Author: -

Abstracts:
- »Judy Joo‑Ae Bae moves beyond silence to consider other forms of communication and argues that Korean survivors of the sex slavery imposed by the imperial Japanese army in the Second World War are not always silent and neither do they solely speak of their experiences through spoken testimony. By investigating the use of alternative communication modes such as song and dance in Nora Okja Keller’s Comfort Woman (1997), Bae’s chapter offers the argument that the rejection of dominant (male and colonial) ways of expression directs our attention to female solidarity and the remembrance of indescribable atrocities inflicted on women.« (Lim, Yiru and Kit Ying Lye. »Introduction. Reading Trauma and Violence: Expanding Horizons.« Reading Violence and Trauma in Asia and the World. Edited by Yiru Lim et al. Source: New York 2025: p. 6.)

- »Survivors of sexual assault are often imagined as “voiceless” until the moment they break their silence and speak trauma through public, political testimony. Of the 200,000 military sex slaves to the imperial Japanese army, most of whom were Korean, 240 South Koreans have officially registered as a victim. Does this mean that the other Korean survivors are/were “silent”? Military sex slaves to the imperial Japanese army, colloquially known as “comfort women,” do not solely speak through testimony. They also express trauma through various alternative modes of communications such as song, touch, dance, and storytelling as seen in Nora Okja Keller’s 1997 novel, Comfort Woman. In this chapter, I offer deeper understandings of alternative modes of communications which have been disregarded or considered to be less important than public and political speech. More specifically, I investigate the protagonist’s purposeful use of song and touch that “speak” her trauma and reject dominant, male, colonial speech. These alternative forms of communications emphasize female solidarity, transcultural connections, and remembrance of war atrocities committed against women and attempt to reconcile and make sense of experiences that words could not describe. Ultimately, the novel’s language successfully remembers the past, speaks the present, and guides the future.« (Source: Taylor & Francis Online)

Contents:

	Song (p. 169)
	Shamanism (p. 171)
	Conclusion (p. 174)
	Notes (p. 176)
	Works Cited (p. 176)

Wikipedia: History of Asia: History of Japan / Shōwa era | History of Asia: History of Korea / Korea under Japanese rule | History of the Americas: History of the United States | Literature: American literature / Nora Okja Keller | Literature: Works about comfort women / Prostitution: Forced prostitution / Comfort women | Sex and the law: Wartime sexual violence / Wartime sexual violence in World War II | War: Pacific War / Japanese war crimes