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The English History Human Rights Camp: From Planning to Management

This English History Human Rights Camp was planned by AIESEC (International Association of Students in Economic and Commercial Sciences). AIESEC is one of the world's largest non-profit student-run organizations, active in 113 countries around the world with members of college students interested in leadership, world affairs, and management. The purpose of AIESEC is to untap young people's potential and grow them into influential leaders. One of AIESEC's activities is to run global projects that last six weeks or longer on global issues. This camp is part of the six-week global project designed to raise awareness of the history of Japanese military sexual slavery.

The idea of this project began to germinate when I talked to the AIESEC members of the Philippines, where some 'comfort women,' victims of Japanese military sexual slavery, were residing, about awareness of the subject. Once the framework for the project was laid down through several meetings with the Philippine members, I looked for teams in Korea that would organize the project. As a result, the two teams under AIESEC Korea, AIESEC Ewha Woman's University and AIESEC Seoul Women's University, came on board. The 'Over HER Tears' project would offer a variety of programs over a six-week period, one of them being the English History Human Rights Camp. The camp was for middle and high school students. We wanted to tell them historical facts about Japanese military sexual slavery, and encourage them to think of the issue in the global context instead of within the boundary of the Republic of Korea. We decided that the camp would be for middle and high school students, not college students or adults, because they were the future leaders of Korean society. Additionally, we decided to conduct the camp in English because we live in a global age and we think they will get to communicate with the greater part of the world instead of just staying in the country. Especially, the subject of the camp is not a local one but relevant to many countries and, therefore, needs to be known and understood by more countries. So we wished that Korean youths could express their thoughts on this subject in English as well as in Korean. That's why we involved foreign college interns who had interest in the issue of Japanese military sexual slavery.
To organize such an event as this camp, we worked on preparations for five months on end. The result was this camp, organized by AIESEC Korea and hosted by the 'Over HER Tears' project team and the members of 'Hatdam,' a high school society under Korean Council for Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan. And this camp is indebted to the House of Sharing and the Northeast Asian History Foundation for their strong support.

The Schedule of the English History Human Rights Camp

The English History Human Rights camp took place for two days from January 29 (Tue) to 30 (Wed), 2013. In the morning of the first day, the participants assembled in the Sports Complex in Seoul. After brief introduction and attendance check, the bus left. When we had announced the gathering time, we had allowed half an hour for possible late comers. But everyone was on time, which made me feel good from the beginning. While the participants who came with their friends looked busy chatting among themselves, some participants who came alone looked nervous. Watching them, I thought, 'Finally! Here we go!'

On arriving at the House of Sharing, we greeted the administrators and assembled in the Training Center along with the participants. They were seated by group-they had been informed of their groups in the bus on its way here-and had a discussion to decide their group names and group catch phrases. Then began the English History Human Rights Camp, as the participants were welcomed, briefed on the camp's objectives, and introduced to the organizing committee, the AIESEC Korea 'Over HER Tears' project team and 'Haetdam.' Then followed an opening speech by the director of the House of Sharing. The camp continued with various sessions that lasted until 10:30 pm. In particular, 'Haetdam' members, even though they were all still high school students, were genuinely interested in facts related to Japanese military sexual slavery and taking their activities seriously. They were praiseworthy, and watching them made me reflect on myself.

When I conducted the sessions, my first impression was that the participating middle and high school students were taking the camp more seriously than I thought they would be. In the morning, my impression of them had not been much different from what I had thought of them before coming to the camp. 'Maybe they weren't very serious when they decided to join the camp. Maybe they are here for volunteer activity credits or at the suggestion of their parents or friends without giving it much thought,' I thought with concern. But the participants' behaviors after lunch put a smile on my face. Although it was a cold day, they ran around energetically to carry out their missions as a group, wrote down what they had heard or felt, tried to listen to the old ladies (the victims) saying in whispers, had tears in their eyes, and said that they wanted to do more volunteer activities. Watching them, I felt proud and moved. After dinner was the 'Be Our Envoy' session. The mission for the students participating in this session was to be special envoys, explaining the facts about Japanese military sexual slavery to foreigners of different cultural backgrounds so that they would understand and sign the contract of support for the construction of a historical museum designed to raise awareness of Korean history. Sitting around by group, they tried to come up with strategies to persuade the foreigners to sign the contract, and how to use the strategies to win over the foreign interns. Even though their English wasn't perfect, they were hard at work persuading, looking up the dictionary as they worked with their group members. Watching them, we college students at the organizing committee had one shared thought: 'By the time they join society, I'm sure they will be great leaders. I wish I had participated in activities like these when I was in middle or high school.' I was impressed and grateful that the participants had managed to complete the many sessions within limited time.

The next day, after big breakfast, we headed back to Seoul and participated in the Wednesday demonstration in front of the Japanese Embassy building, holding the pickets made of the participants' letters to the old ladies. The song 'Like Rocks' we had learned on the first day played. We wanted to dance to it together, but couldn't because it was too crowded. But I found the students keen on listening to the speech in the Wednesday demonstration without being disturbed or distracted so lovely.

Anticipating the Camp's Roles in the Road Ahead

I hope that this camp will be established as a regular event. There are many improvements to be made, of course, if it was to continue. First, when inviting participants, the camp needs to look for a more specifically divided group instead of a broad group of middle or high school students simply interested in certain historical facts, so that we could prepare programs tailored to a majority of participants. Second, the camp needs an increase in the absolute number of foreign interns from a more variety of countries. In this camp, there were three foreign interns (one from Peru and two from China), whereas there were about 40 participants. So, their communication was primarily 'one-to-manyʼ rather than direct. We believe that a larger and more diverse pool of foreign interns will be more effective in equipping the participants with more global view and thinking and also conducive to creating an atmosphere for speaking English.