A one-woman show about adoption by Amy Mihyang, Between:
…encapsulates her experiences as a Korean American woman, a New Yorker, and most of all, a transracial adoptee. Bringing the audience with her on the plane en route from NYC to Korea, the author contrasts her journey with the echoes of other adoptees and those touched by the act of adoption. Mihyang makes us ask ourselves, “Do we need to know where we came from in order to know where we’re going?”
And as The Korea Herald describes her performance:
Mihyang adeptly embraces her characters ― from a confused young girl, desperate to assimilate in America, to a distraught woman confronting a forbidden pregnancy in Korea ― with heart-felt conviction, shifting the audience from empathy-laden sadness to laughter with ease.
For more details, see the press release here, or click on the poster below:
Apologies to readers for not mentioning the show earlier, but fortunately there’s still many chances to see it later this week!^^
Over at a recent post on Noona Blog: Seoul, an excellent blog written by a Swedish woman in a relationship with a Korean man, currently there’s several interesting comments about the sources of racism often directed against Korean female – Caucasian male (KF-CM) couples in Korea.
Many of which were written by Jake of Asian Male Revolutions, who has the admirable and very necessary goal of challenging the racist and emasculating images of Asian men in the US media through that website.
But in the process of – in my view – very much contriving to paint racism against KF-CM couples in Korea in those terms, as well as global racial power relations, I found he made many extremely sexist assumptions about Korean women, which I’d like to challenge. As technical issues prevent me from doing so at Noona Blog directly however,* then – assuming that you’ve already read his comments – I’ll post my original response here instead:
Dear Jake,
it’s difficult not to sound offensive when critiquing someone’s opinions so harshly. But still, however legitimate your concerns about representations of Asian men in the US media are, it’s incredibly naive of you to assume that that these would exist in the same form and degree in the Korean media, or indeed at all.
Argue that they still have a role in expressions of racism against KF-CM couples in Korea nevertheless though, and you end up simply sounding like an apologist.
Much more seriously however, in so doing you also rely heavily on some extremely patronizing and sexist assumptions about Korean women, let alone racist ones against Caucasian men. Let me explain.
I’ll start with your acknowledgment that “there’s no denying that simple male jealousy plays a role in the bellyaching white men…encounter as one part of an interracial couple in Korea.” Naturally I fully agree, and while I consider it a little harsh to dismiss treating that “as simple jealousy from a bunch of Korean/Asian losers” as a “pretty foolish assumption” – after all, you get jerks like that the world over – I also agree that it is wise “to consider the historical and political implications and undertones of various types and permutations of interracial dating” to understand that bellyaching more fully (source, bellyaching pun above).
But what is that historical and political context you identify?
The Western media has a much longer reach than Korean media; in fact all Asian media is to an extent influenced strongly by Euro-centric beauty standards. This has been well-documented by all the plastic surgery, and by the glorification of media figures (singers, actresses) who are selected first and foremost for their vaguely euro-Asian looks (as opposed to supposedly ‘ugly’ Korean features) and then groomed by a team of trainers and managers to become media superstars like Girls Generation, Son Dam-Bi, and all the ‘flavors du jour’ pop-tarts you see on Korean TV shows.
And again I largely agree, having written many posts saying pretty much the same thing myself. But crucially not the “The Western media has a much longer reach than Korean media” part; and as we’ll see in a moment, I feel you have an extremely inflated view of the Western media’s power in Korea.
So given the fact that an embedded system of euro/white-worship permeates South Korean pop-culture, white males have more elbow room to work with in the global dating scene. Many come to the shores of Korea and Asia and have relatively little trouble finding willing women who having seen and internalized images of white beauty standards, would like nothing more than to experience the thrill of dating the mythic “white boy”. And white men who come to Korea are only too happy to take advantage of this fact.
Okaaay…I’ll deal with your warped view of the interracial dating scene in Korea in a moment too (source above: Gusts of Popular Feeling). But first, let’s focus on your views of Korean women which it relies on, which you expand upon in your next comment:
Asian female/white male relationships cannot happen unless both parties are willing to participate in it.
