[KS] KSR 1999-09: _The Korean American Dream: Immigrants and Small

Stephen Epstein Stephen.Epstein at vuw.ac.nz
Tue Nov 9 17:25:42 EST 1999


_The Korean American Dream:  Immigrants and Small Business in New York
City_, by Kyeyoung Park.  The Anthropology of Contemporary Issues.  Ithaca:
Cornell University Press, 1997.  xvii, 228pp.  (ISBN 0-8014-3343-6 cloth;
ISBN 0-8014-8391-3 paper).

Reviewed by Roger Janelli
Indiana University

[This review first appeared in _Acta Koreana_ 2 (1999), pp. 162-63.  _Acta
Koreana_ is published by Academia Koreana of Keimyung University]


       Maintaining that the attainment of anj™ng ("establishment,
stability, or security") is the foremost ideal of Korean Americans, this
highly informative ethnography looks for reasons why this ideal was created
and its consequences for Korean American gender roles, kinship, ethnic
identity, religious affiliation, and involvement in local politics.  The
book is based not only on the author's original fieldwork among Korean
American communities in Queens, NY, but also on an extensive array of
published accounts about Korea, Korean Americans, and other ethnic groups
in the United States.

       After identifying a variety of reasons for emigration from South
Korea to the United States, the author offers a multifaceted explanation of
why many Korean Americans have gravitated toward seeking anj™ng in small
businesses rather than pursuing wage labor or salaried employment in the
New York area.  Noting that many of the entrepreneurs came from rather
different (and often more prestigious) backgrounds in Korea, she views this
gravitation largely as a responsive strategy for coping with language
difficulties and other constraints as well as opportunities in the United
States.

       This prevalent ideal, the author maintains, provides the motivation
for a typical developmental process among Korean Americans.  Ideally,
working for others is pursued only in the early stage of residence in the
United States, until the requisite family members, skills, information, and
capital have been assembled for starting her (or more typically, his)
enterprise.  Not everyone who seeks anj™ng reaches this goal, however, and
Kyeyoung Park shows how its attainment demands long hours and much
sacrifice, not only from the entrepreneur but also from family and
sometimes extended kin.

       Two-thirds of the book is devoted to the consequences of pursuing
anj™ng.  Here the author seeks to demonstrate how this new ideal has
transformed family developmental cycles, gender relations, the views of
women about their own abilities and patriarchy, perceptions of ethnicity,
formation of and participation in local political organizations, and
involvement with Christian churches.  Rather than view the ideal simply as
the cause of all these transformations, however, she contextualizes its
pursuit, showing how it produces different outcomes in different
situations.  This enables the volume to adhere to a central thesis while
still being attentive to wide variations between individual occupations,
opinions, experiences, lengths of residence in the United States, and
responsive strategies.

       Among the difficulties confronting the author have been the major
transformations in occupational ideals, family relations, and gender
identities in South Korea during the past few decades.  While cognizant of
these changes, the author is not entirely successful in incorporating them
into her analysis.  A survey conducted a few years ago by the Chungang Ilbo
reported that "owning one's own shop or business" was the occupation most
preferred by respondents in South Korea.  One wonders, therefore, to what
extent the ideal of attaining anj™ng through small business ownership in
the United States ought to be explained in terms of the immigrant
experience and conditions in America.  Similarly, the family developmental
cycle in Korea has been significantly altered by the gradual disappearance
of the notion that eldest sons are primarily responsible for the care of
parents.  Yet to make a point about the decreasing importance of the role
of eldest sons in the United States, the author states:  "In Korea it is
imperative that the eldest son take care of parents, usually by living with
them" (p. 107).  Adequate sensitivity to variation and change among the
Korean American community and in Korea, however, is perhaps beyond the
ability of one scholar.

       One of the author's most original chapters deals with changing
conceptions of race and ethnicity among Korean Americans.  Here there seems
to be little question that such shifts are almost entirely due to
experiences in the United States.  One of the most jarring changes, she
reports, is that Korean Americans become conscious of themselves as
"Asians" only after immigration.  She persuasively shows how variant
workplace encounters, particularly those involving the police and court
systems in the United States, promote differing constructions and
reevaluations of ethnic identities.

       The Korean American Dream is a most welcome addition to the
literature on Korean Americans.  It reveals their uniqueness as well as
their commonalties with other ethnic groups, is well informed by relevant
scholarship, presents an original thesis, and conveys a fine sense of the
lives and ideas of this vibrant ethnic community.


Citation:
Janelli, Roger  1999
Review of Kyeyoung Park, _The Korean American Dream: Immigrants and Small
Business in New York City_ (1997)
Korean Studies Review 1999, no. 9
Electronic file:
http://www.mailbase.ac.uk/lists/korean-studies/files/ksr99-09.htm
[This review first appeared in _Acta Koreana_ 2 (1999), pp.162-63]


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