Under the Same Sky

Inside the secretive and mysterious world of North Korea, Joseph Kim lived a young boy’s normal life. But when he was five, disaster struck: the first wave of the Great Famine killed millions, including his father, and forced the rest of his family to desperate escape routes into China. Alone in the streets, he had nothing but his street-hardened instincts for survival.

But through the eventual support of an underground network of activists who kept him hidden from authorities, Kim eventually made his way through the American consulate in Shenyang and became one of just a handful of North Koreans brought to the U.S. as refugees.

Joseph Kim’s Under the Same Sky: From Starvation in North Korea to Salvation in America provides a vivid narrative of resilience. In a country where most have never heard of Facebook or Google and where details of social and cultural life are largely unknown, the book serves as an important first-hand account of atrocities committed within North Korea and hidden from the West and most of the rest of the world.

Join New America NYC for a conversation with Joseph Kim on his journey across new countries and cultures and on the political and economic realities in North Korea that continue to thwart the potential for open dialogue and diplomacy with the rest of the world.

Copies of Joseph Kim’s Under the Same Sky: From Starvation in North Korea to Salvation in America will be available for purchase. Follow the discussion online using #NANYC and by following @NewAmericaNYC.

Introduction:

Emily Parker
Future Tense Fellow and Digital Diplomacy Advisor, New America
@emilydparker

Participants:

Joseph Kim

Author, Under the Same Sky: From Starvation in North Korea to Salvation in America

Sue Mi Terry
Senior Research Scholar, Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
@SueMiTerry

This event is co-sponsored by the Joseon Institute, an independent, non-profit and non-partisan think tank preparing for a new North Korea.