Korean Diaspora Communities in Britain and the United States - Essay Example

Provisional Thesis A comparative study on Korean diaspora communities in Britain and the United s: process of community building and notion of homeland. Introduction In the proposed doctoral research, I contend the culturalist argument that immigration patterns depend on ascribed features of each ethnic/national group. I argue that while culturalist perspective might be valid in explaining diversity in the degree of acculturation among different groups in a single country, its explanatory power is greatly reduced when looking at different patterns of immigration adaptation of ethnic/national groups from one country scattered across the globe. I intend to explore the differing patterns of immigration adaptation of Korean communities in the U.K. and the U.S., the process of community building and the degree of efforts exerted by these two comparable groups to either maintain or reject traditional customs, and their sense of identity attached to or detached from their homeland or the host country. Absolute majority of existing literature on Korean diaspora is concentrated on Koreans in the U.S. Study of Korean communities in Europe has received surprisingly little attention from academia, and scant volume of existing scholarly work clearly reflects such neglect. According to the statistics released by the Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Overseas Korean Foundation, the size of worldwide Korean Diaspora is 7,044,716 as of 2007. China, the U.S. and Japan are the top three recipient countries accounting for more than 80 percent of the total population of overseas Koreans. In Europe, excluding the former USSR countries, there are 111,276 ethnic Koreans and the U.K. is home to the largest Korean population in Europe with some 42,000 people. The fact that there is no existing literature on Korean immigrants in Europe provides a good justification for initiating this study. However, novelty alone is not a sufficient condition that justifies the significance of one study. Apart from the literature on Korean diaspora communities, there exists an ample volume of scholarly work comparing the U.K and the U.S. There is an obvious advantage of comparing these two countries as although imperfect, their shared Anglo-Saxon culture, and language can control many endogenous factors that can be problematic while comparing two completely different countries. My intention is not to dismiss the value of existing comparative examinations of Korean communities that have already been done, but to fill in the gap in existing literature by carrying out a research on the group that has not been covered by other researchers before, and uncovering subtle differences - rather than visible differences highlighted in the existing literature on Japan-U.S and China-U.S. comparisons, that exist between the two countries that share many similarities yet subtle differences. Such differences, although they are felt and detected, have not received scholarly attention and therefore exist only in forms of personal anecdotal speculations. The significance of this potential work should not be limited to the field of diaspora studies in parochial Korean context only. It will also make contribution to studies of ethnic minorities in the U.K. in the British context. Some of the empirical findings will be able to be expanded, generalized and have wider implications in the general diaspora discourse. That is, the ultimate aim of my study, and choosing Korean immigrant group, is a mere strategic choice made by a novice student coming from Korea, hoping for a smoother entry to the field of ethnicity and migration academia in her initial stage. My ambition for possible further research after the completion of doctoral dissertation will expand to other ethnic groups in different countries, and also different migrant groups recently burgeoning in Korea. Literature Review There exists no comprehensive study on Korean communities in the U.K. One book exists on a Korean community in Europe, that examines the Korean immigrants in Germany by Jung-sook Yoo (1996) titled Koreanische Immigranten in Deutschland: Interessenvertretung und Selbstorganisation. However, Yoo's book is only available in German language, and therefore is out of my accessibility. On the other hand, there is a relatively rich deposit of academic works covering Korean communities in the U.S. due to its size and especially close bilateral relations between Korea and the U.S. However, when it comes to comparative research on Korean immigrant communities in different countries, the volume of existing literature shrinks considerably. Pyong Gap Min (1992)'s comparison of Korean minorities in China and Japan offers a valuable insight to understanding different patterns of immigrants' adjustment in countries where physical and cultural characteristics of a minority group are not pronounced in the host country. By focusing on the level of ethnic subculture and identity maintenance of Korean immigrants in the two countries, Min argues that physical and cultural differences between the majority and minority groups are not necessary conditions for discrimination, contesting Wirth (1945) and Noel (1968)'s theory on ethnocentrism underscoring the physical and cultural differences between the majority and minority groups as a "necessary condition for ethnic stratification (Min 1992, 5). Kazuko Suzuki's Ph.D. dissertation (2003) compares Korean immigrant groups in Japan and the U.S. and stresses the role of state immigration policy as a decisive factor shaping the adaptation patterns of immigrants. In-jin Yoon (2005)'s book Korean Diaspora, available in Korean language, is a comprehensive examination of Korean diaspora communities in terms of its broad scope, covering Canada, China, Japan, the U.S. and the former USSR countries in Central Asia. However, his description of the U.S. immigration policies and culture as favouring multiculturalism and promoting diversity needs to be re-examined under scrutiny. His conclusion that Koreans in Japan has more negative ethnic identity than those in China and the U.S. due to colonial history and explicit institutional and legal discrimination confirms the findings in previous works by Min and Suzuki. However, he makes identical evaluation of American and Canadian experience of Korean immigrants despite fundamental difference in the nature of immigration policies of the two countries - traditional "melting pot" assimilation approach in the U.S. and more diversity-respecting "ethnic mosaic" in Canada. I find his observation of Canadian experience rather crude, perhaps due to relatively small sample size of Korean-Canadians and sheer breath and scale of his research project. Addressing the issue of different adaptation patterns of an ethnic group emerging from two very similar Anglo-Saxon countries will be the essential part of research question of my doctoral dissertation. Research Question Building on previous studies, I plan to explore the differing mechanisms of Korean community building in the U.K. and the U.S., the outcomes and the causes of establishment of such different mechanisms in countries of similar cultural background. One stark difference is found in proficiency of heritage Korean language among the 1.5 and second generation population. Numerous personal and acquaintances' observations tell much higher level of proficiency in Korean language among second generation Koreans in Europe, not to mention Britain, than those in the U.S. Rapid shift from Korean to English among U.S.