News

Songs of healing and hope for Jeju, Yeosu-Suncheon, and Gwangju

Special concert held on the 74^th anniversary of 4·3 and 10·19 and the 42^nd anniversary of 5·18

A concert to heal the painful history and usher in new hope was held in the three regions of Jeju, Yeosu, and Gwangju.

Under the theme “Again, in Spring, Dreaming of Hope with You,” the special concert commemorated the 74^th anniversary of Jeju 4·3 and Yeosu-Sunchon 10·19 (Yeo-Sun 10·19) and the 42^nd Anniversary of the May 18 Democratization Movement (5·18 Gwangju Democratization Movement). Starting with a performance on April 28 at the Jeju Arts Center, the commemorative event then moved to the Yeulmaru Arts Center in Yeosu (I assume) the following day, ending with the final performance on May 24 at the Bitgoeul Citizen (Citizens?) Cultural Center in Gwangju.

The purpose of the special concert is to heal the wounds of Jeju 4·3 victims and share the values of peace, human rights, democracy, and integration through the 5·18 Gwangju Democratization Movement and Yeo-Sun 10·19. It was hosted by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Gwangju Metropolitan Government, and was organized by the Jeju 4·3 Peace Foundation, Gwangju Cultural Foundation (CEO: Hwang Pung-nyun), and Yeosu Symphony Orchestra (Representative: Moon Jeong-suk). The Gwangju Culture and Art (not Arts?) Center and Gwangju Metropolitan Opera for You (That’s its official name?) co-sponsored the event. Of the songs performed on the stage, “Homeland” and “Jireumtteok Rice Cake” (It’s not giruemtteok? Maybe I’ve always misheard the name, or that is the Jeju word for it, or they are different kinds.) were included. These songs are pieces from the creative opera titled “Sun-i Samch’on” (composed by Choe Jeong-hoon), which is a number opera (what is a number opera? Is that supposed to be “another opera?” or “a number from an opera”?) adopted from Hyun Ki-young’s novel on Jeju 4·3 with the same title and which received a favorable review. (the book or the opera received a favorable review?) Pieces of music composed to shed new light on Yeo-Sun 10·19 and express the suffering of victims were also performed, including “The Living Dead or the Dead Living” and “No More Silence” from the creative opera “Silence in 1948” (composed by Choe Jeong-hoon). The opera numbers (I’m wondering if “number” is too casual for opera. Maybe “the opera pieces” in all these cases—or pieces for the opera, etc) also included “What Should I Do” and “We Are Here” from “Peppermint Candy” (composed by Lee Geon-yong), a creative opera adopted from Lee Chang-dong’s film with the same title.

Then, “A Song of the Nameless” was sung by the 4·3 Peace Chorus and the Club Jaja Children’s Chorus. The entire event was concluded with the performance of “Gwangju in May”, an adaptation of “March for the Beloved” as a piano concerto.

The concert featured art director Kang Hye-myeong (soprano), conductor Park Seung-yu (Jeju Prime Orchestra), pianist Dong Su-jeong, tenor Yoon Beyong-gil, mezzo-soprano Shin Seong-hee, baritone Lee Jong-hyeon, soprano Yoon Han-na, tenor Kim Shin-gyun, and child singers Kang On-yu and Lee Kang-woo.

News

Inheriting values of peace and human rights reflected in 4·3: The first street march in three years

Jeju 4·3 Peace Foundation invites college students for peace march and plans to promote various other projects

[A march of college students passes through the Nammun Intersection in Jungang-ro, Jeju City]

Jeju 4·3 Peace Foundation began the College Students 4·3 Peace March in 2015 and has since supported the autonomous memorial events organized by the nation’s undergraduates during the annual 4·3 week.

With the 2020 global outbreak of coronavirus, however, the foundation inevitably canceled the program, which was based on a rally and a street march. Nonetheless, the Korea Federation of National and Public University Student Associations, Korea Federation of Education University Students Associations, and Jeju-based college students replaced the street march with a contact-free event for the 4·3 week, carrying out various programs in their respective locations. And when the spread of COVID-19 began to ease in April 2022, college students in the Jeju region resumed the street campaign. It has become possible to promote programs that befit the intent of the College Students 4·3 Peace March.

