Projects > Speech Memory

16mm, color, 23:00min, 2007

Father and daughter discuss the lives of past generations to form a posthumous portrait of the filmmaker's grandfather, Key Jin Yun. A deaf-mute Korean born in Japan during its occupation of Korea, Key Jin Yun, was raised fully integrated into Japanese society, learning only written Japanese and Japanese sign language. In 1945, with Japan's defeat and the end of the occupation, he and his family returned to Korea. Speech Memory examines the impact of immigration and cultural assimilation through the details of Key Jin Yun's life, revealing the shifting complexities of language, national identity, and memory.