Gender Roles

The main role I see of gender playing is to show the cultural norms in Japan/Korea as well as the progression of the societies. Men in Japan such as Yoseb try to carry all of the burden of the family on themselves, mainly financially. The men do not want the woman to work at all because it is against the values they have ingrained into them. Yoseb continuously tells Sunja and Kyunghee not to work because he feels it is disrespectful to him if they do. The woman’s role is like the traditional housewife. They cook and do chores around the house, but they usually should not work. Sunja and Kyunghee did not work during the time they were first in Japan, but eventually started, only to save up money for Noa’s college education. Gender also plays a role in showing how society progresses. For instance, while Sunja was told not to work by Yoseb, Mozasu is fine with his girlfriend Yumi working as much as she wants.


Throughout the novel, though, Lee shows hard working women, from Yangjin to Totoyama to Yumi to Sunja. These women had to work to help their family or survive, whether it be Yangjin whose husband died, Totoyama whose child is disabled, Yumi who is the daughter of a prostitute and pimp, and Sunja, who lost Isak to jail. Lee might be using these characters to show how the gender roles in Japan/Korea should be broken because women are strong hard workers too.


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