“Forced labor by Japan is a history that has not ended,” cry high school students

On September 25, the students who wrote the report, The Realities of the Labour Corps and Solutions, Choi Su-jin, Bak Da-jeong, and Kang Ye-won and their teacher Bak Mi-ae (from left) called for everyone’s interest in the issue to prevent the painful history from repeating. Goh Gwi-han

“What changes if you keep digging up the past?” people asked. “Just study hard, if you want to enter a good university,” the students were told. Each time, the students patted each other on the back and said, “Let’s think about the unfairness that the elderly men and women had to suffer in life as victims of forced labor and draft by Japan.” They spent two months, including summer vacation, drawing up a report on the realities of the Labour Corps along with solutions. Their report received the grand prize in the 13th Jeonnam Adolescent History Research Competition organized by the Jeollanam-do Provincial Office of Education last month. This is the story of Bak Da-jeong (11th grade), Choi Gyu-eun (11th grade), Choi Su-jin (10th grade), and Kang Ye-won (10th grade), students at Yeongam Girls High School. In the fifteen-page report, the students explained the colonial rule by Imperial Japan, Battleship Island, Yahata Steel Works, and Tachiso Tunnel along with Japan’s solution to Chinese forced labor and plans and practices to improve awareness.

When the Kyunghyang Shinmun met the students at Yeongam Girls High School on September 25, they were discussing ways to inform people about the history of forced labor along with their supervising teacher, Bak Mi-ae. Bak Da-jeong, the head of the team, said, “We are only starting our mission to tell people that the problem of forced labor is a history that has not ended.”

The girls said they were first drawn to the issue of forced labor after watching the movie, The Battleship Island, in the school’s history study club in March. At first, they shrieked when the actor Song Joong-ki appeared on the screen, but they said they could not sleep after watching the candid portrayal of the situation at the time in the film.

When they later heard news about the Jeonnam Adolescent History Research Competition, they formed a team in July and began their research. The support from their teacher, Bak, who teaches history at the school, was a big help. The girls searched books, articles, and research papers on forced labor every day and gathered in the club room to share and collect information.

They personally made promotional materials to convey historical information with the help of their teacher. They also held a lecture on the topic of forced labor in each classroom, organized a fund raiser, and conducted a survey of sixty students in their school on the topic of forced labor. According to the students, only thirteen students (21.6%) said they knew about the forced labor. They said, “Our textbook only has one or two sentences on forced labor, and we think that’s why we came up with such results.”

The students said they were sorry they couldn’t personally meet the victims of forced labor when working on the report. They contacted the elderly survivors to get their vivid statements, but they could not meet them due to health issues. Instead, the girls interviewed Lee Guk-eon, the chair of the Citizens’ Group on Imperial Japan’s Forced Mobilization. Kang Ye-won said, “It was heartbreaking to hear that the hardships that young students had to suffer was much harsher than portrayed in movies and books and that time was running out for the survivors.” Bak Da-jeong and Choi Su-jin, who sat next to Kang, said, “It was the day we cried the most.”

Bak Da-jeong, Choi Su-jin, and Kang Ye-won dream of becoming a history teacher or scholar like their teacher, Bak Mi-ae. They said telling people about the realities of the forced labor victims was a part of the process of achieving their dreams. They are planning exchanges with Japanese students and lectures in other schools to inform more people about the issue of forced labor. Choi Su-jin called for the attention and support of everyone to prevent such a painful history from repeating and said, “We will lead efforts to inform more people of the undistorted history.” Bak Mi-ae said, “I am proud of the students who ponder and work on how to view and resolve an event that undermined the universal value of humanity from a historical perspective.”