• The Korean Journal of Archival Studies
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• no.45
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• pp.121-153
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• 2015

Struggles to gain acknowledgement of identity have a characteristic of movement to recover human dignity. Participants in this movement come to confirm themselves as the subject of rights and communicate one another, free from oppression. Being guaranteed the opportunity to participate in the public opinion formation process is an indispensable element of human rights. In 1980, though it was short and incomplete, Gwangju experienced communal autonomy under the condition that state power was temporarily stopped. The contents and memories of the Gwangju Democratization Movement that intended to protect autonomy of civil society, resisting pillage of state power, remain intact in the 1980 Archives for the May 18th. The 5.18 archives were registered in UNESCO's Memory of the World in 2011, with its value of human rights and protection of democracy being acknowledged. The 5.18 archives have memories of resistance and struggles for justice, and sacrifices and pains of citizens under oppressive political authority in Gwangju, 1980. Thus, these archives are related to the historical struggles for democracy, and suggest a lesson on the transition process towards democracy to us. Preservation and utilization of the documentary heritage constantly lead the memories of historical events to the present, and enable exchanges of experiences and ideas between the present and the future. This study, through the process of UNESCO's Memory of the World registration and post-registration process, beyond the value of archives, tries to examine how historical events are led to the present, through the archives and to discuss the other values of archives.

• The Korean Journal of Archival Studies
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• no.48
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• pp.5-44
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• 2016

This paper examines the characteristics of the May 18th (5 18) Gwangju Democratization Movement archives to suggest a collection development strategy for the May 18th archives collection network. Individual public and civilian archives collecting the May 18th archives separately should form a cooperative collection network based on documentation strategy. Most of all, May 18th archives are human rights records and should be understood and collected as human rights records. International principles support the collection of the May 18th archives as human rights archives by prohibiting destruction of relevant temporary records and encouraging the victims' right to access to their records. As the May 18th archives were mostly produced by many multiple agencies, this multi-provenance and diversity of the records necessitate the building of an archives portal for the records registries and online search. To document the undocumented past and the victims, the collection network should focus on oral history project as a major part of its collection development strategy. Finally, the May 18th archives collection network should build a cooperative relations with the unwilling public agencies which have the archives holdings. Therefore, the collection development strategy should include advocacy and awareness activities for promoting cooperation from these public agencies and public archives, and the people in general.

• Korea and Global Affairs
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.5-32
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• 2017

5.18 Gwangju Democratization Movement was approved as a legal democratization movement by president Kim Young Sam in May 1993 and was approved as a global recording inheritance by UNESCO in May 2011 for the honor of Gwangju citizens to be restored. However, assessment on this until today after 35 years of occurrence is not nationally unified and the mind of Gwangju maybe only remembered as pride by Gwangju. There are several factors of this continuing situation but this researcher thinks the biggest factor is that professionals reanalyzing the truth ascertainment fitting spirit of the times who are in charge of citizen education are intensively distributed in Jeolla-do and Seoul. Moreover, the journal unlikely assessing 5.18 have enemies in the assailant area during activity that unity is not taking place with divided assessments and trapped in Honam. This study judges that the reason the meaning of 5.18 is trapped in Honam and not nationally unified is because of the limit of "adversary system." Especially researchers who should analyze and explain this incident in a objective views are bias distributed (Gwangju Jeolla-do> Seoul>Gyeongnam) in hometown areas that the possibility of 5.18 meaning not being unified was focused. Academic research studies, journal writers, and publication locations are divided in this study to reveal they are bias distributed and reveal that there is possibility that this biased distribution of researches are becoming obstacles in overcoming regionality.

• Issues in Feminism
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.149-206
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• 2018

This essay is focused on finding women's voice in oral narratives of social memory of national violence and resistance. The books of oral narratives of women who had experienced the national violence and participated in the resistance through historic events such as 5.18, have been published recently. This study is based on the materials that have interviewed women experienced the historic event '5.18' in Gwangju. In this study, there are analyses of the materials of the memory of violence and resistance of '5.18', which have contained the texts written by intellectual males and the oral narratives of females directly involved. So far, the memory and experience of women have not been presented in its entirety in the field of social discourse of '5.18'. In the field women's words were translated in men's words, so the real words disappeared and in the end remained unspoken words. And besides, the existence of women are substituted with the limited images (for example women's body destroyed) presented by men's words in memorial materials. In narratives of '5.18', women are reduced to the images of bodies destroyed by national violence. The destroyed bodies are places for exhibition and disclosure of national violence. Women are not presented as the subjects of the social resistance in oral or written narratives of '5.18'. The images of females are only vehicles to urge the male subjects to resist against unjust violence. In this context, men are interpreted for the protectors of sisters, daughters, wives. Since 1980s, the symbol of '5.18 Gwangju' has represented the most ideal community in Korean society. But women have been on the borderline or outside of the community in fact. However, women intend to construct themselves as the subjects of resistance through the spoken words. They have tried to make the politic places for themselves in the social field by speaking and speaking constantly. The desire to speak out is becoming stronger for women, so these days more words are spoken by more women and more oral narratives made by women are revealed in social discoursive field. So the place for women's voice is expanding in social memorial field of '5.18'.