Janet Poole, University of Toronto:
Christina Yi’s fascinating book narrates the prehistory of the popular Japanese-language literary works written by ethnically Korean writers today. Yi’s careful readings show how the linguistic dilemmas faced by Japan’s colonial subjects became an inheritance that could not be simply returned despite the collapse of empire. A must-read for anyone interested in questions of postcolonialism and language.

Jin-Kyung Lee, University of California, San Diego:
By probing into Japanese-language cultural productions by ethnic Koreans and diasporic Japanese across the 1945 divide, Colonizing Language reveals and deconstructs the multiple borders that have become naturalized and interiorized in the formation of national language and national literary canons in both Japan and Korea. The book is essential to our rethinking of ‘Japanese’ and ‘Korean’ languages and literatures, and its theoretical sophistication deserves an even wider appeal and application outside of East Asian studies.

Sejii Lippit, University of California, Los Angeles:
Christina Yi’s Colonizing Language provides a wide-ranging overview of the emergence and development of Japanese-language writings by Korean writers from the colonial through postcolonial periods. Based on meticulous archival research of Korean, Japanese, and English-language sources, and effectively weaving together historical analysis with close literary readings, it promises to be an authoritative text in the field.