Anonymous
For our project we created a syllabus to be used in a college course on militarized sexual violence in Imperial Japan.
This issue is extremely under taught and many survivors were silenced for the majority of their lives. We wanted to bring this issue to a college setting that can be replicated in universities across the world. We provided specific readings for each week that explore different topics and spark critical conversations.
Overview
Starting during World War II, the Japanese military implemented the largest case of militarized sexual slavery ever recorded. Hundreds of thousands of Korean girls and young women were forced from their homes where they were then raped, beaten, and abused by Japanese soldiers. Some were forced to serve 50-60 men per day, and those who tried to escape were tortured publicly to set an example for others.
Impacts
The abuse that comfort women endured created lifelong trauma, including high rates of infertility, PTSD, and chronic depression. Some studies suggest that the effects of this trauma are passed down generationally through epigenetics. Exposure to stress can alter expression of certain genes that affect stress regulation, which is then passed down to offspring. Many survivors also feel a strong sense of shame about their past, causing them to stay quiet about their experiences. Additionally, symptoms of trauma can be unintentionally passed down through the parenting methods of trauma survivors, namely parental modeling of guilt, which leads to feelings of shame and guilt in children.
Activism
Starting in the 1990s, survivors began to come forward and share their experiences. Several women have testified in front of the US House of Representatives about the abuse they suffered, and urged the Japanese government for a formal apology. Since then, many movements have emerged to advocate for the topic. The organization CARE is involved in advocacy and activism in both the United States and South Korea and has urged the Japanese government to take legal responsibility for the abuse they perpetrated. They have also created curriculum outlines to teach about the history of comfort women in California public high schools.
