Education

During the Japanese colonial era in Korea, educational assimilation into Japanese culture and ideals began early, and was pushed starting first in Korea itself. The publication of school textbooks in Korea became entirely controlled by the Japanese, with the purchase of these textbooks mandatory. Through their imposed textbooks, the Japanese aimed to instill Korean students with a particular understanding that would lead to a full acceptance of Japanese ruling ideologies, interests, and cultural values. Through this education, with the focus being more on simply teaching Korean kids to accept these ideals, their education became more focused on benefitting the Japanese rather than addressing the actual educational needs of students. They were taught that being subordinate and obedient, faithful subjects to the Japanese Empire was what made an “ideal citizen.” By delegitimizing Korean culture and also forcing the teaching of Japanese language, the colonial curriculum was aimed at depriving Koreans of their national identity and spirit.

The Japanese curriculum for Koreans could be boiled down to two main goals– teaching Koreans Japanese, and forming them into faithful “low-class laborers.” Japanese colonialism actually had the primary purpose of increasing the ranks of manual laborers in order to expand their industrialization efforts during the 1930s. Japanese educational institutions in Korea were known as Botonghakgyo, and their numbers rapidly increased in direct correlation with Japanese capitalists’ need to train more manual workers. When Japan began establishing new factories in Korea as part of their industrial expansion efforts, they needed an increasing number of manual laborers that could both perform repetitive tasks and speak Japanese. These institutions were built for the primary purpose of simply training manual laborers rather than truly educating. Thus, Japanese colonialism and the creation of the Botonghakgyo were done primarily in order to achieve the aims of Japanese capitalism.