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Category: Korean Society

February 18, 2006

Joongang Ilbo on Biracial Koreans

The Joongang Ilbo’s Kim Soe-Jung has a very long, thoughtful, and comprehensive piece on the subject.  It never lost my interest for a moment.  What makes this article unlike so many in the Korean press since the Hines Ward phenomenon is that it deals more with the question about how people should be treated than the question of who is Korean.  There are also facts you may not have known, such as the explosive growth in mixed marriages in Korea,...

Categories Korean Law/Korean Society
February 16, 2006

Defector: NK Cheerleaders Sent to Gulag

Who recalls the days when South Korea’s faith in reunification bordered on an obession – a religion, perhaps?  Nothing was more telling of the North Korean regime’s success at self-popularization in the South than the public swooning over a  squad of North Korean cheerleaders,  despite all the procrustean, regimented eeriness surrounding them.  Let’s look back at that time: This bustling South Korean port bid an emotional farewell Tuesday to a North Korean cheering squad whose presence at the Asian Games,...

Categories Appeasement/Defectors/Human Rights/Inside NK/Korean Politics/Korean Society/North Korea
February 14, 2006

Korean Teachers’ Union Gets Some Competition

You may recall how the KTU recently made itself  famous in the Korea blogosphere: its “What a Wonderful World” video for the APEC Summit.  This led, in part,  to an acrimonious controversy over education reform and a silly GNP boycott  of the National Assembly.  On a somwhat more productive front, tt also led to the formation of an upstart rival: The Korean Liberal Teachers Union, established last month by teachers opposed to the educational direction of the left-leaning workers union,...

Categories Anti-Americanism/Korean Education/Korean Politics/Korean Society
February 11, 2006

Hines Ward’s Korean Mother: ‘People Spat at Us’

The great “who is Korean?” conversation goes on. If South Korea doesn’t change the rules, after all, it didn’t win the Superbowl. Today, the Chosun Ilbo interviews half-Korean Johnny Westover, who did not win the Superbowl, but who has been active in fighting for the rights of mixed-race Koreans: Active in a group of mixed-race Koreans, he told a meeting Friday he has never seen a half-Korean become a general in the army, or for that matter reach any position...

Categories Human Rights/Korean Society
September 15, 2005

Common Genes? Why Radical Korean Views on Race May Remind You of You-Know-Who

I meant to take note of The Marmot’s translation of North Korea’s latest blast of Herrenvolk rhetoric: It claimed USFK influence over the last 60 years eroded the unique speech, writing, dress, food culture and lifestyle of the Korean people. “U.S. soldiers indulge in bestial sexual assaults against South Korean women, and have polluted the bloodlines of our race, which remained unbroken for 5,000 years, and sullied the purity of the race,” it said. This is useful context for its...

Categories Korean Politics/Korean Society