[KS] Member's New Publication: The Empire Strikes Back from Within: Colonial Liberation and the Korean Minority Question at the Birth of Postwar Japan, 1945–47

[Deokhyo Choi]

I am pleased to announce my new article on the origins of the “Korean
minority question” in postwar Japan. The article examines the impact of
liberations of Korea and Koreans in Japan on the formation of postwar
Japan.



Deokhyo Choi, “The Empire Strikes Back from Within: Colonial Liberation and
the Korean Minority Question at the Birth of Postwar Japan, 1945–47,” *American
Historical Review* 126, no. 2 (June 2021).
https://doi.org/10.1093/ahr/rhab199



(Abstract)

The recent historiography of empire has discussed the impact of
decolonization on metropolitan society, or how the “empire strikes back.” A
growing literature also examines the postcolonial return migration of
colonial settlers and its multifaceted aftereffects on the “home” country,
bringing fresh insight into how decolonization is experienced “when empire
comes home.” This article adds a different question for exploration: What
does decolonization look like on the empire’s home front when colonial
liberation takes place within, or *when the empire strikes back from within*?
By examining the “liberation” of Korean imperial subjects in Japan after
World War II, this article provides a unique vantage point for analyzing
decolonization’s impact on metropolitan society. I will demonstrate how
Japanese history can offer new insight into the convergence of two critical
social phenomena regarding decolonization, namely, empire’s homecoming and
colonial liberation on the empire’s home front. Moreover, this article also
aims to challenge the historiographical “amnesia of empire” in the study of
US-occupied Japan. I will discuss how the Korean minority question became a
critical locus where US-led democratization and the postimperial transition
from a multiethnic empire to the so-called monoethnic nation intersected
and shaped the formation of postwar Japan.

-- 
Dr. Deokhyo Choi
Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Korean Studies

Jessop West
1 Upper Hanover Street
School of East Asian Studies
The University of Sheffield
S3 7RA, UK
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