This can only mean one thing – that Korean women, having internalized media messages glorifying white men, are also actively seeking them out to satisfy their own ‘white fetish’. Therefore, we cannot simply categorize white men as “predators” for Asian flesh: instead, a significant number of Asian women are willing collaborators.
Interesting choices of terms you’re using, especially that last. Continuing:
Or at the very least, they are passively open to it – that is, they might not go out of their way to seek white men, but if one does hit on them they are psychologically “primed” to be much more open to their sexual and romantic advances, as opposed to a black or even Korean man.
This is just more evidence of the pervasive white worship in Korean society, and it illustrates just how thoroughly and totally many Korean women internalize this message.
You’ve seen them in the bars and clubs and lounges of Seoul. To them, white boys on their arm are the ultimate accessory to their personal crusade to be the “coolest” chick on the block.
They’re commodifying race – and according to their rather twisted logic, being seen with a white guy the equivalent of having the latest handbag or shoes.
They ought to stop and think about the implications of their choices. To them it’s a confirmation of their own belief that “being with a white man = COOL + URBANE + COSMOPOLITAN + TRENDY”… but it’s actually an expression of a colonial mindset – they are psychologically and mentally colonized, dominated, and enslaved.
They’re not setting the tone on what is cool – they’re doing the exact opposite: setting the tone on what is sick, twisted, and unwholesome.
Disclaimer: I am in no way claiming that ALL Korean women with white men are like this. But there is also no denying that a significant number of these women do exist. So please take my comments for what they are, and don’t take them out of context. Thanks.
Hey, no-one is denying that there are some Korean women who seek a White boyfriend for much the same reasons they would a Gucci handbag (or various types of Korean men either for that matter). But a “significant” number of Korean women with White men are like this you say? What percentage of them do you mean by that term roughly? 10? 25? And do you actually have any evidence whatsoever that they represent anything but the tiniest fraction of all KF-CM relationships?
Also, I’m rather confused: what percentage don’t want a White boyfriend as an accessory, but like you say just want to experience the thrill of dating one instead (which apparently is bad, even though we’re all attracted to the exotic)? What percentage are simply psychologically “primed” to spread their legs more readily for a White man “as opposed to a Black or even Korean” one? And finally, presuming you even allow for the possibility, what percentage of Korean women would you say aren’t passive, unthinking dupes of media messages of White male supremacy and are thus able to have genuine loving relationships with White men?
More to the point, have you asked so much as a single Korean woman of what she thinks of your characterization of them above?
I have asked one myself actually, my wife, and I’d wager that her reaction to you on the right is pretty representative. But I’ve asked many many more about interracial dating (including many who only speak Korean), and I think you’d be rather surprised at the far greater numbers of Korean women who have little interest, even a positive distaste at the possibility of dating White men.
Moreover, while global racial patterns of hegemony and privilege certainly ensure that more White guys end up in South Korea than, say, Indian guys, and that stereotypes of both exist that encourage and discourage Korean women to form relationships with them respectively, it doesn’t automatically follow that Korean women assessing them as potential partners don’t do so by pretty much the same criteria that they do for any men, including Koreans.
Most South Asian men in Korea, for instance, are laborers, which obviously puts them at a big disadvantage to middle-class White teachers. Also, as one Korean female friend put it to me, while White guys tending to be taller has a great deal to do with their attraction to some Korean women (albeit a disparity that is rapidly disappearing), that still isn’t enough to overcome the anticipated language and/or cultural difficulties for most others. And another acknowledged that while White men in Korean tended to have more money (and freedom) than Korean guys in their early-20s, with the ESL industry in Korea being the joke that is, then, financially-speaking, in fact Koreans make much better partners by their late-20s and early-30s.
In short, while the specific mixture of the fish in the sea may well be determined by forces beyond their control, women are very much the arbiters of which ones they reel in so to speak.
To be fair, you do somewhat acknowledge this in your next comment, and which I admit I misinterpreted in the first draft of this post. But still, it is interesting how you force that into a narrative of Korean female submissiveness and White men’s sexual colonialism nevertheless. You say of the relationship between one commenter’s German father and Korean mother’s relationship, for instance:
…until Korean male/German female relationships become just as commonplace as what’s already out there (that is, WM/AF relationships), you can’t exactly hold that up as a ’shining example’ of “colorblindness”. It’s not — it’s more of an expression of racialized power structures and a neo-colonial history.
