• English & American cultural studies
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• 제14권2호
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• pp.185-206
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• 2014

The concept of the "diaspora" has established itself as one of the major topics in literary and cultural studies in the first two decades of the twenty-first century. Contemporary studies on this topic tend to regard is diaspora as either as a liberatory space unmoored from a repressive national identity-formation or as a condition pregnant with challenges to the authority of a nation-state or nationalism. Viewed from within the social realities of multi-ethnic nations, however, diaspora has an alternative, darker face. For, reproduced within the concept itself, is that of a hierarchy: this hierarchy is one in which a dominant group seeks to repress the same ethnic members for their failure to conform. What is more, the cultural difference, which diaspora is believed to preserve, lends the dominant group an excuse to re-ethnicize its immigrants, subsuming them under the same extra-national category as that of the people or homeland they have left behind. By analyzing a range of historical and theoretical models, this study offers itself as an attempt to clarify the current, and often confusing, understandings of the condition of diaspora. By delving into its political potentials and discussing their possible socio-political ramifications, the study suggests that researchers of diaspora need to anchor themselves in historicity lest they end up "speaking for" their chosen subjects.

• SUVANNABHUMI
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• 제11권2호
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• pp.125-157
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• 2019

It has been widely argued that Area Studies is in a critical condition especially in Australia, Europe and the US. However, in the Southeast Asian region, most especially Indonesia, we are witnessing the rise of Area Studies programs with the establishment of several such programs both in research institutions and universities. In this paper, I will discuss a few examples of Area Studies research on the emerging diasporic connections in Southeast Asia and reflect on the constitution of ethnic networks as "sites" where transnational identities are forged beyond state boundaries. Indeed, transnational movements of people have occurred and continue to happen due to particular events like wars and political turmoil, as well as for economic reasons. Today, we find many diasporic groups, including minorities, in the border areas of Southeast Asian countries and historically, minorities have been known for their movements in mainland Southeast Asia. If previously, the diasporic connections, especially with the homeland, had been very limited or even non-existent, today such connections have emerged across national boundaries. On top of this, economic and social networkings are equally on the rise both within and at transnational levels. It is, therefore, important to discuss the identity of diasporic groups and transnational networkings in the cases of two border areas in Southeast Asia.

• Journal of the Daesoon Academy of Sciences
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• 제18권
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• pp.53-79
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• 2004

This paper explores the relationship between Korean immigrants to the United States and their religious identity from the cultural point of view. Most scholarly studies on Korean immigrants in the United States have been dominated by sociological approach and ethnic studies in examining the social dimension of the Korean immigrant communities while neglecting issues concerning their religious identity and cultural heritage. Most Korean immigrants to America attend Korean churches regardless their religious affiliation before they came to America. One of the reasons for this phenomenon is the fact that Korean church has provided a necessary social service for the newly arrived immigrants. Korean churches have been able to play a key role in the life of Korean immigrants. Korean immigrants, however, have shown a unique aspect regarding their religious identity compared to other immigrants communities in the United States. America is a nation of immigrants, coming from different parts of the world. Each immigrant community has brought their unique cultural heritage and religious persuasion. Asian immigrants, for example, brought their own traditional religions such as Hinduism, Buddhism. People from the Middle Eastern countries brought Islamic faith while European Jews brought the Jewish tradition. In these immigrant communities, religious identity and cultural heritage were homo genously harmonized. Jewish people built synagogue and taught Hebrew, Jewish history, culture, and faith. In this case, synagogue was not only the house of worship for Jews but also the center for learning Jewish history, culture, faith, and language. In short, Jewish cultural history was intimately related to Jewish religious history; for Jewish immigrants, learning their social and political history was indeed identical with leaning of their religious history. The same can be said about the relationship between Indian community and Hinduism. Hindu temples serve as the center of Indian immigrantsin providing the social, cultural, and spiritual functions. Buddhist temples, for that matter, serve the same function to the people from the Asian countries. Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, Tibetans, and Thais have brought their respective Buddhist traditions to America and practice and maintain both their religious faith and cultural heritage. Middle Eastern people, for example, have brought Islamic faith to the United States, and Mosques have become the center for learning their language, practicing their faith, and maintaining their cultural heritage. Korean immigrants, unlike any other immigrant group, have brought Christianity, which is not a Korean traditional religion but a Western religion they received in 18th and 19th centuries from the West and America, back to the United States, and church has become the center of their lives in America. In this context, Koreans and Korean-Americans have a unique situation in which they practice Christianity as their religion but try to maintain their non-Christian cultural heritage. For the Korean immigrants, their religious identity and cultural identity are not the same. Although Korean church so far has provides the social and religious functions to fill the need of Korean immigrants, but it may not be able to become the most effective institution to provide and maintain Korean cultural heritage. In this respect, Korean churches must be able to open to traditional Korean religions or the religions of Korean origin to cultivate and nurture Korean cultural heritage.