 

Street march: Jeju youth raise voices for resolution of 4·3

On April 1, 2022, the Jeju College Students 4·3 Peace March was held by Jeju National University’s Student Union “US” (President Yang Woo-seok), Jeju Tourism University’s Student Union “Tie” (President Lee Yoon-hee), Jeju International University’s Student Union “Stone Wall” (President Yang Ji-hyeok), and the election campaign headquarters of Cheju Halla University’s Student Union “Youth” (Presidential candidate Lee Gyeong-seok). On the day, more than 200 local college students marched on the streets in Jeju City, starting from Gwandeokjeong Pavilion, through the intersections around Jungang Rotary, the Citizen’s Center, and Gwangyang Rotary, until they reached the front gate of Jeju City Hall. The street march was concluded with a joint statement, where the young men and women in Jeju vowed to inherit the values of peace and human rights reflected in Jeju 4·3.

The local college students were determined to raise their voices, just as their foregoers, including college students and other young locals, took the lead in resolving Jeju 4·3. “We sincerely hope that the people of Jeju will be able to wholeheartedly welcome the spring with the just resolution of Jeju 4·3,” they said.

In particular, the Jeju-based students expressed their commitment to inherit the values of peace and human rights reflected in Jeju 4·3 and unanimously urged the government to swiftly supplement the special clauses on family relations in the Jeju 4·3 Special Act and take ensuing measures. The students also demanded that the United States admit its responsibility for Jeju 4·3 and officially apologize to the victims and their families. Finally, the young Jeju residents emphasized the need for President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol to fulfill his campaign pledge to resolve Jeju 4·3.

Prior to the street march, the students volunteered to place condolence flowers in front of the 3,982 headstones for the missing Jeju 4·3 victims in the Jeju 4·3 Peace Park, praying for the rest of the souls of the deceased.

[Local college students volunteered to place condolence flowers in the Tombstone Park for the Missing.]

Popularizing 4·3 nationwide: students from around Korea join in commemorative event

The student unions of 21 colleges around Korea, including 13 colleges of national or public universities, eight educational colleges, and four Jeju-based colleges, set up and operated the Memorial Altar for the Jeju 4·3 Victims in their respective Student Union Halls or in other sites on campus. Visitors to the memorial altar were given a booklet, “Jeju 4·3 at a Glance,” to aid their understanding of Jeju 4·3, along with a camellia flower pin.

The national or public universities whose student unions participated in the program include: Seoul National University, Kangwon National University, Hanbat National University, Korea National University of Cultural Heritage, Jeonbuk National University, Incheon National University, Mokpo National University, Chungbuk National University, Kunsan National University, Korea National University of Transportation, Pusan National University, Chungnam National University, and Seoul National University of Science and Technology. The list of the educational colleges that joined the event is as follows: Jeju National University’s Teachers’ College, Jeonju National University of Education, Busan National University of Education, Chuncheon National University of Education, Seoul National University of Education, Gongju National University of Education, Gwangju National University of Education, and Korea National University of Education. In the Jeju region, the student unions of Jeju National University, Jeju National University’s Teachers’ College, Cheju Halla University, and Jeju Tourism University participated in the campaign.

Each college of Jeju National University also held diverse memorial programs on their own.

The College of Humanities staged the 4·3 Remembrance Challenge with the concept of Baekbi, a nameless monument in the Jeju 4·3 Peace Memorial Hall, where students were encouraged to leave comments related to 4·3, which is yet to be properly named. The college also offered a curated exhibition on 4·3, based on which a “Golden Bell” quiz contest was held to provide prize money to students with outstanding performances. These programs helped attract public attention by creating an opportunity for young people to feel a sense of achievement.

The College of Education produced and operated a space for a memorial record. In the space, visitors could leave memorial comments. A video on Jeju 4·3 was also screened and a quiz event was held in each department.

The Teachers’ College hosted different contests with the theme of Jeju 4·3, where participants created poems, slogans, and two-line acrostic poems.

 

“Come visit Jeju National University’s Little Exhibition Hall on 4·3”

In April, with the heated momentum generated along with the College Students 4·3 Peace March, a permanent exhibition hall on Jeju 4·3 was set up on the campus of Jeju National University for the first time. The university’s 54^th Student Union “Us” and the Jeju 4·3 Peace Foundation turned the meeting room on the third floor of the Student Union Hall into the Little Exhibition Hall on 4·3, so that students can reflect on the historic event at any time. The exhibition hall consists of four exhibitions, a permanent memorial altar, and a video screening corner. The exhibits are titled “Jeju 4·3 Timeline”, “Jeju 4·3 Is a Historical Event of the Republic of Korea”, “A Photographic Revisit to Jeju National University’s Movement to Discover the Truth of Jeju 4·3”, and “College Students 4·3 Peace March – We Walked Together”.

The Jeju 4·3 Timeline was designed with the help of Park Gyeong-hoon, artist and Jeju 4·3 Peace Park consultative committee and Memorial Hall head who graduated from the university’s Department of Fine Arts. The photos showing the university’s movement to reveal the truth of Jeju 4·3 were donated by Kim Gi-sam, a Jeju-born photographer who captured the scenes on film in the middle of the movement.

