2024: Peace Study Tour
The theme of the 2024 ESJF study tour is peace learned from modern Korean history. This study tour will focus on Korean history and the impact of U.S. foreign policy on the peninsula.
2023: Decolonization Study Tour
This study tour examined postcolonial Germany’s accountability on its former colonial countries in Africa from the late 19th to the early 20th century from the perspective of the colonized. It also focused on Germany’s colonial history in the public memory through its educational system. This study tour program included: 1) a discussion with activists representing the people of Namibia demanding a formal apology and reparations from Germany; 2) learning about the history of German colonization in Africa; 3) a session with German educators who will explain German education policy and the curricula differences (if any) between the teaching of the colonial period with the Holocaust; 4) visits to museums and a school; and 5) an optional half-day city tour in Berlin. Many activists and educators we met on this study tour closely connected the sexual violence their ancestors were forced to endure under German colonization with the Japanese military sexual slavery system, also known as the “comfort women” system, that numerous women and girls in Asia were forced to endure.
This study tour was from Monday, June 19 to Friday, June 23, 2023. We thank the Korea Verband e.V. for making the necessary arrangements for this tour.
This study tour was from Monday, June 19 to Friday, June 23, 2023. We thank the Korea Verband e.V. for making the necessary arrangements for this tour.
How it began
In 2019 and 2022, organizations in South Korea invited ESJF co-founder Sung Sohn and educators in the San Francisco Bay Area to an international symposium and forum on the theme of preserving the history of military sexual slavery by Japan before and during WWII. On both occasions, ESJF educators actively sought a broader scope of study on South Korean history and culture. Their interest and dedication became the foundation of ESJF's Study Tour.