Racial and Cultural Otherness: The Lived Experience of Americans of Korean Descent


Book Description

In the sociological literature, Otherness is conceptualized as a condition of difference that is imposed upon a group by another more powerful group. In this qualitative, phenomenological study, it was determined that Americans of Korean descent do, in fa




Critical Perspectives on Racial and Ethnic Differences in Health in Late Life


Book Description

In their later years, Americans of different racial and ethnic backgrounds are not in equally good-or equally poor-health. There is wide variation, but on average older Whites are healthier than older Blacks and tend to outlive them. But Whites tend to be in poorer health than Hispanics and Asian Americans. This volume documents the differentials and considers possible explanations. Selection processes play a role: selective migration, for instance, or selective survival to advanced ages. Health differentials originate early in life, possibly even before birth, and are affected by events and experiences throughout the life course. Differences in socioeconomic status, risk behavior, social relations, and health care all play a role. Separate chapters consider the contribution of such factors and the biopsychosocial mechanisms that link them to health. This volume provides the empirical evidence for the research agenda provided in the separate report of the Panel on Race, Ethnicity, and Health in Later Life.




Communicating Ethnic and Cultural Identity


Book Description

This intercultural communication text reader brings together the many dimensions of ethnic and cultural identity and shows how they are communicated in everyday life. Introducing and applying key concepts, theories, and approaches--from empirical to ethnographic--a wide variety of essays look at the experiences of African Americans, Asians, Asian Americans, Latino/as, and Native Americans, as well as many cultural groups. The authors also explore issues such as gender, race, class, spirituality, alternative lifestyles, and inter- and intra-ethnic identity. Sites of analysis range from movies and photo albums to beauty salons and Deadhead concerts. Visit our website for sample chapters!




Preaching to Second Generation Korean Americans


Book Description

This in-depth study on preaching to second generation Korean Americans, the first of its kind, is based on empirical and ethnographic fieldwork. Matthew D. Kim conducted surveys and semi-structured qualitative interviews with Korean American pastors and second generation young adult respondents in three geographic regions of the United States: the Midwest, the West Coast, and the East Coast. His primary conceptual framework employs social psychologists Hazel Markus and Paula Nurius' theory of possible selves to facilitate the process of congregational exegesis in the second generation Korean American church context. This book offers a new contextual homiletic model that enables Korean American preachers to engage in deeper levels of ethnic and cultural analysis in their sermonic preparation. Simultaneously, the author reconstructs conventional preaching roles of Korean American preachers and second generation listeners so that they may co-creatively imagine new possible selves that radically advance Christian mission and practice in the world. This book will serve as a primary or secondary source for upper-level undergraduate, graduate, and postgraduate courses on preaching, communication studies, ethnic and racial studies, cross-cultural ministry, or social psychology.




Racial Conflict and Healing


Book Description

A Korean theologian approaches the issue of racial conflict-including discrimination between minority communities-and constructs a theology of seeing that aims to heal the ruptures of racism. As ethnic tensions continue to simmer and occasionally erupt, immigration and affirmative action laws are hotly debated in every ethnic minority: African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Native Americans-even Asian Americans (the so-called model minority) struggle in the racially-charged atmosphere of contemporary America. In the aftermath of the Los Angeles riots of 1992 and the ensuing violence against Korean Americans, Andrew Sung Park seeks a theological model that will help transform a society of oppression, injustice, and violence into a community of equity, fairness, and mutual consideration. Park emphasizes that such a transformation does not and cannot begin only with good intentions, but must be grounded in an understanding of all the socio-economic and cultural issues that lead to oppression and tension. Using the Korean term han to describe the deep-seated suffering of racial oppression, he then suggests resources for understanding and healing in both Christian and Asian traditions. Part I of Racial Conflict and Healing describes the status quo from a Korean American perspective, including discrimination against ethnic minorities and the discrimination they inflict on one another. In Parts II and III, Park suggests that American society as a whole needs a superordinate vision to form a unified community. Park argues that our profoundly individualistic society must learn to understand an idea of self that is formed through relationship with others. Finally, in Part IV, he presents a theological model, a theology of seeing, as a way to genuinely understand the other and to promote healing within our society.