No, actually it can be colorblind, and both relationships and the people behind them are more then mere expressions of vast, impersonal forces. But if you’d like a more specific critique of your twisting facts to suit your narrative however:
It’s the German man’s knowledge when he goes abroad that his country is wealthier and more powerful, compounded with the Korean woman’s knowledge that her’s is less wealthy (particularly back in those days), that makes the Western-male/Asian female (WM-AF) relationship so numerous.
And since women generally look to marry “up” while men look to marry “down” (socially and economically), you can see why the inequality between the white and Asian races makes the WM-AF relationship so easy to forge.
Put simply, I call bullshit on women marrying up and men marrying down: in virtually every society, both historically and today, the vast majority of men and women marry someone within the same socioeconomic group as themselves. Earning much more money than women however, then men are certainly freer to marry down, but that doesn’t at all mean that they aim to do so, or that they don’t aim to marry up any less than women.
If you take some time to analyze our message instead of reacting emotionally, you’ll see just how out of line your thinking is, and how little time and effort you put into trying to understand something that is admittedly *highly, highly* complex. It’s a difficult concept for anyone to wrap his or her head around, so I guess I can’t blame you for taking the lazy way out with convenient and disjointed logic.
But then I said I’d talk about the Western media’s influence in Korea, and so I’ll do so now by contrasting the different impacts you feel it has on Korean men and women (my emphasis):
But the rub for Korean men (in general) is that men in places like Madison Avenue in New York City and Hollywood who control the images that go up on billboards and on TV and movie-screens are white – and they invariably make those images in their own image: White, Male, and BLOWN WAY OUT OF PROPORTION. In short: welcome to the world of Hollywood and the White Male Action Hero.
Keep in mind that while this is happening, Asian males are either completely excluded or used as a foil to make the white male look better in comparison. So Asian males in America or Korean males living in Korea internalize this subliminal message in the media and think that they can’t possibly step up to a blonde girl (or whatever white chick). They live their entire lives being psychologically castrated, in sharp contrast to a white male from where ever, who is emboldened or even arrogantly empowered by the jumbo-sized images made in his likeness, in the embrace of gorgeous white, black, latin, and of course Asian women in movie theatres all over the world.
Hey, again I completely agree about the representations of Korean and Asian men in the US media. But I’m curious as to how you think this affects Korean males in Korea exactly, and what’s more upon whom you – very tellingly – imply that there is an equal effect as on Asian males in America. Pray, have you actually watched or read any Korean television, movies, magazines, or websites recently? It’s not like they’re lacking for strong, macho images of Korean men getting the Korean girl; or indeed, frequently getting the White girl these days, creating hypersexual stereotypes of them in the process.
Am I also “emotionally reacting” in pointing that out?
And simultaneously (being human and all) many white women are conditioned to shoot for white men as the “gold standard”, since all the glorified images of ‘male sex appeal’ feature only white males. Some even view Asian males with contempt or pity, and this of course spills over when white chicks go abroad – though to be fair, I’ve noticed this racist bias more in North American white females than European ones. So it is any wonder we see a “global sexual marketplace” that is DOMINATED by white males (figuratively) ‘raping’ and exploiting these loopholes to their sexual advantage?
Given the above dynamics of a GLOBAL system of media brainwashing that favors white males, is it any wonder that some people in Korea or elsewhere might secretly (or openly, in some cases) resent a white male for doing what he does? It’s not unreasonable, or completely out of the realm of possibility.
Ah. So while Korean women are mere passive dupes of the Western media, in contrast Korean men are savvy, knowledgeable consumers of it, and for whom calling a Korean woman walking down the street with Caucasian male a whore, say, is hence a justified response to their symbolic castrations and emasculation therein? As is the way the Korean media treats Western men?
To put it mildly, that sounds rather apologist to me. But then considering what you write about White guys in Korea, then what would I know, right?
