Carolyn Ren

WGST & G⁺JI Undergraduate Student Fellow 2022

Carolyn Ren, Undergraduate Student, International Politics and History, Georgetown University Walsh School of Foreign Service

Carolyn Ren (she/her) is a Junior in the SFS, studying international politics and history. Carolyn serves as a Corepathway fellow and interns for Darfur Women Action Group, the Asian/Pacific Islander Domestic Violence Resource Project, and National Center for Victims of Crime. Carolyn deeply cares about the eradication of gender-based violence and human rights violations through sustainable civil remedies, and she plans to pursue a future legal career in international human rights law, advocating for and empowering those who need help.

Research Project: Korean “Comfort Women”: The Intersection of Colonialist Legacies, Transnational Feminism, and Nationalism 

During WWII, the Japanese government coerced approximately 170,000 Korean Women into sexual slavery. Known as “comfort women”, many survivors have become silenced. The Japanese government that stills harbors nationalistic nostalgia for its historical legacy as a colonial superpower is also expecting history to become unwritten. Thus, this research project aims to remind the world of the forgotten comfort women and address two questions: 1) How have colonialist legacies shaped the social, economic, and political oppression of comfort women? 2) How can transnational feminism combat nationalism and historical crimes and help Korean victims of sexual slavery obtain their rightful reparation?