Factory Workers

The Coveted Seoul and a Girl Becoming a Factory Worker

This lecture focuses on Kyungsook Shin’s novel The Girl Who Wrote Loneliness, which tells the story of rural girls leaving their homes to work in Seoul’s Guro Industrial Complex. The lecture explores why these girls left their homes for Seoul, their experiences in the city, and how they dealt with discrimination. It also considers their perspective on Korea’s modern history (1970s-1980s) as factory workers.