by Yoo Kyung Sung, The University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM
“I didn’t know what was happening in Asia during WW II. I had no idea Korea was under Japanese occupation!” Every semester I repeatedly hear this message from my preservice teachers after reading books like When My Name Was Keoko, by Linda Sue Park. I wonder, “How did they miss this in their American history courses?”
These comments, and the picturebook The Grandmother Who Loves Flowers by Yoonduck Kwon, were catalysts that led me to reflect on the childhood texts I read, as a young Korean schoolgirl, about the WWII Japanese occupation of Korea. Seeking the truth about our history was important to me, but it was also equally uncomfortable. The Grandmother Who Loved Flowers is based on the story of Dahl Yun Sim, a thirteen-year-old Korean girl, kidnapped by Japanese soldiers during WW II as she and her sister were out picking wild greens.
