Korean+War+Interview+Project+Seung+Woo+Eun+C+Block

=Seung Woo Eun = =Korean War Interview =

=Interview Questions: = 1. Please introduce yourself with your name, age, and background. 2. How did you view the war? Did you support the South or North? 3. What were the restraints from the officials? 4. In your opinion, what was the cause of the war? 5. How did you escape war-sites? 6. How did North Korea treat the ones captured? 7. What was education like? 8. What are your views on unification? Is it possible? 9. How did the government use propaganda? 10. How did status affect role in military? 11. What do you think about the 38th parallel? 12. What was life like after the war? 13. What is your opinion on Stalin and Kim IL Sung?

=Release Form =



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= = =Video = PART 1 media type="file" key="asian studies part 1 swe.mov" PART 2 media type="file" key="asian study swe part 2.mov" PART 3 media type="file" key="asian study swe part 3.mov" PART 4 media type="file" key="asian study swe part 4.mov"

=Summary =

media type="file" key="asian.mp3"

=Analysis Questions =


 * 1) How does your interviewee's testimony fit in with what you have learned about the experience of civilians?**

My interviewee, my grandfather, is a perfect testimony for Korean War interview because he was a Korean middle school when the war actually occurred. Because he was too young to be a soldier, he was able to describe the lives of the civilians including himself. Though the event took place around 50 years ago, he was able to clearly explicate the experience, which shows that the war had a significant affect on his psychological aspects. Some of the ideas about the lives of the civilians that I learned during class were actually mentioned by my grandfather. For example, people went through starvation because food was taken away from them, and how they had no ideas about how the war actually started. He also referred to the rivers and lakes as blood rivers and lakes where civilians who tried to cross over were shot to dead. Finally, my grandfather shared a story of him hiding in mountains, which was similar to the descriptions of the readings from the packets. For example, readings from Toll of Innocence and Shattered Faith share stories how Hongyoung tried to cross from North to South by bridges and the obstacles she went through. Though my grandfather moved from places to places within South Korea, the cost of starvation, fear, and memories of dead innocent civilians can be viewed in similar aspects.


 * 2) Using your background knowledge try to contextualize their testimony. How do you think major events of the war affected their life at the time?**

Before the interview, I acknowledged that the civilians of Koreans had gone through starvation all the way and had to move from places to places abundant times. When the interview was over, I perceived that the way the South Korean government treated their citizen affected in how civilians such as my grandfather had to live in adverse conditions. It is true fact that South Korea had poor weapons and was unprepared for the war, but the government should have made arrangements for the citizens to be secured. The greatest crisis was the loss of rice when the Japanese conquered Korea. Japanese conquer on Korea created even more adverse conditions for South Korea because nothing was left over. No militaristic power and no food affected civilians to live with nothing. For example, my grandfather had no shoes and no shirts that he had to walk on bare foot. This just shows how poor the civilians were at the time of war and how the so-called government did nothing to help them to stay safely. This perhaps portray the limitations South Korea had when facing major communist nations such as China and Soviet Union under poor conditions left by the Japanese.


 * 3) Hypothesize or explain how you interviewee was able to stay out of danger.**

The time period of Mr. Eun’s birth played a major role in surviving the war. If he was born two or three years faster, he probably would have been taken away to be one of the frontier soldiers for the South Korean army. Still, he had abundant obstacles to overcome to survive the war. Moving from places to places by foot has been one of the major issues because it took days and days to transfer and dangers were all over the places. When the Soviets and North Koreans pushed all the way back up to Busan, Mr. Eun thought that he would be soon dead. He actually admired Captain Macarthur for his actions in the Incheon port. Even though Korea pushed all the way back up till the 38th parallel, my grandfather still hid in the mountains and lived a sneaky life because he feared of the continuous war. The lifestyle in mountains could perhaps been a successful strategy for Mr. Eun’s survival of the war. Though he lost one of his sisters, who has currently successfully returned to South Korea, Mr. Eun praises the UN and McArthur as savors of the South Koreans from the communist attack.

=Essay: =

The context of history can be viewed from different perspectives. Therefore, the truth about the war is rarely known. Furthermore, history textbooks are biased towards its nations, some sort of self-integrity, which can make different views of the events differently from others who learned the same material differently. Even with these obstacles, interviewing a civilian of the Korean War develops one possible idea how the civilians of the South felt during that time. Because my grandfather did not participate in the army, his explanation of the civilians was more vivid. He was in a generation where he did not actively involve with the war, but one of the many civilians who suffered the war both mentally and physically. Starvation and continuous fleet perhaps could be described as the most suffering events of the war. It was interesting how my grandfather had different opinions about the reunification of Korea. He actually had affinity of the North Korea and wanted a reunification.

The interview with my grandfather, Du Ha Eun, added more realistic events to the historical context of the Korean War. It is evident that starvation is present in time of wars, but historical contexts rarely explain how civilians overcame starvation or any alternative methods in their lifestyles. For example, because the Japanese took all the food away from Korea when they left Korea, Korea went into the war with nothing. When the North Koreans took everything from the South Koreans who had merely nothing, their lives were devastating and miserable. In these adverse conditions, Koreans hid food under the mud and came back during midnight to lessen their starvation. The interview also provided some new facts about the lives of the civilians during the Korean War. For example, when my grandfather attended middle school, the principal was a communist and he would stress communism to his students. Just like the movie, there were converts who actually taught in the South in this case. The interpretation of the coverts in the South delineates how there would have been both communistic and democratic movements within same region, which could have confused the way the civilians thought.

Primary sources are often more accurate and show the realistic views of the war. The event of hiding in mountains and continuous fleet by walking shows how much the civilians feared the danger of the war. My grandfather was luckily enough to survive the war to give an explanation of the war. He criticized how armed forces told them to evacuate the place, but never aided in fleeting. The arm forces would move by cars, but civilians had to always fleet by foot, which took days and days. All these examples that a civilian went through just shows the cruelty of war. By the end of the interview, it was evident that Korean War should be remembered for the remaining years to grasp the idea that war should not happen between any nations. When considering human ethics, one should sympathize the death of innocent civilians; thus, avoid any cruelty of wars. It was also clear how the civilians of the South thought Kim Il-Sung as the villain of the Korean War. This idea is probably biased as a South Korean, but the fact that Kim Il-Sung refused the unification at first and attempted to take over with the aid of Soviets show his own ambition to dictate the nation just like Stalin and Mao. The past is over and the nation as a whole should concern about Korea’s future. It is debatable whether reunification will benefit both nations and it is unsure whether the reunification would actually occur or not. Thus, it is ardent to decide which choices are right, which is the continuous debate that all generations would face.