[KS] Re: 'Memoir' defames Korean culture

[Ross King]

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>Honhyol is in fact a word used in polite conversation by educated Koreans,
>even by mixed-blood Koreans themselves. The derogatory word is "tuigi."

Being the father of a mighty cute mixed race little boy myself, this
terminological question has vexed me for some time. Despite what the author
of the lines above says, the "honhyela" (I'm using Yale romanization here)
word ain't exactly a warm-and-fuzzy word, and Koreans seem to use it for
lack of a better term. "Thuki," of course, is much worse. But "honhyela",
for me, anyway, has a rather too clinical, antiseptic, sterile, cold sort
of feeling and obviously focusses (etymologically, at least, but it is safe
to say most educated Koreans know the characters) heavily on modern
Koreans' hang-ups about bloodlines, pure blood (vs. mixed/adulterated
blood), etc.

But in my fieldwork on "Kore mar", the language/dialect(s) of the Koreans
in the former USSR, I have encountered a fantastic word, "cakupey" (in
Yale), which is used to designate the offspring of any mixed race marriage.
What is nice about it is that, unlike either "honhyela" or "thuki",
"cakupey" without exception among native speakers of "Kore mar" conjures up
only positive images of cute, bright, intelligent, charismatic, adorable,
desirable offspring -- all connotations rather absent in "honhyela".
Standard Korean desperately needs this "cakupey" word.

Unfortunately, I have encountered some South Korean "kwukehakca" who have
an aversion to this word "cakupey" ('Don't say that in public!'), perhaps
because of a general sense of discrimination against dialect data in
general, but perhaps also because, somewhere along the way, some other
South Korean "kwukehakca" has suggested a rather lewd etymology for this
word (< ccak 'one of a pair; odd match' + pay 'stomach'), an etymology
which is by no means believable for simple phonological reasons (fortition
vs. plain in cak/ccak and the vowels in  pay vs. -pey; the dialect I work
on keeps these vowels distinct), and which in any case is totally
alien/unknown to the Kore mar speakers who use it on a daily basis.

Anyway, at 'Swuph sok uy Hoswu', the Korean Language Village at Concordia
Language Villages, where we get second generation Korean American kids,
Korean adoptees, non-Koreans and 'mixed' kids, we call the latter
"cakupey". One of my little Quixotic campaigns.

Cheers,

Ross King
Associate Professor of Korean
University of British Columbia