Category: Daily Life

Hollywood movies and Western cosmetic brands were so popular in pre-WWII Korea that the colonial regime feared that young Koreans were being ‘intoxicated with frivolous Americanism’ by the ‘Jewish devil’ to ‘hold hands in a Western-style manner’ and to ‘advocate the supremacy of romantic love’

2022-12-22

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This article from December 1942, which particularly stands out for its especially anti-Semitic and anti-American messaging, was written to commemorate

Korean Workers

Young female employees lining up to receive mandatory ‘payroll savings booklets’ to automatically deduct their wages to contribute to the Imperial Japanese war effort (Seoul, 1943)

2022-11-27

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The following is a photo of some young female employees at a company in Seoul lining up to receive some

Daily Life

Not content with merely banning U.S. and British jazz music, colonial authorities forced cafes, bars, and restaurants to throw out all phonograph records, and replaced the in-store background music with Imperial Japanese military songs and news propaganda blaring on the radio (Jongno, Seoul, 1943)

2022-11-23

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This is a story about a restaurant association in Jongno-gu, Seoul which not only banned American and British jazz music

Daily Life

Korean schoolgirls standing in front of Seoul Whashin Department Store in 1943 as Korean women make some stitches in Shinto cloth amulets to be gifted to Imperial Japanese soldiers

2022-11-14

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In Imperial Japan, schoolgirls would stand around public places like department stores and hold white strips of cloth, and then

Daily Life

Onerous regulations prescribing long lists of permissible and forbidden types of clothing were imposed on Koreans in 1943 to promote a ‘minimalist lifestyle’ of ‘Japanese beauty and simplicity’ in the name of wartime resource conservation

2022-11-11

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In September 1943, almost two years into waging war against the United States and Britain, facing extreme shortages in everything

Daily Life

Imperial Japanese PSA ordering residents to avoid movie theaters in the daytime, using a fictional skit contrasting Yōko, the ‘good Korean girl’ in simple work pants practicing air raid drills, against Hoshiko, the ‘bad Korean girl’ dressed up ‘flamboyantly’ going to the movies (Seoul, 1944)

2022-11-06

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This article is just one of many from the ‘Yōko versus Hoshiko’ column, a Keijo Nippo newspaper serial featuring fictional

Food Shortages

‘Yōko versus Hoshiko’, a 1944 morality play pitting ‘good Korean woman’ Yōko, who is kind and considerate, against ‘bad Korean woman’ Hoshiko, the selfish, corrupt patriotic group leader harboring liberal and hedonistic British/American thoughts who ‘needs to be shot’ for betraying Imperial Japan

2022-09-21

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This is my translation and transcription of six fictional stories from Keijo Nippo, a propaganda newspaper and mouthpiece of the