But here’s the funny thing: to him, he’s just ‘innocently’ going about his personal life – but of course he also doesn’t see (well, probably chooses not to see, that is, ignore) that the entire System is built for HIS personal advantage. It’s custom-built for his white male needs – and that is very racist, no doubt.
And on that note, I’ll put this response to rest. Regular readers may well wonder why I devoted so much time to it: after all, its flaws speak for themselves. But then I’m only human, and I reacted partially because it reminded me of how a commentator on this blog also conflated the 2 issues in an earlier post for instance, and whom I simply gave up reasoning with. Much more though, because it was annoying to spend 60 minutes on a comment only to have it disappear (see below), and finally especially because I was angered by comments on a similar post on Noona Blog not only gushing with enthusiasm for Jake’s comments but also implying that he had “a fact-based academic writing style”, when if anything it’s marked by their complete absence.
Combine that with being a White man married to a Korean woman blogging about gender issues in Korea too, who as a result has had trolls insulting the both of us incessantly for 3 years, or even being sent 3000 word emails patiently explaining that the vast majority of White men in Korea (but always excluding myself of course) have yellow fever, and that I’m just being emotional in not acknowledging that…then hopefully you can see why I get very tired and angry at hearing that sort of thing sometimes!^^
Update: See I’m No Picasso and Roboseyo for two excellent posts written in response to this one.
You’ve seen them in the bars and clubs and lounges of Seoul. To them, white boys on their arm are the ultimate accessory to their personal crusade to be the “coolest” chick on the block.
They’re commodifying race – and according to their rather twisted logic, being seen with a white guy the equivalent of having the latest handbag or shoes.
They ought to stop and think about the implications of their choices. To them it’s a confirmation of their own belief that “being with a white man = COOL + URBANE + COSMOPOLITAN + TRENDY”… but it’s actually an expression of a colonial mindset – they are psychologically and mentally colonized, dominated, and enslaved.
They’re not setting the tone on what is cool – they’re doing the exact opposite: setting the tone on what is sick, twisted, and unwholesome.
Disclaimer: I am in no way claiming that ALL Korean women with white men are like this. But there is also no denying that a significant number of these women do exist. So please take my comments for what they are, and don’t take them out of context. Thanks.
*Actually, my original intention was just to leave a comment at Noona Blog, but as soon as I hit “submit reply” then it disappeared into the ether. As the same thing happened on a different post last week however (my first there), then wisely I’d saved it first. Of course, it’s annoying that I can’t seem to comment at all there then, but normally I’d just chalk that up to the idiosyncrasies of the individual website. Yet then the same thing happened on Seoul Beats yesterday too (thanks for the link guys!), which I have successfully commented on before. Do any technically-minded readers have any possible explanations? A plugin issue perhaps, or something to do with the most recent version of WordPress? (Switching from Firefox to I.E. didn’t help) Thanks in advance!
( Source: Mental Poo; reproduced with permission )
A receipt from a recent visit by blogger My Jihae to an upscale restaurant in Seoul, about which she wrote:
I’m not sure how many restaurants do this, and why this restaurant bothers to do this in the first place, but on the top of the receipt they blatantly keep track of whether the guests are locals or foreigners. They pegged me right away, I guess it’s that obvious.
For those of you that can’t read Korean, for now let’s say that waegookin (외국인) on the right generally means a foreigner, and naegookin (내국인) on the left a Korean person. And that does indeed describe My Jihae and her dining partner respectively, although she is actually Korean-American. But why bother to note the distinction between two ethnically-identical customers at the same table?
Some commenters to her post speculate that it may have been done for taxation purposes, which I wrote would be something good to know if true, as otherwise:
…many expats (myself included) may simply chalk things like this up to Koreans typically and completely unnecessarily pointing out our foreignness, when in fact they may be nothing of the sort.
And see Occidentalismhere and here for a similar case in Japan. Unfortunately however, not all perceived Korean tendencies towards exclusion are simply misunderstandings on the part of non-Koreans.
…where when speaking in Korean, Koreans freeze up because they have some silly preconceptions that foreigners simply ‘can’t’ speak Korean or that they just ‘shouldn’t’ speak to us in Korean – the latter which comes without the help of the government and medias insistence in the last 10 years or so that ‘globalization’ means that Koreans should all have to speak English whenever they encounter big-nosed white people.