Yang Woo-seok, president of the Jeju National University Student Union, said the student representatives created the space with the idea of enabling visitors to easily access the site in their daily lives and learn about Jeju 4·3. “We sincerely hope that all students will stop by at least once and reflect on Jeju 4·3 as part of the nation’s history,” he urged. Koh Hee-bum, director of the Jeju 4·3 Peace Foundation, stated that it is not easy to permanently provide space for education on 4·3 within the school premises. He also expressed his gratitude, saying that he was touched by how the students try to inherit their foregoers’ efforts to clarify the truth of Jeju 4·3. “Those who previously led the movement would be very proud of them,” he added. The Little Exhibition Hall on 4·3 will be open permanently throughout the year and will be managed and operated jointly by the Jeju National University Student Union and the Jeju 4·3 Peace Foundation’s Camellia Supporters.

Review – Eve Event of Memorial Ceremony for Jeju 4·3 Victims

Overcoming the Era of Stigmatization and Discrimination

Kim Jin-cheol

Writer and Board Member of Writers Association of Jeju

[Musical team “Tunes” stages a performance hoping for national liberation and disapproving of tragic national division.]

The eve event of the 74^th Memorial Ceremony for the Victims of Jeju 4·3, hosted by the Jeju 4·3 Peace Foundation and planned by the Jeju Federation of People’s Art Association, was held under the theme of “Overcoming the Stigmatization and Discrimination.”

Last year, the pre-event of the memorial ceremony focused on “unremembered names,” while the program this year addressed the issue of “stigmatization and discrimination” that the people of Jeju had to endure due to Jeju 4·3. The tragic event that swept over Jeju left the island with an unwanted stigma. The stigma of being a “red island,” attached to the region after the March 10 General Strike of 1947, took away the lives and livelihoods of innumerable Jeju residents. Because of that stigma, many of them were convicted under false charges in trials by unlawful courts-martial, and many later went missing. The stigma did not disappear for decades and plagued the people of Jeju. They were unable to escape the yoke of the guilt-by-association system under the charge that their family members were associated with the armed resistance forces. Some even got involved in fabricated cases where they were falsely accused of being spies and had to serve jail terms. For decades, how on earth could the people of Jeju bear the burden of the stigma? Taking this into consideration, attempts were made to unravel their unspoken memories with art during the eve event this year.

The gala concert featured a musical under the theme of the eve event, where the story of an elderly man’s life was told on the stage. The man represents so many others who walked the tragic path of fate regardless of their own will due to the stigma of Jeju 4·3. His father was killed under the false charge of being a rioter during Jeju 4·3. For this reason, he has been pointed out by people as the child of a rioter since he was little. One of the most severe aspects of damage caused by Jeju 4·3 was the merciless destruction of the family-based community. If any of one’s family members died after being accused of being a rioter, he or she was left with the lasting stigma of being “red” (a commie). Then, the person would have no choice but to blame the family member whose sentencing twisted his or her life. However, the memories of victims’ families are full of sorrow for their loved ones. In the musical, the elderly man misses his father whose face he doesn’t even remember. The feelings he has would not be different from what other bereaved families have felt.

[President Kim Dong-hyeon of Jeju Federation of People’s Art Association, Acting Governor Koo Man-seob of Jeju Special Self-Governing Province, Chairperson Oh Im-jong of the Association of the Bereaved Families of Jeju 4·3 Victims, and President Koh Hee-bum of the Jeju 4·3 Peace Foundation give a memorial speech (Upper left). A play of gestures and sounds, titled “Memories That Are Left Unspoken”, is performed on the stage.]

After an accidental encounter with a relative, the man is imprisoned under a false accusation of working as a spy who sought to overthrow the state, and another bridle of stigma is put on him. It is said that the nation’s fabricated espionage cases involve significantly more residents of Jeju than those of other regions. The reason traces back to the islanders’ experience of Jeju 4·3. Given the nation’s divided situation, those bearing the stigma of espionage have been completely excluded from society. The innocent people who were unexpectedly branded as spies had to endure lives where they could not even dream of anything.

