The Korean Americans


Book Description

Korean Americans are one of the fastest growing ethnic groups in the United States. Although they share many similar cultural characteristics with other Asian Americans, the Korean Americans are unique in terms of their strong ethnic attachment, extensive participation in Christian churches, heavy involvement in self-employed small businesses, wide geographic dispersion in settlement, and the emergence of the 1.5 generation phenomenon. This book answers the following questions for the student or interested reader: • Who are the Korean people? • Why did they come to the United States? • How did they adapt to their new country? • How are they received by the majority of Americans? • What are their accomplishments, problems, and contributions to American society? Other special features include: • An extensive coverage on the ethnic background (history, language, religion, customs, and other cultural heritage) of Korean Americans. • Current statistical data on Korean immigration to the United States. • A comprehensive analysis of socioeconomic characteristics of Korean Americans as compared with those of other minority groups. • A succinct analysis of the unique characteristics of Korean Americans. • Effective use of personal narratives. In 1970 there were about 70,000 Korean Americans—the number grew tenfold to about 790,000 in 1990. The Korean American population is now estimated at well over a million, and demographic projections indicate that the number will reach about three million by the year 2030. Korean Americans are thus among the new groups of Americans to become another integral part of the American history of cultural pluralism and ethnic diversity. Examined are the most significant areas of Korean American's adaptation—economic adjustment, sociocultural adaptation, family life, ethnic associations, intergroup relations, and psychological adjustment. In each area of adaptation, positive attainment as well as the problems of adjustment are analyzed in light of current theories and empirical research. The book concludes with a discussion of the unique characteristics of Korean Americans and their impact on society.




Caring Across Generations


Book Description

More than 1.3 million Korean Americans live in the United States, the majority of them foreign-born immigrants and their children, the so-called 1.5 and second generations. While many sons and daughters of Korean immigrants outwardly conform to the stereotyped image of the upwardly mobile, highly educated super-achiever, the realities and challenges that the children of Korean immigrants face in their adult lives as their immigrant parents grow older and confront health issues that are far more complex. In Caring Across Generations, Grace J. Yoo and Barbara W. Kim explore how earlier experiences helping immigrant parents navigate American society have prepared Korean American children for negotiating and redefining the traditional gender norms, close familial relationships, and cultural practices that their parents expect them to adhere to as they reach adulthood. Drawing on in-depth interviews with 137 second and 1.5 generation Korean Americans, Yoo & Kim explore issues such as their childhood experiences, their interpreted cultural traditions and values in regards to care and respect for the elderly, their attitudes and values regarding care for aging parents, their observations of parents facing retirement and life changes, and their experiences with providing care when parents face illness or the prospects of dying. A unique study at the intersection of immigration and aging, Caring Across Generations provides a new look at the linked lives of immigrants and their families, and the struggles and triumphs that they face over many generations.







Second-Generation Korean Experiences in the United States and Canada


Book Description

In Second-Generation Korean Experiences in the United States and Canada, Pyong Gap Min and Samuel Noh have compiled a comprehensive examination of 1.5- and second-generation Korean experiences in the United States and Canada. As the chapters demonstrate, comparing younger-generation Koreans with first-generation immigrants highlights generational changes in many areas of life. The contributors discuss socioeconomic attainments, self-employment rates and business patterns, marital patterns, participation in electoral politics, ethnic insularity among Korean Protestants, the relationship between perceived discrimination and mental health, the role of ethnic identity as stress moderator, and responses to racial marginalization. Using both quantitative and qualitative data sources, this collection is unique in its examination of several different aspects of second-generation Korean experiences in the United States and Canada. An indispensable source for those scholars and students researching Korean Americans or Korean Canadians, the volume provides insight for students and scholars of minorities, migration, ethnicity and race, and identity formation.




Korean, Asian, or American?


Book Description

The voices of second-generation Korean Americans echo throughout the pages of this book, which is a sensitive exploration of their struggles with minority, marginality, cultural ambiguity, and negative perceptions. Born in the United States, they are still viewed as foreigners because of their Korean appearance. Raised in American society, they are still tied to the cultural expectations of their Korean immigrant parents. While straddling two cultures, these individuals search for understanding and attempt to rewrite their identity in a new way. Through autobiographical reconstruction and identity transformation, they form a unique identity of their own—a Korean American identity. This book follows a group of second-generation Korean American Christians in the English-speaking ministry of a large suburban Korean church. It examines their conflicts with the conservative Korean-speaking ministry ruling the church and their quest to achieve independence and ultimately become a multicultural church.




Korean Americans and Their Religions


Book Description

Since 1965 the Korean American population has grown to over one million people. These Korean Americans, including immigrants and their offspring, have founded thousands of Christian congregations and scores of Buddhist temples in the United States. In fact, their religious presence is perhaps the most distinctive contribution of Korean Americans to multicultural diversity in the United States. Korean Americans and Their Religions takes the first sustained look at this new component of the American religious mosaic. The fifteen chapters focus on cultural, racial, gender, and generational factors and are noteworthy for the attention they give to both Christian and Buddhist traditions and to both first&– and second-generation experiences. The editors and contributors represent the fields of sociology, psychology, theology, and religious ministry and themselves embody the diversities underlying the Korean American religious experience: they are Korean immigrants who are leaders in their fields and second-generation Korean Americans beginning their careers as well as leaders of both Christian and Buddhist communities. Among them are sympathetically analytical outside observers. Korean Americans and Their Religions is a welcome addition to the emerging literature in the sociology of &"new immigrant&" religious communities, and it provides the fullest portrait yet of the Korean religious experience in America.




The Korean American Dream


Book Description

Korean immigrants to the United States establish their own small businesses at a rate exceeding that of immigrants from any other nation, with more than one third of all Korean immigrant adults involved in small businesses. Kyeyoung Park examines this phenomenon in Queens, New York, tracing its historical bases and exploring the transformation of Korean cultural identity prompted by participation in an enterprise. Park documents the ways in which Korean immigrants use entrepreneurship to improve the quality of their lives, focusing on their concerns and anxieties, as well as their joys. The concept of "anjong" is crucial to the lives of first-generation Korean Americans in Queens, Park explains. The word may be translated as "establishment," "stability," or "security," and it identifies a particular concept of success through which Koreans make sense of the American ideology of opportunity. What they seek is not great wealth or social position but rather the creation of their own small businesses as a way of realizing the American dream. The pursuit of "anjong" is important enough to justify changes in gender and kinship relations, resulting in the rise of a Korean American women-centered and sister-initiated kinship structure. Commitment to the concept has also inspired a different understanding of class, ethnicity, and race, and stimulated new religious ideas and practices.




Second-generation Korean Americans


Book Description

Kim argues that educational and occupational success for groups in the racial middle such as Korean and Asian Americans does not necessarily translate into further integration in other sectors of American society. Educational and professional accomplishments, while accelerating integration and acceptance, can be accompanied by exclusion in other sectors of society. Thus, Korean and Asian Americans may experience rapid intergenerational upward mobility and integration, but still be subject racialization and exclusion. This challenges the assimilation paradigm that immigrants and their children will assimilate and continue to achieve full integration and acceptance in the mainstream society.