Sometimes, I’ll meet someone new, and hear this:
“You’re Korean? You don’t look Korean.”
Sometimes, it’s not as explicit or as offensive as that, but
I’ll get the impression that my appearance is something to be contemplated,
under the impression that only certain faces can match certain ethnicities.
But we deal with this on an every day basis. It’s part of
being a minority in the United States. Yes, stereotyping is a big problem, and
it has many aftershocks. One of those aftershocks is the tendency to correlate
perceived ethnicity with presumed identity.
“Black folks come in all shapes, colors, and sizes. We are
not one monolithic group—every single black person doesn’t look alike; we don’t
think alike; we don’t act alike; we don’t harness the same beliefs; but that does... in no way does that diminish our blackness, or serve to leave us less
than authenticated as a black person.” –Stephen A Smith (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a27-dKmL4H4&t=2m57s)
I found this part of First Take particularly relevant and
poignant because I feel it can be applied to Korean American identity: Korean
folks come in all shapes, colors, and sizes. We are not one monolithic
group—every single Korean person doesn’t look alike, we don’t think alike, we
don’t act alike … but that does in way diminish our Korean identity, or serve
to leave us less than authenticated as a Korean person.
Part of the problem is cultural—Korean culture is
monolithic. All elementary schoolchildren learn English as a second language.
Most students wear uniforms; many attend hagwons,
or after-school tutoring centers. Many Koreans are quite tied to video
games and PC gaming—this is the country with the most active e-sports
community, after all. A large majority of Koreans speak Korean, and many were
born in the country and identify as ethnically Korean.
But dig beneath the surface and I believe that same culture
has many faces. Perhaps a face with a surgically re-made nose in Apgujeong.
Perhaps the face of an older lady peddling scarves in Namde-mun market. Perhaps
it’s the student with a mask during finals season trying not to get sick. Maybe
it’s the wrinkled imma (forehead) of a typical male salary man. Try to look
around you in Seoul and in Korea and you will see a diversity of faces where
there is also uniformity.
You will hear a diversity of voices, in separate dialects.
You will hear the hushed voice of a man laying floorboards, with his coworker
talking about the state of the economy. If you listen closely, you will see the
fallen leaves by the beautiful flowers—a country struggling with rapid
modernization, with social and economic inequality, with youth suicide, and
with an oppressive patriarchy. You will come to empathize with the Korean
mother beside you complaining that her daughter has lagged behind in her
English studies. You will wonder what really becomes of widows, divorced women,
gays, lesbians, and trans people in an culture of shame. Then again, maybe you’ll hear the hymns and choral sounds
of Presbyterian, Methodist, and Catholic churches—a Christian community tied by
fervor, Confucian values, and a complete rejection of the ‘other’—even if the
‘other’ includes other Christians.
You’ll see the clasped hands and consider the preponderance
of couples in a country with the lowest fertility rate in the OECD. You’ll see
the hands spelling Korean Sign Language on morning news broadcasts… and
everything else. Then, the clap of several thousand hands in unison, cheering
on the national football team, will just about overwhelm you. It is then, one
might contemplate the worn lines in one's grandmothers’ palms and think of the hours
spent manually washing, cutting, folding, and holding lives with their hands.
Then, maybe, you can contemplate how multifaceted Korea is
and how diverse Korean people can be. We come in all shapes, colors, and sizes.
We are not one monolithic group—we don’t harness the same beliefs. That does
not in any way diminish our Korean identities.
Does this answer your question? Yes, I’m Korean.
What’d you expect me to be?
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