In the story, the elderly man’s father and other prisoners who were falsely accused and convicted due to Jeju 4·3 are finally acquitted in the retrial held several decades after the unlawful courts-martial ruling. Although the cases of social stigmatization decreased as the truth of Jeju 4·3 was investigated and the stories of deaths due to false charges were known to the public, the record of conviction still shackles the lives of victims. Unfortunately, most of the victims have passed away without resolving their sorrow. The good news is that some of them have finally escaped the legal stigma as they were acquitted in the retrial of the courts-martial trials that had lacked due process. Due to this, they can now shout out with dignity, “I am not guilty,” which they have said only to themselves for decades. Monologues told by the elderly man in the story deliver the “unspoken memories” he carried deep in his heart. These memories had been forcibly sealed by state power over the past years. The man had nowhere to turn to when wanting to speak of his family, the horrific experience of Jeju 4·3, and the unfairness of the guilt-by-association system. Since he was not allowed to bring up the topic for several decades, the memories must have remained a lump in his mind. We can only vaguely guess the feelings of victims’ families that has hardened like calluses when they say, “Back then, everyone lived a hard life, and what should we talk about now after so many years have passed?” They had to remain silent for a long time because of state power, but inside, there must be countless cries that have yet to be expressed. These “unspoken memories” were expressed with dancers’ performances. The dancers’ gestures, which took place in silence for two minutes without any background music, are an attempt to reveal the inner cries of the Jeju people that were not expressed outwardly. Each and every gesture of the dancers conveyed through the body allowed the audience to feel the weight of Jeju people’s lives reflected in their silence. “The silence of 74 years was a deeper cry than a two-minute silence. It was a silent scream,” was explained in the introduction of the performance. How many cries of grief and how many screams of pain did they have to hold in their hearts? In the ensuing performance of singing Arirang, I wanted the audience to feel catharsis when the victims’ pent-up sorrows that were not spoken of burst into the singing of Arirang. The lyrics, “Let’s sing confidently of the stories hidden in Halla Mountain” and “I go over the pass of Jeju 4·3”, mean that beyond the years of silence, we should change the “unspoken memories” to “the speakable memories”.

[The eve event featured performances by Kim Dae-ik, a Jeju-born folk singer (left), and Jeong Tae-choon, a singer also known as a “troubadour” of the time.]

Aside from the musical, many musicians of different generations performed on the stage. The Jeju 4·3 Peace Choir, consisting of a children’s choir and Jeju 4·3 victims’ relatives, sang songs conveying the values reflected in Jeju 4·3, while pop singers such as Kim Tae-ik, Jang Sa-ik, and Ahn Ye-eun expressed a memorial tribute by singing their own songs. The song that the entire group of artists sang together at the finale was “Evergreen”. What would be the unchanging values of Jeju 4·3 that we should inherit, just like the unchanging evergreen trees? Previously, President Moon Ja-in said in his memorial speech that Jeju 4·3 will “serve as a compass for human rights, life, peace, and unity for those coming generations heading for a better world”. It is our responsibility to hand down to the next generation the values of Jeju 4·3 that do not end only as memories of what happened in the past but help to stop similar tragedies from happening in the future. In that sense, we can take a step together toward a better future by honoring the victims every year.

[A choral piece by Evergreen is performed.]

Furthermore, reviving the unspoken memories that have been stuck in ideology is another task of ours in properly valuing Jeju 4·3, just as President Kim Dong-hyeon of the Jeju Federation of People’s Art Association said, “Just as the painful day is remembered, the enthusiastic shout every April should also be spoken of as a part of the truthful history.”

“Do-ol” Kim Yong-ok said Jeju 4·3 values “self-reliance” and “independence”. We need to approach the substantive truth about what kind of society Koreans dreamed of after national liberation and for what innumerable people were sacrificed. Only then will “Baekbi,” that lies without a title, be able to be inscribed with the true name of Jeju 4·3.

Political circles always refer to the complete resolution of Jeju 4·3. I wonder what they mean by speaking of the complete resolution. Questions remain over whether they believe financial compensation will be enough to completely resolve what the people of Jeju experienced for several decades. There are still a lot of tasks to be carried out. So many people remain shackled with stigma, while it is difficult to find traces of the missing victims. We should also make more concerted efforts to excavate the remains of those that are buried somewhere. On top of that, the issue of who should be held responsible for Jeju 4·3 has not been properly addressed. A monument to the person who ordered the killing of Jeju people is erected on Jeju’s soil, while there remain memories that are sealed just like the entrance of Darangshigul Cave. Without solving these issues, the complete resolution of Jeju 4·3 will be nothing more than an empty slogan. It is my understanding that everyone shares a common desire concerning Jeju 4·3. I believe that there will be a day when we can get rid of the outdated shackles of stigmatization and discrimination and restore the unspoken memories. With the COVID-19 situation getting a little better, the eve event of this year was attended by many people. I hope that it was a time for some people to comfort their pain from the past events, and a time for others to dream of a hopeful future.