hidden Voices and Visions: The Murmuring (Najeun moksori 1, 1995)

3.2 Never-ending Story: Habitual Sadness (Najeun moksori 2, 1997)

3.3 They Are Still Alive: My Own Breathing (Najeun moksori 3, 1999)

CONCLUSION...60

NOTES...62

BIBLIOGRAPHY...65

FILMOGRAPHY...68

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 2.1 Silence Broken...37

Figure 2.2 Silence Broken...37

Figure 3.1 Sun-duck Kim. "In the Boat"...46

Figure 3.2 Duk-kyung Kang. "A Comfort Station"...46

Figure 3.3 Duk-kyung Kang. "Stolen Innocence"...47

Figure 3.4 Habitual Sadness...53

Figure 3.5 Habitual Sadness...53

Figure 3.6 Habitual Sadness...53

About this Master's Thesis

Rights statement

• Permission granted by the author to include this thesis or dissertation in this repository. All rights reserved by the author. Please contact the author for information regarding the reproduction and use of this thesis or dissertation.

School	Laney Graduate School
Department	Film and Media Studies
Degree	MA
Submission	Master's Thesis
Language	English
Research Field	Gender Studies Cinema
Keyword	Dai Sil Kim-Gibson Documentary The Korean Comfort Women of World War II The "Comfort Women" Movement Young-joo Byun
Committee Chair / Thesis Advisor	Schreiber, Michele, Emory University
Committee Members	Pratt, David B, Emory University Bernstein, Matthew, Emory University

Last modified

Primary PDF

Thumbnail	Title	Date Uploaded	Actions
	Still Alive: South Korean Comfort Women of World War II Through the Lens of Documentary Film ()	2018-08-28 13:42:12 -0400	Press to Select an action Download

Supplemental Files

Thumbnail	Title	Date Uploaded	Actions