Abstract
Younger-Generation Korean Experiences in the United States seeks to capture the complex realities of 1.5- and second-generation Korean Americans’ ethnic identity formation. Pyong Gap Min and Thomas Chung do this by providing a collection of essays written by 1.5- and second-generation young adult Koreans on the subject of their ethnic identity development. Pulling from various data sources, including previously published works as well as revised essays presented at a conference, the book compares the personal narratives of two cohorts of Korean American young adults (those who spent their childhood and adolescence in the late 1960s and early 1970s and those who grew up in the 1980s and the early 1990s). The editors pay close attention to four major factors that shape 1.5- and second-generation Korean Americans’ (SGKAs) identity formation: “(1) their retention of ethnic culture, (2) their social networks with ethnic friends and involvement in ethnic organizations, (3) their linkages to the mother country and perception of the mother country’s global power and influence, and (4) their experiences with racial prejudice and discrimination” (p. 7).
The strength of the book resides in the main body of the text, which includes three essays from the first cohort and ten essays from the second cohort that describe the contours of Koreans’ ethnic identity development in the United States. These stories are told from various perspectives and social contexts, but are all interwoven by four commonly shared experiences. First, SGKAs grew up encountering racism, rejection, and prejudice. They faced questions and comments from the broader society like “Where are you really from?” and “Go back to China!” and were treated like monolithic strangers from a different shore. And this maltreatment came from all sides. It came from the white majority as well as from other ethnic minorities. SGKAs also encountered prejudice from within their own ethnic community, both in the United States and in Korea.
Second, multi-directional rejection and maltreatment lead SGKAs to experience identity confusion and alienation. SGKAs are dogged by self-doubt and questions like “Am I Korean or American? Am I Korean American or American Korean? Who am I and where do I belong?” This kind of existential identity questioning can be accompanied by internalized racism and self-hatred and can lead some SGKAs to suffer from low self-esteem and a sense of shame from being unable to fit into ideal-type notions of a “Korean” or an “American.”
Third, this identity estrangement connects to the theme of being in a bicultural limbo, neither here nor there, being betwixt and between. SGKAs are unable to be fully embraced by the Korean or the American community. They function in two separate worlds. As soon as school is over, they inhabit another world with a different language and different foods, routines, and rules. They lead double lives, code-switching in and out of two separate worlds riddled with cultural landmines. SGKAs’ busy and reticent immigrant parents are unable to help them navigate the complex waters of American mainstream life, whether it is knowing how to make small talk around the water cooler or asking one’s boss for a promotion beyond the bamboo ceiling. Being in this liminal no-man’s-land, SGKAs’ ethnic identities will take on a different shape and hue depending on other dimensions of their identities like gender, sexuality, class, physical ability, and so on.
Finally, all of the essays highlight the idea that identity is fluid and constantly evolving. Many who experienced ethnic existentialism come to later embrace their hybrid identity. They come to recognize that they are both Korean and American and learn to feel more comfortable in their own bicultural skin. There are peaks and valleys in ethnic identity development, and SGKAs are on an ongoing journey of constructing what it means to be Korean American.
Reading these diverse yet commonly threaded stories, readers can come to their own conclusions regarding the liminal, fluid, intersectional, multiple, and continuously evolving nature of Korean Americans’ ethnic identity formation. The editors, however, organize the personal narratives by utilizing a typology of ethnic identity development, which they introduce in the beginning and revisit at the end of the book. Ethnic identity formation is dependent on a combination of low and high internal factors (retention of ethnic culture, involvement in ethnic social networks, linkages to the homeland) and external factors (racial discrimination). Based on this typology, the editors conclude that the first cohort of Korean Americans had many more problems in developing their ethnic identity than the later cohort. This is due to the earlier cohort having more difficulty in retaining ethnic culture, being less involved in ethnic social networks, and lacking positive linkages to the homeland than the later cohort. It is also because the earlier cohort grew up encountering more intense and overt racial discrimination in America than the later cohort. Thus, the later cohort of Korean Americans are more likely to have a strong positive ethnic identity as Koreans throughout their lives and have experienced much less inner psychological turmoil over their identity than the earlier cohort. The editors therefore conclude that today’s younger generation of Korean Americans are not forced to accept either a Korean or an Asian label. Instead, they have the luxury of choosing whether or not they want to add their Korean ethnic identity onto their American identity. They can pick and choose from American and Korean culture in the ways that suit them best.
Readers may find that the personal narratives that fill the main body of the book do not fit neatly into the ethnic identity typology provided by the editors. No matter their cohort type, all of the essays share the common thread of being in-between, self-conscious, hybrid, and experiencing an identity evolution. The identity typology insufficiently captures the fluid, situational, intersectional, and evolving nature of identities across time and place. Given that the book seeks to provide a cohort analysis, it would have also been helpful to have a more detailed description of the sample so that readers could know how the two cohorts compared in terms of age, gender, place of socialization, and class. It is also unclear how the essays were selected and how representative they are of the Korean American population. Several of the essay authors are sociology PhDs, and many are leaders in the Korean American community. As the editors recognize, their cohort analysis is also impeded by the fact that there are only three essays from the first cohort and that not all of the same subjects were addressed in the essays. Finally, readers who have a more systematic view of racism in America may question how easily Korean Americans can now forge an optional ethnicity of their own.
Younger-Generation Korean Experiences in the United States is, no doubt, a must-read for anyone interested in the subject of 1.5- and second-generations’ ethnic identity formation. Some readers may find the typology of ethnic identity formation helpful. All readers will find the personal narratives of the second generation’s journey of ethnic identity development moving and thought-provoking.