From Subservience to Autonomy: Kim Wŏnju's "Awakening"
Kim Wŏnju ( 1896-1971 ), better known by her pen name, Iryŏp (One Leaf), was one of the most outspoken and controversial feminist writers of modern Korea. This study presents a brief biography of Kim up to the time she became a Buddhist nun in the early 1930s, situating her life in the ideological, literary, cultural, and even political settings of her time. It then critically analyzes the structure, narrative strategies, and ideological implications of Kim's short story "Chagak" (Awakening, 1926), attempting to ascertain the story's place in the context of the time and in the author's development as a feminist writer.
Under the Mandate of Nationalism: Development of Feminist Enterprises in Modern Korea, 1860-1910
Modern Korean feminism from its birth in the late nineteenth century was inextricably interwoven with nascent nationalism, which emerged as a reaction to the encroachments of Western industrial nations and Japan in their scramble for hegemony in East Asia.1 It grew as an integral part of the national mobilization movement in an effort to muster all available resources in Korea, including women, to counter these foreign aggressions. This rise of nationalistic consciousness polemicized women's issues as a compelling subject for public discourse and action, and thereby incorporated Korean women into the heart of national Ufe for the first time in Korean history. Both nationalism and feminism were new and difficult concepts with which contemporary Koreans had to grapple. First, until the nineteenth century, Korea under the Yi Dynasty (1392-1910) had been relatively iso- lated from the rest of the world, except China. In this insulation Korea prided itself on being a stronghold of orthodox Confucian civilization, second only to China. Second, in a society entrenched in Confucian patri- archal ideology, women's issues had rarely been considered appropriate for open discussion, let alone for being incorporated into national policy- making. In this context, the task of formulating a new national identity and its mandates and accommodating feminism within this nationalistic framework was a taU order. The coalescence of nationalism and feminism in Korea, therefore, resulted in a tortuous course of development, often lacking consensus and charged with conflicts and even regression. And this complexity makes the study of the relationships between nationaA¼sm and feminism in Korea a demanding venture into one of the most tangled narratives in the country's intellectual history. Korean nationaUsm, unlike European or Japanese expansionist mod- els, represented an essentially defensive political consciousness and activ- ity, born out of the realization of the poUtical frailty of the country. As an expression of patriotic struggle to fend off the impingement of the world superpowers, it stressed internal reforms and self-strengthening as a means to forestall and repel foreign domination and keep national integrity and sovereignty intact. Korean nationalism, in essence, was a reactive ideology and mechanism for self-empowerment, survival, and self-preservation against imperiaUstic aggression or colonization from outside.2
The Kapsin Coup of 1884: A Reassessment
On the night of December 4, 1884, a small group of reform-minded Koreans staged a bloody coup to seize political power in hopes of instituting drastic reforms that would transform Korea into a modern state. But unfortunately for Korea, these reformers only remained in power for three days, and their attempted coup ended in disastrous failure. This incident is known in Korea as the kapsin chöngbyön, the political disturbance of the year kapsin (1884). This article attempts to reassess the historical significances and implications of this incident by analyzing and evaluating the possible consequences this abortive coup may have had upon the history of modern Korea.