메이지 ‘여학생’들의 해외부임지 ‘부산고등여학교’

Abstract

Women’s education in Korea under Japanese rule first began with the founding of Busan Women’s High School as a women’s public secondary educational institution in 1906. Japanese women, educated as women of the empire during the Meiji era, were dispatched on a mission of women’s education, and most of them were sent to Kyungsung Women’s High School and Busan Women’s High School. In particular, female students at Tokyo Women’s Normal School, a government school, carried out an education in imitation of Empress Haruko who was the model for women of the Meiji era, just as they themselves were educated. Such educational content was incorporated into the curriculum at Busan Women’s High School. Furthermore, there are records stating that Busan Women’s High School was closely related to female activist Ioko Okomura and to the Japanese Patriotic Women’s Association (Aikokuhujin). Such a characteristic reveals Busan as an area with a background that was far more distinctively colonial. The educational content of Busan Women’s High School had an impact on not only the institutions for women education in the area but also the daily lives of the residents of the area. Female students who received modern women’s education fought to secure their independence and autonomy but were limited in terms of not being able to overcome the national ideology. As beings with a double identity of contributing to the system while trying to deviate from the system, they were the main agents who left behind the conflicts of women’s education to the next generation.