[KS] Naming Kwangju, May 1980

[Don Baker]

Personally, I prefer a much less used name for what happened in Kwangju in May, 1980--the Kwangju Resistance Movement. After all, "democracy movement" is too tame for what went on there (armed resistance to government brutality) and "uprising" implies that the people in Kwangju rose up first rather than rising up only after the government  viciously attacked them. However, I, too, am usually forced to use one of the more common labels you mention, since, if I write "Kwangju Resistance movement," I have to explain why I use that unusual label.  There is a difference in the way most Koreans use "Kwangju Uprising" and "Kwangju Democracy Movement."   Kwangju Democracy Movement was not what it was called in Kwangju in the 1980s (then it was called the "Kwangju massacre"). That term was imposed as a way to downplay how violent those ten days in Kwangju were. So people who want to treat what happened in Kwangju as simply one manifestation of the the broader peaceful democratization movement in the 1970s and 1980s refer to it as a democracy movement. However, those who see Kwangju citizens as inspired by a burning desire for both democracy and social justice prefer to call it the Kwangju Minjung Hangjaeng. I suspect that's what people are thinking of when they talk about the "Kwangju People's Uprising." Only a few of those who were actually in Kwangju in May, 1980, would use that term. Those who were there realize that the vast majority of the participants in the citizens' uprising were not thinking of about broader issues of democracy and social justice. They were primarily concerned with saving their lives and the lives of their friends and family members. In other words, the "Kwangju Uprising" was mostly about self-defense, as well as anger at gratuitous military brutality.  Don Baker ProfessorDepartment of Asian Studies University of British Columbia Vancouver, Canada V6T 1Z2 don.baker at ubc.ca

Date: Sat, 12 Nov 2011 10:51:17 -0800
From: djtorrey at yahoo.com
To: koreanstudies at koreaweb.ws
Subject: [KS] (no subject)

Dear List Members,
Forgive my ignorance, but in English-speaking circles, is it acceptable to refer to what happened in Kwangju in May 1980 as "The Kwangju Uprising"? I see both "Kwangju [People's] Uprising" and "Kwangju Democracy Movement" used interchangeably, although in Korean-language sources, in line with the official re-naming in 1988, the proper name is the translation of "Kwangju Democracy Movement," that is, 광주 민주화 운동 (Kwangju minjuwha undong). I'm assuming that English-language sources use both "Uprising" and "Democracy Movement" because "uprising" doesn't have the negative connotation of 반란 pallan/ballan (rebellion) or 내란 naeran (civil unrest), which is what the movement was referred to before the official re-evaluation and re-naming. (Then again, from a Western
 outsider's perspective, would "rebellion" and "civil unrest" have the same negative connotation that they would from a perspective internal to the Korean context?)
Thanks for any enlightenment on this issue. 
Deberniere Torrey. 		 	   		  
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