( Source: unknown )
And which personally used to get me extremely frustrated and angry while learning Korean a few years ago, although now I believe that that reaction from Koreans more often stems from simple inexperience and/or nervousness in dealing with non-Koreans. Still, whatever combination of factors are responsible in any given case, all have clear solutions, something which can not be so easily said of the ways in which Korean notions of nationalism, citizenship, and even the Korean language itself arguably inherently exclude others. Focusing on the latter in this post, I identify 2 main ways in which it does so:
First, because Koreans might take a vacation to New Zealand, say, and describe New Zealanders as waegookin while they’re there, so clearly “foreigner” doesn’t quite cut it as a translation. Perhaps “non-ethnic Korean” would be more suitable? But then what about about My Jihae back in the restaurant?
Given such confusion, then as you might expect the question of the most appropriate English term has already attracted a great deal of attention from many generations of expats, and so if you can forgive my heemanggomoon (희망고문; literally “hope-torture” or “stringing someone along”, and one of my favorite Korean words), I’ve decided that it would be unhelpful to repeat any of that here. Instead, let me refer you to this excellent post by regular commenter Seamus Walsh for the most recent and comprehensive discussion of this aspect of the language issue (but this and this post by others are also helpful), only passing on myself what I wrote in my own post on it 2 years ago:
It may not sound like much, but like I said in this forum, Korea’s (and Japan’s) bloodline-based notions of nationalism and citizenship emphasize and exaggerate the differences between natives and non-natives to an extent rarely found elsewhere in the world, and the constant reminders of these quickly become wearisome to anyone who’s spent even just a few months living here, let alone 8 years. And ironically, constantly hearing the term waegookin in our daily lives probably means that we come to adopt some of the same notions of division and distance ourselves too, and the effect snowballs.
Naturally, Seamus also covers the the second reason in that post, the fact that Koreans never say “my home”, “my wife”, “my language”, or “my country” for instance, but say “our” (우리) instead. And that I can add something useful to here, as by coincidence there was recently a lively discussion on that very topic on the email-based Korean Studies Internet Discussion List, prompted by the following question by William Pore of Pusan National University (image: Asadal Thought):
Dear List:
For any comparative Asian linguists, Ural Altaic linguists (?), or, maybe even Korean linguists on the list, I would like to inquire if a pronoun similar to the Korean we (i.e. ‘uri’) occurs with the same frequency/prominence in any related languages to the same degree that it does in Korean. Should we accept the assertion that I nearly always have had that the prominence of that pronoun in Korean is due to a particular Korean mindset alone?
And rather than have you scroll through the full June archive yourself, my contribution is in presenting a truncated and much(!) more readable version of the most pertinent comments instead. Starting with JMF’s reply then:
Perhaps this is not directly related, but I witnessed some very interesting aspects of “uri” while raising my daughter in Korea. Not only my daugher but all of her “pure Korean” friends as well naturally used the words “I/my” almost exclusively. I saw and heard all of them say in Korean “my house,” my school,” “my Mommy/Daddy,” etc. Of course, they were quickly corrected/reprimanded by parents and teachers until they capitulated and began to use “we/our” almost exclusively where they had once felt that “I/my” was more natural. In a word, ”uri” is not somehow “organic” to Korean-ness or Korean language but rather externally injected and enforced.
Frank Rudiger, University of Vienna:
And here comes something even less directly related, yet not completely unrelated: In Russian, there is a similar way of saying “we” when actually meaning “I”, for example “me and my mother” would literally be “us with mom” (my s mamoj). In other words, this is not necessarily a purely Korean phenomenon. I guess Russian is not the only example. What about “we won” (wir haben gewonnen) meaning “our team has won” in German (at least)?
