Creation of Comfort Women: Historical and Intersectional Analysis of the Abuse of Korean Women During Japanese Colonization

This paper attempts to answer how the forced sexual servitude faced by Korean comfort women for the Japanese soldiers of World War II resulted from the intersection of colonial subjectivity, class discrimination, and patriarchal values present in Japan and the Korean Peninsula. The research is based on the historical analysis of both parties' secondary documents and governmental statements. The documents will originate from South Korea and Japan due to the lack of research and information from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. The analysis exemplifies the fact that gender itself was not the key reason behind the forced sexual servitude which Korean women had to endure at the time; there was a combination between class, gender, and colonial aspects that further ignited the creation of Korean comfort women. This paper considers that Korean wianbu were considered representatives of the Korean colonial body. Still, their identity was also formulated by their gender and class, which played a crucial role in their vulnerability as a group that essentially resulted in their forced sexual servitude towards Japanese soldiers in World War II as both the Japanese and Korean people had class discrimination and patriarchal society which erased their personas before, during, and after their time as comfort women.