Mediating the South Korean Other


Book Description

Multiculturalism in Korea formed in the context of its neoliberal, global aspirations, its postcolonial legacy with Japan, and its subordinated neocolonial relationship with the United States. The Korean ethnoscape and mediascape produce a complex understanding of difference that cannot be easily reduced to racism or ethnocentrism. Indeed the Korean word, injongchabyeol, often translated as racism, refers to discrimination based on any kind of “human category.” Explaining Korea’s relationship to difference and its practices of othering, including in media culture, requires new language and nuance in English-language scholarship. This collection brings together leading and emerging scholars of multiculturalism in Korean media culture to examine mediated constructions of the “other,” taking into account the nation’s postcolonial and neocolonial relationships and its mediated construction of self. “Anthrocategorism,” a more nuanced translation of injongchabyeol, is proffered as a new framework for understanding difference in ways that are locally meaningful in a society and media system in which racial or even ethnic differences are not the most salient. The collection points to the construction of racial others that elevates, tolerates, and incorporates difference; the construction of valued and devalued ethnic others; and the ambivalent construction of co-ethnic others as sympathetic victims or marginalized threats.




Killing the Model Minority Stereotype


Book Description

Killing the Model Minority Stereotype comprehensively explores the complex permutations of the Asian model minority myth, exposing the ways in which stereotypes of Asian/Americans operate in the service of racism. Chapters include counter-narratives, critical analyses, and transnational perspectives. This volume connects to overarching projects of decolonization, which social justice educators and practitioners will find useful for understanding how the model minority myth functions to uphold white supremacy and how complicity has a damaging impact in its perpetuation. The book adds a timely contribution to the model minority discourse. “The contributors to this book demonstrate that the insidious model minority stereotype is alive and well. At the same time, the chapters carefully and powerfully examine ways to deconstruct and speak back to these misconceptions of Asian Americans. Hartlep and Porfilio pull together an important volume for anyone interested in how racial and ethnic stereotypes play out in the lives of people of color across various contexts.” - Vichet Chhuon, University of Minnesota Twin Cities “This volume presents valuable additions to the model minority literature exploring narratives challenging stereotypes in a wide range of settings and providing helpful considerations for research and practice.” - David W. Chih, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign “Asian Pacific Islander adolescents and young adults are especially impacted by the model minority stereotype, and this volume details the real-life consequences for them and for all communities of color. The contributors provide a wide-ranging critique and deconstruction of the stereotype by uncovering many of its manifestations, and they also take the additional step of outlining clear strategies to undo the stereotype and prevent its deleterious effects on API youth. Killing the Model Minority Stereotype: Asian American Counterstories and Complicity is an essential read for human service professionals, educators, therapists, and all allies of communities of color.” - Joseph R. Mills, LICSW, Asian Counseling and Referral Service, Seattle WA




The Flows of Transnationalism: Questioning Identities and Reimagining Curriculum


Book Description

This reflexive, transcultural dialogue scholarship integrates autobiography alongside an in-depth, critical analysis of Eastern and Western philosophy. Moon revisits his cultural heritage providing rich narratives that debunk a universalized, Eurocentric approach to truth in the contemporary curriculum and social discourse. As an exploration of multiple versions of knowing and identities, The Flows of Transnationalism allows readers to extend and invent their own approaches to examining the fluidity of identities. Moon promotes diverse perspectives within curriculum studies by disrupting the self-other and cultural sameness-difference dichotomy. Amid the urgent need of developing anti-racist pedagogy, this book provides an innovative way to studying identities in a transnational context. This thought-provoking book on transculturalism, cultural identities, and curriculum is intended to benefit educators, university faculty, and interested members of the public. It is written for those who have the desire to learn and apply diverse approaches for engaging with cultural identities through lived experience and its sociopolitical interpretation.




Bipolar Orders


Book Description

North Korea and South Korea are never far from the news headlines - one for the alleged danger it poses to the world, the other for its apparent capitalist success story. In Bipolar Orders, Hyung Gu Lynn analyzes the processes driving both countries since the 1980s. North Korea has experienced severe economic deterioration and increasing international isolation, while South Korea has undergone democratization and witnessed the emergence of a vibrant consumer culture. Paradoxically, this growing gap in ideologies and material standards has led to improved relations between the two countries. Why has this counterintuitive development occurred? Is North Korea really a threat, and if so, for whom? This book provides a substantive, accessible, and timely examination of the complex and compelling histories of the two Koreas.




Click and Kin


Book Description

The essays in Click and Kin span the globe, examining transnational connections that touch in the United States, Canada, Mexico, India, Pakistan, and elsewhere.