Kang Kyung-ae (1906 – 1944) was a leading writer, feminist, and labor activist during the colonial era. After publishing her short story “Broken Strings” in the Chosun Ilbo newspaper in 1931, she migrated to Gando, a.k.a. Jiandao in the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture of northern China. As a result, much of her writing dealt with the local communist movement and anti-Japanese resistance fighters. By depicting the poverty experienced by ethnic Koreans living in Gando, Kang’s works exposed the dark side of colonialism while giving voice to the resistance.