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DARE TO DREAM IN THE MIDST OF WAR.

1945. Rice fields seem endless in a quaint farming village of South Korea, yet Iseul the villagers have been starving for as long as they can remember. Their Japanese colonizers have taken every last grain with them as they are finally forced out of the Peninsula. In the newly independent Korea, Iseul and Jung-Soo dream of what their future might bring. Yet, war is on the horizon, and Iseul has fallen for an alleged North Korean communist spy.

Men are conscripted and rice is taken to feed the growing army as the Peninsula is thrust into an international war that would determine if the strategic region will become communist or democratic. With nothing but the news of death and hunger awaiting the village of women, children and the aged, Iseul musters up whatever hope she has left to bring the village together to make paper. Soon, the village once known for its rice, becomes famous for its paper, becoming a beacon of hope for their battle-worn soldiers awaiting letters from their loved ones.

In the current international climate where North Korea takes center stage, “Forgotten Reflections” weaves an inspirational tale of family, lost memories, folklore and an unforgotten history, spanning three generations as South Korea rises from the ashes.

 

About

Young-Im was born in Mokpo, South Korea and relocated to Manila, Philippines at the age of one where she grew up in an international environment. Young-Im graduated from Seoul National University with a B.A. in English Literature and an M.A.  from the University of York (UK) in English Literary Studies. She is currently pursuing her Ph.D. in Comparative Literature at the University of Oregon.

“Like any other third culture kids, I returned to my ‘passport’ or home country to find that the stories my mother told me about Korea were far from the truth. For the next 10 years, I struggled with what it means to be Korean. After spending over a year living with my grandmother, I was struck with the realization that my life was diametrically different from the one that my grandmother lived as a young woman in South Korea, not just because I was an expat Korean, but due to the fact that the war that had marked my grandmother’s generation was nowhere to be seen in modernized South Korea. Today, I am grateful to be in a vibrant academic environment in which I can explore topics I deeply care about such diaspora, postcolonial studies, transpacific studies, Korean and Southeast Asian studies.”

 

Contact

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