CWJC 2017 Summer Lecture Series: "Justice for Comfort Women"

Dear friends,

As you may know, as cofounders of Comfort Women Justice Coalition (CWJC) in San Francisco, our member has been working hard to organize this very rare and special opportunity.

As Prime Minister Abe and the government of Japan has been employing various strategies to undermine the volumes of backbreaking research and documentation to support the undeniable facts of the Japanese Military Sexual Slavery as part of its militaristic past during WWII (for which we Zainichi Koreans in Japan continue to suffer its legacies of colonial racism in postwar Japan), we believe that it is of utmost importance to help reveal more new studies coming out to render the hidden voices of hudnreds of thousands of victims of this horrific system of colonial sexist violence visible, and validated, once and for all. Only then, will justice be won, to pave the way for a future where the fundamental human rights of all girls and women are protected in the world. 

Thanks for your interest, and we hope you can join us!

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Please join us for the CWJC 2017 Summer Lecture Series "Justice for Comfort Women" on July 7th (at SFSU) and July 19th (at Cathay House Restaurant, SF). 

We are delighted to sponsor two lectures by Prof Peipei Qiu (co-sponsored by SFSU Asian American Studies Department) and Prof Su Zhiliang (co-sponsored by Global Alliances), the esteemed authors of the critically acclaimed book, Chinese Comfort Women: Testimonies from Imperial Japan's Sex Slaves (Oxford University Press, 2014). The book has been named Best Book of the Year by the Chinese American Librarians Association and received numerous raving reviews. Publishers Weekly, for example, stated that "This vital work, combining exemplary scholarship and humanitarian activism, should prove valuable to a wide audience and indispensable to specialists."

Professor Qiu's topic is "Comfort Women"-Imperial Japan's Sex Slaves During the Asian Pacific War.  Profesor Su's topic is Road to UNESCO Recognition of Nanjing Massacre and the "Comfort Women" in the Memory of World Register.  

This is a rare opportunity that allows us to learn directly from those scholars on their decades of scholarship that has significantly expanded and revised our understanding of the so-called Japanese Military "Comfort Women" system.  

Professor Peipei Qiu's talk

Fri, July 7, 2017

1:30pm - 3:00pm

San Francisco State University, Library 121

1600 Holloway Avenue, San Francisco

Professor Su Zhiliang's talk

Wed, July 19, 2017

4:30pm - 5:30pm

Cathay House Restaurant

718 California Street, San Francisco 

Banquet with Professor Su Zhilian

at Cathay House Restaurant (after the public lecture)

$25 per person.

Must RSVP at tkinukaw@sfsu.edu 

More information at: www.remembercomfortwomen.org

Upcoming Event: Zainichi-themed Film Screening in Berkeley

YOU ARE CORDIALLY INVITED...

Film screening of The Sky Blue Symphony, a documentary by the Zainichi filmmaker Yeongi Park from Japan about Zainichi Korean youths in "Chosen Gakko" (Korean Schools) in Japan. 

The Director will join us from Osaka in person to show and discuss the film, and share first-hand account of what's going on in our communities on the ground in Japan!

Date: Thursday, March 2, 2017  

Time: 6:00-8:30pm

Location: Room 141, Giannini Hall, UC Berkeley -- off Hearst Street (10 minutes from Downtown Berkeley BART); map link: https://goo.gl/maps/Rs3wovwbXjm)

*FREE! Light refreshments will be served

*Language: Japanese and Korean, with English subtitles

6:00pm Reception with the Director

6:30pm Film Screening

8:00pm Q&A, Discussion with the Director

Join us!! See you there!!

Sponsored by: Eclipse Rising, Zainichi Corean Social Justice Organization

EclipseRising [at] gmail.com

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About Yeong-I Park, DIRECTOR, CINEMATOGRAPHER/DP, EDITOR
Born in Japan in 1975, as a third generation Korean in Japan. Graduated from Kanagawa Korean Middle and High School, and from Korea University in Japan (majored in philosophy). Studied film and movie at the Vantan Academy. His short film “Wearing,” made for the graduation work was shown at film festivals in Japan, North and South Korea. He has participated in motion picture production of many genres since. “Sky Blue Symphony” is a master compilation of his diligent efforts capturing the Korean schools, their students and activities all over Japan for the past decade.

Director Statement

The Korean Schools in Japan, where Koreans born and raised in Japan attend, have a long history of discrimination and persecution. They have been exposed to violence because they have a relationship with North Korea. However, nobody has dealt with the relationship in detail. Though their roots are in South Korea, why do they call North Korea their homeland? Why do they look full of hope and tell their dreams with confidence in spite of so much hardship? I made this film to seek the answer to these questions.

Synopsis

This documentary mainly filmed the 2 week-long trip of the Zainichi Korean students who attend one of Japan's 60 Korean schools to North Korea (DPRK). As third and fourth generation Koreans born and raised in Japan, students' visit to their ancestral home country is profound, as captured in film through their talks, singings, and other interactions with their Korean brethren there. At Panmunjom, which is a symbolic place of the tragic division of our one Korea, looking over to the South, the land of their ancestors’ birthplaces, they are overcome by the realization of the tragedy of the war -- and the deep, indelible mark left upon their own lives and struggle with identity and belonging. What does "homeland" mean to these students, born as "alien" in the former colonial metropole, in a country that refuses to accept them as members of the only society they know to be home, and seek to reclaim their cultural and ancestral heritage through a most vilified country in the world?

Please endorse the 2017 AAAS Resolution Proposal to Support "Comfort Women"

Dear Eclipse Rising supporters,

We have an urgent, time-sensitive request, to endorse the Association for Asian American Studies (AAAS) resolution proposal, “Supporting Remembrance of ‘Comfort Women’ and their Endangered History” before the Feb 10 deadline.

Step 1, Sign up for 2017 membership: Sponsors must be current, 2017 AAAS members or lifetime members. Anyone can become a paid member! If you haven't already renewed your membership, see link below, as we push together to get this resolution approved by the board at the 2017 AAAS conference in Portland! Membership ($40-130): https://aaas.press.jhu.edu/membership/join

Step 2: To endorse, simply fill out this short endorsement form by Feb 10 or sooner: https://docs.google.com/…/1FAIpQLSd0UE_lePJQdfXRZ…/viewform…

In order for the resolution to qualify for a board vote in Portland this year, we need a total of 10 co-sponsors and 100 endorsers, all of whom must be AAAS members for 2017 by the time of the submission (Feb 10). 

So please endorse today, and please help us spread the word by forwarding this message widely to fellow AAAS members (and would-be members)! For your information, an updated letter and resolution proposal to the board are below.

Thank you and we’ll be in touch again soon. In the meantime, please contact us at: comfortwomenresolution@gmail.com.

Thank you,

“Comfort Women” Section Chairs,
Grace J. Yoo, San Francisco State University
Kay Fischer, Chabot College
And “Comfort Women” Section Members