Dr. Balazs Szalontai, Mongolia International University:
In Mongolian language, which has some interesting grammatical similarities with Korean, this practice is carried even further. One would often hear a lady utter the term “manaa nuhur” (our husband), rather than “minii nuhur” (my husband), though she supposedly does not intend to share the said individual with any additional ladies.:)
Alison Tokita, Tokyo Institute of Technology:
I know Japanese much better than I know Korean, but clearly the Korean uri has its equivalent in Japanese language and usage. The Japanese equivalent of uri has indeed been very frequent in recent decades as an aspect of Nihonjinron (theories or discourse of Japanese uniqueness), but is probably declining in the younger generation. The Japanese equivalent actually uses archaic forms of the pronoun. Some examples:
Japan is expressed as not only Nihon, but as waga kuni (our country; cf the softer watashitachi no kuni). The Japanese are not only Nihonjin, but wareware Nihonjin (we Japanese). My or our house can be wagaya (cf watashitachi no uchi).
Then there is the use of koku (country, nation): Japanese literature is koku bungaku (recently the use of Nihon bungaku is starting to replace this); Japanese history is kokushi (now changing to Nihonshi); Japanese (national) language is kokugo: what is taught to Japanese in schools is kokugo and what is taught to non-Japanese is Nihongo.
The use of our and national instead of the country name conveys a somewhat closed country, nationalistic mentality, and as Japan is becoming more internationalized this seems to be going out of favour. These are only my impressions, but others may know of research on this linguistic phenomenon.
Dr. Edward D. Rockstein:
Of course, the usage of koku [a Sino-Japanese loan word] you describe has antecedents in Chinese usages such as guoyu national language, guoshi national history, guowen national writing system or national literature, ddeung ddeung, nado nado, deng deng.
And by Owen Miller, with a similar example from England that I was very surprised and happy to see as a former Geordie myself(!), and with most of my extended family still in the region:
I wouldn’t like to step to far into the territory of the linguists on this list but I really wonder whether the case can be made empirically that the pronoun we is more frequent in Korean than in other languages. While I’m sure that John Frankl is right about its enforced use (as a result of ideological norms of national and familial collectivity that probably have relatively recent *historical roots), this doesn’t mean that it isn’t used **frequently** in similar ways in other languages. *
The use of the ‘national we’ is not uncommon in the UK, although perhaps uncommon enough that it makes me wince when I hear it. For example, teaching the First Opium War last year I found myself feeling strangely uncomfortable when the students spontaneously started discussing how terrible it was that ‘we’ had done this bad thing to China.
In certain British English dialects ‘we’ is also very commonly used in the way that Ross King describes above (exclusive first-person plural pronoun) in non-national contexts. For example, the Geordie English pronoun ‘wor’, as in ‘wor lass <http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/wor_lass>’.
It strikes me that the Korean discourse on the use of ‘uri’ is probably something of a self-reinforcing feedback loop: Encourage the use of a word in official discourse so as to strengthen national collectivity –> discover that word is used frequently –> find that this is evidence of strong national collectivity –> further encourage use of word etc etc.
Finally Jonathan:
Is there evidence of widespread vernacular use of uri prior to the twentieth century? I ask because I wonder if its use was prompted by the Japanese use of ware as in wareware Nihonjin?
And after all that, a clear message that this lingusitic feature of Korean is by no means as unique to Korean as many of us probably thought!
Thoughts?
Update 1:As several people have suggested in the comments, and Sara confirmed, the reason that upscale restaurants keep track of non-Koreans is so that they can determine which dishes are the most popular among them, and adjust their menus accordingly. Which is certainly nothing to get upset about, but then wouldn’t actually be all that helpful either, and it would make much more sense to note customers’ nationalities instead (provided staff had the ability to politely ask them).
Regardless however, certainly Koreans in the service industry do frequently unnecessarily keep track of customers which are non-Koreans. As I originally thought Brian in Jeollanam-do‘s receipt on the right was a prime example of for instance, but after reading his explanation:
In my case, I was at a Lotteria (shut up, it’s pretty good) in a Kim’s Club next to my apartment, and the “foreigner” was to help identify who the take-out order went to. Just to preempt any commenters from James’ post, no, I’m not terribly offended and it’s not the worst thing to ever happen to me. It’s just an odd default term considering the people working the counter usually just announce the order to the crowed in order to connect people with food. There’s no reason not to just announce “Bulgogi Burger set,” or whatever, unless the person assumed I wouldn’t understand the announcement. A good posibility, in spite of me having ordered in Korean.
