[KS] Korea & ethnic purity

[Hilary K Josephs]

Dear colleagues:

I am afraid that my comments were not very well phrased. And I was assuming that those who responded to this most recent query had also followed the earlier "discussion" which I started at the beginning of July. My mindset was shaped by study of Asian history in the 1960s and I have not kept up with all the research done since then, with the exception of reading about the Manchu/Chinese relations under the Qing. I used the terms "ethnocentric" and "ethnic purity" because I could not think of any other more appropriate terms. No offense to anyone was intended.

Naively I had presupposed that because of the Chinese tribute system, in which Korea participated, that there was easy passage across the Chinese-Korean border and that some Chinese gravitated to Korea and permanently settled there because of economic opportunities, chain migration by family members, intermarriage, etc. Those who responded to my July query disabused me of that notion: there were ethnic Chinese who lived in traditional Korea but not in any great numbers. It is still unclear to me whether over time those people became thoroughly Koreanized (through intermarriage, for example) and ceased to identify with their place of origin (became monolingual, did not make visits back to China, etc.) Becoming Koreanized would not have necessitated a rupture with the Confucian heritage because the Koreans were, if anything, more Confucian than the Chinese and used study of the Confucian classics as the basis for the Korean civil service examinations. So  a Korean could become expertly schooled in classical Chinese, regardless of whether he had any Chinese ancestry.

I once read a characterization of cultures that distinguished "clubs" from "missions." The British were an example of a club; the French were an example of a mission. In the case of the latter, so the theory went, if you got a French-style education and could speak French fluently, you would be accepted. Having just finished reading Proust's A la recherche du temps perdu, with its description of rampant anti-Semitism (directed even against people whose grandparents had converted to Catholicism), I think that characterization is a gross oversimplification, but as counter-proof I suppose one could point to Sarkozy, who is half-Jewish.  Applying the theory to Asian countries, maybe China is an example of a mission (even the Jews disappeared into the general population) and Japan is a club. How about Korea? Perhaps because of its geographic position, it had to accommodate more in-migration than Japan but it still clung to an identity which was separate from either China or Japan.

I was careless to bring in the subject of citizenship, which is a fairly modern concept. There is no necessary, but-for connection between attitudes towards dual nationality and ethnic diversity.  I might point out that India does not give full citizenship rights to overseas Indians.

Regards,Hilary





From: koreanstudies-bounces at koreaweb.ws [mailto:koreanstudies-bounces at koreaweb.ws] On Behalf Of abbie.miyabi Yamamoto
Sent: Sunday, October 02, 2011 10:47 PM
To: Korean Studies Discussion List
Subject: Re: [KS] Korea & ethnic purity

Dear Professor Josephs,

Korea's law regarding dual citizenship has recently changed. Now under limited circumstances, dual (or multiple) citizenship is allowed. Japan officially still does not recognize dual citizenship for adults over 22 or those past two years of obtaining foreign nationality although the law is not strictly enforced.

Yours,
Miyabi Yamamoto
2011/10/2 Hilary K Josephs <hkjoseph at law.syr.edu<mailto:hkjoseph at law.syr.edu>>
Dear colleagues:

Based on previous discussion of the presence of "foreigners" (including ethnic Chinese) in Korea, would it be safe to infer that Koreans are just as ethnocentric as the Japanese? May one also infer that most of the ethnic Korean population in Japan came to the country involuntarily? By involuntarily I mean forcible removal, not in search of better economic opportunities. As I recall, Korea, like Japan, is a country which does not recognize dual nationality for its citizens, in other words, if you obtain nationality elsewhere, your Korean nationality is automatically revoked.

Best regards,Hilary K. Josephs



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