Femininity vs. Masculinity During the Colonial Period

           In the film “Blue Swallow”, the main character, Park Kyung Won appears as the exact counterexample of what the model femininity constitutes of at the time of the early Twentieth century when the Japanese Empire was gaining more power over the world. Park appears as the first Korean female pilot and the film has a format of biography depicting the life of this individual. This film depicts the unusual career for women at the time; Park is an opposite of what the society demanded of women during the colonial period.

           

            In "The Politics of Gender in Colonial Korea", the author mentions that the “secondary education aimed to create more ‘feminine’ women” (Yoo 70). He adds that “the highly gendered division of courses encouraged women to select ‘feminine’ courses” (Yoo 70). In the Japanese empire and colonial Korea, women were more encouraged to learn housekeeping and sewing in lieu of learning masculine courses such as “ethics, national language, literature, history, geography, mathematics or science” (Yoo 70).

On the one hand, this is obvious in the film that there are only two actual female pilots in the pilot institute while there are much more male pilots. It is easy to understand how women were like during the colonial period when you look at the setting of the film. It indicates that it was uncommon for women to pursue their careers as pilots which were considered as masculine. In addition, when Park is high in her career and becomes a respected female pilot, her boyfriend feels uncomfortable about her ambition. Park’s boyfriend, Han proposes a marriage to Park so she can become his wife; he expects her to be a housewife and raise children. Even though she refuses to marry him, this scene also implies that the women were often discouraged to pursue their desired careers. At some point, the women were forced to give up on their jobs, dreams and careers.

Furthermore, this film eventually ends with the death of Park. I think Park’s death has an important message. This is also connected with the circumstance that women encountered during the colonial period as Yoo describes. Park dies due to the flight accident when she flies back to Korea. She dies at the age of thirty two. Her tragic and early death along with her boyfriend’s death indicates that the women tended to be unsuccessful pursuing their own desired careers due to the society that demanded women to be feminine housewives. Through Park’s death, the film director might have wanted to criticize the social influence that prevented women from having their own dreams and careers and how it was difficult for the women at the time to be equivalently successful like men.