tag May 18
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- [Beyond Death, Beyond the Darkness of the Age] published
- The first memory of and the definition work on the May 18 Democratization Movement! “In this splendid season, great citizens have changed the world” (Hwang Sok-yong) An underground bestseller 32 years ago—now, we remember May 18 openly and proudly The courage involved in and the truth of the May 18 Democratization Movement, which inspired struggles for freedom and justice worldwide Beyond Death, Beyond the Darkness of the Age shocked the entire nation thirsting for the truth behind May 18 upon the publication of the first edition in 1985 and became an underground bestseller, to be read by countless people bated breath. Now, 32 years later, a completely revised edition has been published. The first systematic record of the May 18 Democratization Movement, Beyond Death, Beyond the Darkness of the Age strives not only to reflect wholly the perspectives and testimonies of citizens of Gwangju who took part in the resistance movement but also, in this full-fledged revision, to elucidate the historical and legal nature of the incident by including the contents of the military operation of the martial law troops leading to massacres starting on May 18 and the results of May 18-related trials that have been disclosed so far. In addition, the volume endeavors to describe the resistance in a multifaceted and objective manner through the testimonies of and reports by journalists both at home and abroad who covered the resistance on site at the time as well as the participants in the movement themselves. Begun in secret immediately after the incident in 1980 in order to escape the South Korean government’s rigorous surveillance, the collection of materials and coverage regarding the struggle constituted a collective task where all those involved had to take considerable risks. Published under such restrictive conditions, the first edition of this work was only 320-pages-long. On the contrary, the revised edition published now summarizes vast additional materials based on investigations and research to date leading from public hearings and trials on May 18 and the legislation of the Special Act on the May Democratization Movement, Etc., thus amounting to over 600 pages, nearly twice the original edition. If the first edition published 32 years ago aimed at publicizing the truth of the struggle, distorted as “armed riots by insurgents” at the time, this revised edition has been prepared to resist the fabrications and disparagement of the truth of the movement and the participants, which have became increasingly blatant since the instatement of conservative administrations in 2008. Just as the first edition served to trigger the June Struggle of 1987 by exposing the Chun Doo-hwan regime’s illegality and violence, the revision will become a foundation for setting contemporary South Korean history right and becoming a country of peace and human rights against the distortion of history that has been committed by ultra-right reactionary forces since the impeachment of the Park Geun-hye administration.
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