Suk-Young provides creative work that comprehensively explores the history and implication of the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). DMZ is of great historical and social-political relevance to the Koreans. In her work, Suk-Young writes about various inter-Korean border migrations and the citizenship they obtained on the basis of emotional affiliation instead of legal delineation. The article highlights that these people objected the nation’s idea to limit them along the geopolitical border and struggled to establish their identity by using their physical strength and emotions (Suk-Young 6).
I feel that through reviewing various resources, Suk-Young has successfully provided a piece that explains the background of the Korean division while shedding light on the region’s Cold War legacies. Suk-Young challenges the idea of preserving the DMZ as a natural preserve (34). In line with Suk-Young’s sentiments, I believe that such move would counteract the effort of unifying the Korean community. This would primarily mean retaining the borders that characterized the deadly civil wars, which would check the process of healing.
I also feel that Suk-Young made rational and insightful explanation when examining the effect of emotional citizenship in Korea. It is apparent that the emotions triggered by brutal actions executed by the governments prompted anger that fueled conflicts. For example, the film Repatriation is highly empathic and inciting (Suk-Young 99). Suzy’s work supports the relevance of such emotion in bringing out the course of the Korean history by noting “ the excess of emotion and pathos in the plays are wholly melodramatic” (261). Suk-Young understood the significance of this strategy and utilized it to develop her agenda accordingly. In this respect, I view Suk-Young‘s work as a preemptive and broad encyclopedia that we can use to build our knowledge about the socio-political aspects pertinent to the Korea’s history.
Works Cited
Suk-Young, Kim. DMZ Crossing: Performing Emotional Citizenship along the Korean Border. New York: Columbia University Press. 2014. Print.
Suzy, Kim, “Mother and Maidens: Gendered Formation of Revolutionary Heroes in North Korea.” Journal of Korean Studies 19.2 (2014): 257-289. Print.
