The Comfort Women: Sexual Violence and Postcolonial Memory in Korea and Japan (Worlds of Desire: The Chicago Series on Sexuality, Gender, and Culture)

After rereading the book recently, I have renewed respect for Professor Soh – she has taken a very courageous step to reject the ‘master narrative’ of the comfort women issue by providing so much on the historical background of Korea as well as revealing information on many of the comfort women survivors, facts that are conveniently left out by activists of the redress movement. It is no wonder that Chong Dae Hyup, the main organization that promotes the movement in South Korea, no longer wants to do anything with Professor Soh, but her name not being on the list of academics supporting the 2015 Open Letter in Support of Historians in Japan, an attempt to pressure Japan to further acknowledge and once again account for the ‘past wrongs,’ really speaks volumes.More than anyone in American academia, she fully understands the complexity of the issue as demonstrated in her extensive research, and she is undoubtedly the most qualified to discuss the matter objectively, having received education in Japanese, Korean, and English. Moreover, she is currently a resident and scholar in the United States, making her independent of any activist groups from overseas, which allows her to speak freely without compromising academic integrity. While I personally do not support transnational feminism which is what the professor identifies herself with, this book must be thoroughly studied in order to partake in any reasonable discussion on the issue of Imperial Japan’s Comfort Women system. A solid 4.5 stars for the depth of the research and the overall objectivity that is maintained throughout the book.

This book provides a much-needed alternate angle of the comfort women experiences. Because the era and the situation was so tragic, most accounts are written in a narrative that everything was terrible, all of these women hated every aspect of their miserable lives, and that is the only way to interpret this time in history. C. Sarah Soh comes in and offers to tell the largely ignored accounts of the women that had neutral or even positive things to say about things that happened to them. She is not glorifying anything that happened at this time, just offering the testimonies that do not fit into the popular narrative. The events of this period are still tragic, and I support the survivors' seeking closure by way of an official apology, but I appreciate being able to see more sides of the situation to get a fuller picture.Only fours stars because sometimes the writing got awkward, like when she would unnecessarily provide the Korean pronunciation for a random word. Some made sense because they were thematic and appeared often throughout the book, but others seemed to just be there as a reminder that you are reading about people in another country who spoke another language.

... and most definitely NOT for casual readers or those who are not willing to re-examine their preconceived ideas and views of the wartime comfort women. This work is likewise ill-suited for those who aren't serious readers of history.C. Sarah Soh, as a native Korean who was fortunate to receive formal education both in her homeland and abroad, has produced a masterful examination of a controversial issue involving Korea and Japan which people from both countries have long oversimplified.Koreans generally believe that Imperial Japan's leadership ordered, planned, and executed the gunpoint kidnapping of thousands of Korean females and summarily shipped them like chattel to frontline brothels.Japanese people - at least those who know this issue - either agree that the Koreans were largely victimized, or claim that this is a gross fabrication and that the comfort women were essentially willing prostitutes.Professor Soh cites several examples, such as interviews with survivors, to show that the truth is far more complex. Some survivors stated they were not forcibly taken by Japanese troops. Others are shown to have bought their way to freedom with earnings - earnings??? Yes. Hence the question - if the comfort women were slaves, they wouldn't have had wages. Then what were they: slaves or prostitutes or something else?Additionally, Professor Soh does the reader a huge service by detailing the sociocultural contexts of 1930s-1940s Korea and Japan. Information on views on sex, women, and the sexism that characterized pre-modern Korean and Japanese societies is provided, thus presenting the reader with a better understanding of what facilitated the existence of "sex care work" in both societies. Anyone familiar with Korea and Japan today will be aware that extramarital affairs have been generally tolerated, historically speaking, and that older men have often availed themselves of sexual services provided by far younger women.The comfort women issue did not happen in a vacuum. Japanese generals didn't wake up one day, deciding to 'award' their enlisted men with females to sate their urges, and they didn't decide to violently seize thousands of Korean women at will. As a reader of Korean ethnicity myself, I know this is a painful subject, and I personally believe there were abductions. But as the attentive reader will see, the story is far more diverse and much more complicated that flag-waving nationalists on either side of the East Sea (or, as some call it, the Sea of Japan), would want us to believe.It is worth noting (somewhat of a spoiler alert) that Professor Soh was shunned and coldly treated by South Koreans who are involved in the redress movement after those activists learned of the fruits of her research. I wonder why. Did Professor Soh's findings upset their ostensibly benign agenda? Is there something she uncovered the redress activists preferred not to even know and prefer that their compatriots remain ignorant of?If the comfort women issue is of any interest to you, read this book. It is a must-have in the library of any serious student of Korea's modern history.