-born Korean-Americans is documented in Alba and Nee (2003), with over 80 percent of U.S.-born second-generation Filipinos and Koreans speaking only English at home, compared to less than 40 percent among Cubans, Dominicans, Mexicans and Salvadorans. Such trend is much less visible in the U.K. In fact, the Korean communities in the U.K. created a semi-institutional way to prevent heritage language loss, holding religious service or mass only in Korean. This contrasts with what happens in Korean-American churches, where English service is held separately for children who do not speak Korean (Yi 2008). What made Koreans in the U.K. to make stronger efforts to maintain traditions not to mention the systematic efforts to prevent language attrition than Korean-Americans Theoretical Framework Many sociologists have tried to come up with theories on factors that can affect patterns of immigrant adaptation. Sowell (1975) and Light (1972) emphasize the importance of ascribed features that are innate in each ethnic group in determining the course of incorporation to the host society. Bonacich and Modell (1980) argued strength of solidarity and social network among the members of ethnic group were important resources for ethnic minorities to resist against discrimination. Gibson & Ogbu (1991) recognized the importance of migration motivation - forced or voluntary - to the host country as an important factor affecting the adaptation. Chiswick (1986) stressed the salience of human capital of each immigrant and its compatibility and transferability in the host society, while Portes and Bach (1985) focused on the concentrated effect of ethnic enclave rather than the influence of personal socioeconomic background of immigrant in the country of origin. My hypothesis contends the validity of culturalists' argument that ascribed characteristics are fundamental in explaining different patterns of incorporation. As we have seen in previous empirical studies comparing same ethnic group in different countries showing different patterns, the culturalists argument seem to lose much support. In studying Korean communities in the U.S. and U.K., examining migration motivation might not be useful, as Korean immigrants to these two countries came predominantly voluntarily. Looking at pre- and post-migration socioeconomic background might be still valid as more recent generation of immigrants to the U.S. became diversified and include increasing number of less-educated people with lower-socioeconomic background. My hypothesis is that the immigration policy of receiving country plays a crucial role in shaping the adaptation patterns of ethnic minorities. I will look into "Only English" assimilationist approach by the U.S. and contrast it with more lenient and accommodating British approach. Methodology & Provisional Timetable The proposed research will need data from both Korean-American and Korean-British communities. While it is possible to depend partially on the ethnography and quantified data available in existing literature for the Korean-American immigrant communities, the data on Korean-British need to be obtained through extensive first-hand gathering by the researcher, as no preceding work exists. After completion of my MSc thesis, I will be required to stay in Oxford full-time for at least three terms. During the mandatory three-term residence in Oxford, I will complete additional coursework on methodology and audit any relevant courses offered on migration and ethnicity. In the free time, I will do further literature reading as well as frequently travel to New Malden, Surrey, suburb south of London, the home of the largest Korean immigrants in Europe, and carry out my field research, adding more contextual base to my MSc thesis that maps out the Korean communities in the U.K. After the mandatory residence-in-Oxford term is over, I intend to rent a room for a few months in New Malden and immerse myself in the Korean-British enclave, which will enable me to observe more closely at how the community operates as an insider. I will also take a trip to Korean language schools and regularly attend churches, as church is the key place for Korean immigrants to collectively practice shared tradition and values, both in the U.K. and the U.S. My research will be predominantly qualitative in nature, and I will conduct in-depth interviews with 1.5 or second generation children, preferably those who entered university or above, to observe intergenerational language shift trend. I will also distribute questionnaires and surveys to find out more information about demographic composition of the members of the Korean communities in the U.K. e.g. occupation, educational background, etc. The most effective way to elicit response from questionnaires seems to be through church participation. Once my field work on Korean-British community is done, I will conduct field work in the U.S. in a similar fashion. From my experience of living in two different cities in the U.S. in youth, I have established points of contact in these two cities with a network of acquaintances in Korean-American churches. I anticipate that field work in these two cities - one a big city with large Korean population and the other a mid-sized city with not so many Koreans - might generate some interesting points to study that might be different from existing literature on Korean-American communities, which have been concentrated on covering only metropolitan cities with large Korean population. I hope to spend the third year writing up the dissertation based on the data I will have gathered from both countries by that time. In analyzing the data, I will employ "a variation-finding comparison" that rules out "a principle of variation in the character or intensity of a phenomenon having more than one form by examining systematic differences among instances" (Tilly 1984, 116). I will have to adopt some help from the comparative and historical sociology field, as my area of research is comparative and cannot completely rule out the contextual and historical circumstances of the two groups. Read More