Comments on: Chongryun schools just like any other: English teacher

By: The Marmot’s Hole » Chongryun English teacher responds to comments

The Marmot’s Hole » Chongryun English teacher responds to comments — Thu, 31 May 2007 10:29:25 +0000

[...] Williams, the English teacher at a Chongryun-affiliated school in Japan who penned a piece in last week’s Japan Times, shot me an email further explaining his piece and answering some of the comments he read here on [...]

By: The Marmot’s Hole » Chongryun English teacher responds to comments

The Marmot’s Hole » Chongryun English teacher responds to comments — Thu, 31 May 2007 10:29:24 +0000

By: lirelou

lirelou — Fri, 25 May 2007 05:14:20 +0000

Uri, thanks for #12. Well put.

By: Uri Onara

Uri Onara — Fri, 25 May 2007 02:42:00 +0000

Bingobangoboy is closer to the truth than some of you reactionaries apparently want to admit. But let’s not lose sight of a few facts. For most of their history, the schools were hardly distinguishable from Pyongyang in their curricula. Major reforms have taken place and it has been a long time now since Kim Il Sung Revolutionary Thought was a required subject for 4th graders. But there are still Young Pioneer groups in the junior highs, etc. Yes, portraits were removed from all alementary and junior high classrooms, thank goodness, but remain in the high schools and university. (An important change, but hardly a defection). The curricula changes a few years ago did make the schools very close to Japanese schools in content, with widesweeping depoliticization. However, Korea University still trains ideologues and cadres. One can still major in Kim Il Sung Thought. The teachers are mostly grads of the university. To say that Juche has disappeared is a stretch, but indoctrination has been toned down. The reason is that parents were voting with their feet and KJI personally allowed this relaxation. Chongryun is still clearly toting the Party line and promote it where they can. Which is not to say that rank and file are true believers. Chosing Korean language education in Japan is not automatically a vote for the Kims, though that is where the faithful will send their kids. THe guy who wrote this article may come across as a useful idiot, but hey, so do most gaijin English teachers in Japan.

By: Peter Pan

Peter Pan — Thu, 24 May 2007 15:03:51 +0000

I was thinking ‘like a tool’ instead of ‘pathetic’, but I can go with that.

Really bingobangoboy, I think you’re the one who needs to get a clue. I think perhaps you’ve spent too much time in these North Korean schools and they’ve brainwashed you too

By: peninsular aborigine

peninsular aborigine — Thu, 24 May 2007 03:31:32 +0000

“Basically, if you’ve never set foot in a “North Korean” school in Japan, know nothing about zainichi issues & history, and your reaction is nothing more than a Pavlovian response to the words “North Korea,” you end up looking pretty pathetic.”

Someone looks pathetic . . .

By: lirelou

lirelou — Wed, 23 May 2007 23:58:19 +0000

I found the article to be highly informative. It’s always enlightening to get the point of view of someone who’s been inside, albeit as a foreigner, whose Korean language skills are likely less than bi-lingual. Snow brings up the suggested possibility that anti-Japanese curricula may be more evident in the ROK schools than in these Zainichi schools. For Netizen Kim, I’d suggest that Korean culture and identity may be the primary vehicle by which KWP cadre within the schools identify students who can be recruited for purposes other than education. It’s good to hear from some commenters that not everyone who goes through these schools comes out a Kim worshiper, and that confirms reports that have surfaced over the past several years that Chosen Soren membership is dropping off.

Thanks for publishing it.

By: Rhesus

Rhesus — Wed, 23 May 2007 17:28:39 +0000

“That’s not what the other lawyer said.”

By: Netizen Kim

Netizen Kim — Wed, 23 May 2007 16:56:17 +0000

These North Korean funded schools, whose primarily objective is to preserve the Korean culture and identity amongst the zainichi, is no different in spirit from the National Jewish Outreach Program and the thousands of JCCs all over North America.

By: snow

snow — Wed, 23 May 2007 15:25:49 +0000

With the Korean Federation of Teachers teaching North Korean propoganda in the classrooms in South Korea and teaching students to hate Japan and the US, I wonder how much different that might be from anything students might learn in a zainichi school.