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Critics' Opinion:
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First Published:
Apr 2020, 176 pages
Paperback:
Mar 2021, 176 pages
Book Reviewed by:
Rachel Hullett
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A fierce international bestseller that launched Korea's new feminist movement, Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 follows one woman's psychic deterioration in the face of rigid misogyny.
Truly, flawlessly, completely, she became that person.
In a small, tidy apartment on the outskirts of the frenzied metropolis of Seoul lives Kim Jiyoung. A thirtysomething-year-old "millennial everywoman," she has recently left her white-collar desk job―in order to care for her newborn daughter full-time―as so many Korean women are expected to do. But she quickly begins to exhibit strange symptoms that alarm her husband, parents, and in-laws: Jiyoung impersonates the voices of other women―alive and even dead, both known and unknown to her. As she plunges deeper into this psychosis, her discomfited husband sends her to a male psychiatrist.
In a chilling, eerily truncated third-person voice, Jiyoung's entire life is recounted to the psychiatrist―a narrative infused with disparate elements of frustration, perseverance, and submission. Born in 1982 and given the most common name for Korean baby girls, Jiyoung quickly becomes the unfavored sister to her princeling little brother. Always, her behavior is policed by the male figures around her―from the elementary school teachers who enforce strict uniforms for girls, to the coworkers who install a hidden camera in the women's restroom and post their photos online. In her father's eyes, it is Jiyoung's fault that men harass her late at night; in her husband's eyes, it is Jiyoung's duty to forsake her career to take care of him and their child―to put them first.
Jiyoung's painfully common life is juxtaposed against a backdrop of an advancing Korea, as it abandons "family planning" birth control policies and passes new legislation against gender discrimination. But can her doctor flawlessly, completely cure her, or even discover what truly ails her?
Rendered in minimalist yet lacerating prose, Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 sits at the center of our global #MeToo movement and announces the arrival of writer of international significance.
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Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 is less of a character study than an extrapolation of the lived experiences of a generation of women in South Korea. An understanding of Cho Nam-Joo's intentions and the context of the setting is essential to appreciating the novel. It is plotless and straightforward in a way that could be perceived as artless, or curiously devoid of emotion. And yet it simmers with untapped fury, destined to resonate as strongly with Western readers as it has in its native country...continued
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(Reviewed by Rachel Hullett).
South Korean society has long been profoundly patriarchal, with traditional expectations that designate men as breadwinners and women as homemakers remaining intact even as more women have entered the workforce. According to a 2017 report, Korea has the highest gender pay gap among all Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) nations, with women earning just 63 percent of their male counterparts' salaries.
Naturally, several movements have developed in response to this glaring disparity in how men and women are treated in South Korea. It wasn't until 1987 that the first institutional feminist organization, Korea Women's Association United (KWAU), was formed to address questions of gender inequality, democracy, and ...
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