Abstract
During an interview from 2020, South Korean writer Han Kang pointed to the “impossible riddle” of humanity as the reason she finds it so difficult to look at human beings without becoming overwhelmed.1 She acknowledged that while humans have committed horrific atrocities against one another, we also possess a certain dignity which suggests that we have a desire for goodness within us. As a countermeasure to the distress and hopelessness that we may feel as a result of this dichotomy, Han proposes that “[when] we are confronted by the horror of humanity, we have to question ourselves that [sic] what is the meaning that we are human;” we need to actively engage in moments of self-reflection to understand how we comprehend our interactions with one another and choose to define being human.2 Before we decide who we want to become, it is crucial that we recognize who we currently are, starting with the ways in which we have oppressed groups of people for our advantage. While women, in particular, have always been subjected to violence and exploited for the benefit of patriarchal societies, we have more recently witnessed a nearly universal crackdown — specifically perpetrated by national governments — on women’s bodies. Women’s agency and bodily autonomy are slowly shrinking as governments have adopted legislation designed to limit a woman’s right to determine how to care for her body and to express her sense of self under the guise of moral and ethical superiority.
Recommended Citation
Worthington, Abigail
(2025)
"“Knowing with” the Unknowable Woman: The Body as Protest in Han Kang’s The Vegetarian,"
The Compass: Vol. 1:
Iss.
12, Article 5.
Available at:
https://scholarworks.arcadia.edu/thecompass/vol1/iss12/5