Fantastic work viewing the comfort women issue in light of gender issues. Well-researched and footnoted, and yet written in a very accessible way that's an easy read.

I enjoyed reading this book, because it has a balanced yet in-depth look at the Comfort Women in Korea. It was educating yet sobering to learn about all the different complicated circumstances that lead to militarized prostitution.

it`s good!!

This has become a painful read. Not the material - just the author and her facination with big words. It's been mentioned previously in other comments. She also loves to add suffixes to make basic words seem big as well. Overall the book doesn't flow well. I've still got to finish the book for a college class but dreading it.

This is an amazing book and puts this sensitive issue of comfort women in perspective. Anyone who wants to really understand the background how this could have happened without the sensationalism of the modern times should read this book. The author comes from the same culture as most of the comfort women and understands the reasons much better than any non Asian person could. It makes us understand why it took so many years after the war for these victims to try and find justice and at the same time understand much better the Japanese reaction, even to this day to all the claims and calls for apologies.It's not an easy to read book and almost reads like a study book, probably because of the author is a professor of anthropoly and she explains that clearly in her reasons for writing this history, which is very well re-searched.It leans heavily on the Korean culture and ways of life starting from before the war right up to the modern day, for reason that the majority of the comfort women were from Korean origin but goes on to explain how everything changed as the war progressed. I think a must-read for anybody interested in this sad chapter of history which tends or tended to be forgotten, but even by reading the book reasons for that can be clearly understood. Equally well anyone interested in Chinese, Korean and Japanese culture and history should read this book.

往々にして売春は自由意志ではなく、強制によってなされることが多い。ヨーロッパに多いロシア人売春婦はロシアマフィアが管理、強制しているように。強制的に戦争中に性労働を強いられた犠牲者の方には国籍を問わず同情を禁じ得ない。しかしながら、強制といっても、親に売られた、朝鮮の業者に騙されたなどの結果としての強制であり、日本軍、あるいは官憲が拉致して売春をさせたという証拠はインドネシアに於けるオランダ人の例を除いて存在しない。本書にもあるように韓国人元慰安婦の供述は変遷しており、韓国世論への迎合の可能性が高い。しかしながら、慰安所を管理していたのは日本軍であり、その恩恵？を受けていたのも日本軍兵士であるから、道義的責任について謝罪の必要はあるとは思うが、すでに日本国政府は謝罪している。さらに日本と韓国の間の財産、請求権一切の完全かつ最終的な解決が日韓基本条約で確認されている。いわゆる従軍慰安婦の問題は朝日新聞の誤報によって多くの女性が拉致されたとの誤解が広まったことが火に油を注いだ面が大きく、本書のように、韓国人の立場としては比較的客観的な内容は評価に値すると思う。

口調というか、書き方からすれば、慰安婦制度がひどかったと思われているように聞こえてきますが、韓国の歴史家も強制の証拠が見つからず、有名なもと慰安婦も任意参加という証拠について言及していますので、妙にバランスがとれているように思います。大まかに言うと著者の結論は、（義理の父を含めての）親戚は借金返済などのため娘たちを売ることがあるから、前払い売春制度は、女性の家族が一度前払い金を貰ったら、女性は性の奴隷ですので、ひどいとのご意見だと思います。和訳があればよいと思います。おすすめしたいです。

This should be mandatory reading in Japanese schools