…then I realize that it would indeed make sense to identify a foreign customer if the person taking his or her order felt that they’d be unlikely to understand their announcement. But I disagree with Brian’s first last line though (why assume that someone who can order in Korean couldn’t also understand that it’s arrived?), and which is just the sort of thing which so aggravates me about speaking Korean in this country like I explained. Hence the “외국인” was actually unnecessary then, but rather more because of the Lotteria worker’s preconceptions of non-Asian foreigners’ Korean ability (they would never do the same to a Japanese person) than anything inherent to the Korean language.
Either way, it’s good to remember that whenever one is highlighted like this, then it could be for any number of reasons, and 99% of the time the people responsible do not mean to and are probably completely unaware that they may be causing offense. Moreover, as Brian’s discussions here and here of decades-old journal articles on this subject attest to (see this one at Gypsy Scholar also), this is something one just has to get used to.
What do you find interesting about Korea? Perhaps even interested enough to study Korean for?
I’d wager that very few of you would consider doing so for pottery or the history of kimchi-making. Unfortunately however, such things are still staples of most Korean textbooks and courses on Korean culture.
…sometimes I wonder if Koreans actually know what their own culture is all about. Do they not realize that watching TV on tiny screens on the bus/subway, playing games at the PC bang all day and boiling it up at the Jimjil Bang or Baths are as much part of Korean culture as kimchi is? Would it not be more useful for us to learn more about the history and use of these? Show me ONE teacher who has been here more than a month who has not heard about the whole history of kimchi.
And not just more useful, but also more interesting and more entertaining too. In that vein, let me present the blog “솔직녀의 섹스와 연애 이야기” (An Honest Woman’s Thoughts on Sex and Love) as an alternative Korean study source, and of course as another Korean voice on gender and sexuality in Korea also.
While the author has actually been living in America for 10 years, in her own words she’s had a lot of Korean boyfriends and sexual experiences, and more importantly aims to avoid a loveless and sexless marriage like many of her counterparts back in Korea. In particular, it was this post about teaching Korean to her American boyfriend that first caught my eye, and which readers here might be most interested in. Rather than spoiling that for you though, and being unable to choose from so many interesting-looking posts to translate myself, here is one my wife selected for me instead(!):
혼전섹스는 결혼의 필수조건 Why Sex Before Marriage is Necessary
최근에 이글루스에선 처녀 논쟁이 한창이었다. 뭐 보지 않아도 뻔한 논쟁이지만, 아직도 여자는 결혼할때까지 처녀여야 된다고 주장하는 사람들을 보면서 묻고 싶었다.
Recently, on Egloos there was a big debate about virginity and sex before marriage. It was predictable and quite boring really, but it showed me that still some people think that women have to be virgins before marriage. Which made me ask myself the following:
사랑하는 사람이 처녀가 아니면 그 사람과 결혼 못한다는 얘긴가? 누군가를 사귀기 시작해서 좋아하게 됐는데 알고보니 섹스 경험이 있더라.. 그러면 좋았던 감정이 사그라드는건가? 결혼하고 싶은 여자가 있는데 혼전 섹스를 하자고 한다면? 꾹참고 결혼할때까지 기다려 할껀가?
Are there people that would not marry someone they loved if they discovered that they weren’t a virgin? If they found out after starting to like someone that they have had sexual experience, would their feelings for them disappear? How about if a woman they loved suggested having sex before marriage? Do both of them still have to resolutely suppress their desires until the wedding night?
사람마다 가치관이 다르니 누가 옳다 그르다 따지고 싶진 않다. 하지만 누가 나에게 혼전섹스에 대해 어떻게 생각하냐고 묻는다면 난 주저없이 말하겠다.
Everybody’s values are different, and I don’t want to distinguish between right and wrong here. But if anybody asks me what I think of sex before marriage, I wouldn’t hesitate to give my answer:
넌 차 살 때 테스트 드라이브도 안 해보니?
Wouldn’t you test-drive a car before buying it?
