2023 UCLA CKS "Comfort Women" Creative Project Contest

"Taken Away" by Soon-duk Kim @ comfortwomeneducation.org

Through this creative project contest, CKS aims to educate the UCLA community on ongoing issues pertaining to “comfort women” from Korea, Taiwan, China, the Philippines, and elsewhere, who were forced into sexual slavery by the Japanese Imperial Army during the Pacific War.

We are pleased to announce the results of the inaugural UCLA Center for Korean Studies "Comfort Women" Creative Project Contest.

In 2022, the Center for Korean Studies announced a gift to create a permanent endowment to support creative projects by UCLA students and faculty, together with an online archive, research and programming.

The contest was open to all UCLA undergraduates who were enrolled in Spring 2023. Each work addressed the topic of "comfort women" in some way in literary, visual, or mixed media formats. 

Students read this brief article on "comfort women" to familiarize themselves with the topic:

Beverly Milner (Lee) Bisland, Jinmin Kim, and Sunghee Shin, “Teaching about the Comfort Women during World War II and the Use of Personal Stories of the Victims,” in Education about Asia 24 no 3 (Winter 2019), https://www.asianstudies.org/publications/eaa/archives/teaching-about-the-comfort-women-during-world-war-ii-and-the-use-of-personal-stories-of-the-victims/.

We thank all of the students who submitted such heartfelt projects and acknowledge the finalist prize winners:

First place

Violet Miso Ko, Flowing Tears

Second place

Joyce Kim, Hope of the Young Girl (소녀의 희망)

Rainer Lee, I Will Speak Still

Third place (three-way tie)

Annika Brucia, The Resilience of Woman

Chaeeun Jang, 우리 할머니 Grandma

Donya Noubahrestan, Poetry Inspired by Stories of "Comfort Women" 

We look very much forward to hosting the second annual contest in 2024!

Published: Friday, March 10, 2023