Experience in the International Labor Market and Dilemma as a Nationalist; Focusing on Ju Yo-seop’s Novels Inspired by the Writer’s Overseas Stay​​

Author : Joung Ju-a​​

Page : 73-109

Abstract   

  This paper discusses discrimination and exclusion in international labor markets that a young Korean nationalist writer Ju Yo-seop experienced. Ju went to Shanghai to join the provisional government of Korea just after the March 1st Movement in 1919. Since then, he stayed abroad for about 16 years in Shanghai, Beijing, and California from 1920 to 1940. Based on his overseas experience, he has written some novels. Born in Pyongyang (the North Korean capital of today), he was under the influence of the Pyongyang regional nationalist movement represented by Ahn Chang-ho who asserted “Capacity-enhancing Movement” as the way to gain Korea’s independence; especially emphasizing modernization through industrial development. Ahn had a great influence not only on Korea but also on overseas Koreans. The time in the US and China helped Ju realize that ethnic and class issues can never be separated from the international labor market, a place where racial and ethnic discriminations prevail. He faces a dilemma between preserving the ethnic community and at the same time solving the problems of the classes that exist within it. In this paper, Ju's novels and articles are examined to show Singanhoe was considered by him as an alternative to combine both the survival of ethnic community and abolition of class discrimination.​​

<Key Words>

Ju Yo-seop, To Catch the Cloud, One vs 150 Million, a group of people who have lost their country, Ahn Chang-ho, March 1st Movement, Singanhoe, Capacity-enhancing Movement​