모든 남자가 차로 치면 벤츠나 BMW 같을 수는 없지만, 최소한 내가 편안하게 느낄 수는 있어야 되지 않을까? 좀 삐거덕 거리는 부분이 있다면 고칠 수도 있겠지만, 아무래도 어색하고 영 내 몸에 안맞는 차가 있듯이, 사람도 그렇다. 서로 좋아해도 이상하게 섹스에 있어선 영 아닌 경우가 있다. 그리고 섹스가 영 아니다보면 결국 그 남녀관계엔 불만이 생기게 마련이다.
( Source: unknown )
If all men are cars shall we say, then of course not all can be Benzes or BMWs. But at least I should feel comfortable driving it before I buy it, yes? And sure, if there’s a squeaking noise or small problem, then it can be fixed. But still, I wouldn’t feel as comfortable about buying it anymore. Just like people. Strangely, even if a man and a woman really like each other, the sex can be bad. And if it continues to be bad, then of course it will be a problem for their relationship.
1년 정도 사귀었던 남자친구가 그런 경우였다. 원래가 그다지 말이 많은 사람이 아니었지만, 섹스에 관해선 거의 서로 침묵을 지키던 사이었다. 문제는 난 그와의 섹스가 전혀 만족스럽지 않았던거다. 난 나름 그를 흥분시켜주려구 ‘자긴 내가 뭘해주면 좋아?’ 물어보면, ‘음.. 니가 하고 싶은대로 해.’ 모든 대답이 이런 식이니.. 내가 만족스러운지 어떤지는 한 번도 물어본 적이 없고, 그러니 나도 물어보기 힘들고.. 그와는 결국 헤어졌고 (섹스가 가장 큰 이유는 아니었다), 헤어질 때까지도 서로의 섹스만족도에 대해선 한마디도 나누지 못했다.
This happened with a boyfriend I had for one year. Originally, he wasn’t really a talkative person, and although we did have sex we never talked about it with each other. But it was completely unsatisfying for me. I would ask him “What would you like me to do to turn you on?,” but he would always answer “Do whatever you want.” And he never asked me if it was good or not for me, which meant it was kind of awkward for me to ask him n turn. In the end, we split up. Our unsatisfactory sex life wasn’t the biggest reason for that, but then until the split-up we never asked each other even once if it was good for the other person or not.
섹스가 잘 맞는 상대와는 섹스에 대해 솔직하게 얘기하기가 쉽다. 서로 기본적으론 만족스러워하는 걸 아니까. 잘 안 맞는 상대일 수록 섹스얘기를 꺼내기 힘들고, 그러다보면 계속 불만이 쌓이고.. 악순환의 연속인거다. 그런 상황을 피하기 위해서라도 진지하게 좋아하는 상대라면 더욱더 결혼을 결심하기 전에 섹스를 해볼 필요가 있다. 좋으면 다행인거고, 실망이라면 적어도 결혼하기 전에 실망하는게 나으니까.
It’s easy to speak honestly to talk about sex with someone when the sex is good. Basically, because you both already know the other is satisfied. But for those for whom the sex is bad, it’s very difficult to bring the subject up. But that leads to a viscous circle of bad sex leading to not talking about it, which leads to continued bad sex, and so on. So, if you want to avoid that happening with a partner whom you really like and are thinking about marrying, then you really need to have sex with them before making that decision. It’s better to be disappointed before marriage rather than after.
결혼 상대는 결국 평생의 섹스 파트너가 되는 셈인데 섹스를 테스트해보지 않고 결혼하는건 너무 위험한 결정아닐까?
Your wife or husband will be your lifelong sexual partner, so not having sex before marriage is very risky!
James: Personally, I would rather have stressed the value of talking with your partner particularly if the sex is bad. And I’m a little troubled with her argument that she would still be put off buying a ‘car’ with a ‘small problem’ even if it got fixed, and in turn that she seems to be advocating simply giving up on your partner if they’re bad in bed rather than biting the bullet and talking to them about it!
But I don’t want to potentially misrepresent her views, as I haven’t really read enough of her posts to properly judge her opinions yet. And of course something may be lost in translation, so I invite and would very much appreciate it if any other Korean speakers could check for me.
In the meantime, for those with Korean partners especially, I hope you enjoy the “inside information” she regularly offers!
(For all posts in the Korean Sources on Sexuality and Gender series, see here)