• Journal of English Language & Literature
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• 제56권6호
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• pp.1311-1337
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• 2010

This paper deals with one of the hottest debates in the history of the Association for Asian American Studies (AAAS) since its inception in the late 1960s. In 1998 at Hawai'i, the AAAS awarded Lois-Ann Yamanaka its Fiction Award for her novel Blu's Hanging, only to have this award protested. The point at issue was the inappropriate representation of Filipino American characters called "Human Rats" in the novel. This event divided the association into two groups: one criticizing the novel for the problematic portrayal of Filipinos in colonial Hawai'i, and the other defending it from the criticism in the name of aesthetic freedom. Such a "crisis of representation" in Asian American identity reflects on the ways in which local Hawaiians are positioned in the complicate power dynamic between oppositional Hawaiian identity and cosmopolitan diasporic identity within the larger framework of Asian American pan-ethnic identity. The controversial event triggered the eruption of Asian Americans' anxiety over the identity-bounded nation of Asian America where intra-racial classism and conflict have been at play, which are primary themes of Blu's Hanging. This paper shows how Yamanaka's Blu's Hanging becomes so disturbing a work to prevent the hegemonic formality of Asian America identity from being fully dogmatic. Ultimately, it contradicts the political unconscious of the reading public and unmasked its false consciousness by engendering a "free subjective intervention" in the ideological reality of colonial Hawai'i.

• International Journal of Computer Science & Network Security
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• 제22권7호
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• pp.404-412
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• 2022

An increasing number of students from different cultures study in higher primary schools. This trend is due to: 1) the government's discourse on increasing the level of participation of foreign students in national educational programs and the need for internationalization; 2) the need of employers for professionals who are trained to work in a multicultural environment to meet the needs of different markets and customers. Methodology. This study is based on the results of the OECD (2018) structured survey of 1,093 teachers at universities in Australia, Colombia, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Georgia, Malta, Vietnam, Turkey, and Argentina, examined policy, the practice of cultural characteristics in training specialists, and teachers' attitudes to cultural diversity. Results. The attitude and perception of cultural features by teachers does not determine the practice of forming a cultural environment and managing this environment to ensure quality education of students of different nations. The main culturological aspects of training are self-expression of cultural and ethnic identities, expression of cultural characteristics and their value through multicultural activities in universities, teaching students to combat ethnic or cultural discrimination. Therefore, the formation of a multicultural environment in higher education occurs through the activities of students and teachers, which complement each other. The practical value lies in identifying two important components of the formation of cultural diversity among students, such as self-expression of ethnic and cultural identity and the expression of cultural differences by teachers in the course of educational activities.

• Korea journal of population studies
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• 제33권3호
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• pp.53-73
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• 2010

The purpose of this study is to investigate social distance and attitude toward migrants's citizenship in Korea, a society with increasing cultural diversity. Using data from the 'Multiculturalism and Social Integration Survey' conducted by Academy of Korean Studies in 2008, this study analyzes three main issues: social distance between Koreans and foreigners, perception of the bases of national identity, and attitude toward migrants' citizenship and the causal factors of the attitude. The results show that social distances between Koreans and African Blacks/Arabs are significantly larger than those between Koreans and other ethnic or racial groups. But the relatively large social distances between Koreans and South-East Asians/North Korean defectors poses a more serious challenge to Korean society, since South-East Asians and North Korean defectors have comprised ever bigger part of migrants in Korea. The civil element is found to be more important base of national identity than the cultural or the ethnic bases, and there exists a strong negative attitude toward dual nationality. The results of regression analysis suggest that the potential of global citizenship for migrants will be realized by expanding universalism for basic human rights and awareness of the civil base of national identity on the one hand, and by minimizing the strong belief in ethnic homogeneity and the negative attitude toward dual nationality on the other hand.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• 제40권
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• pp.159-183
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• 2015

This study examined the issue of criticism in Korean Chinese literature in 1990's. This is transitional time why China introduced a market economy system. It had an important effect on Korean Chinese society not the cultural climate but also literature. Besides, Diplomatic Relation between Korea and China in 1992 gave an impulsion to changing literature. So this study tried to take note of directionality of Korean Chinese literature through the Korean Chinese magazine Literature and Art(Munhakwayesul) and Zhangbaikshan. First issue of Korean Chinese literature in early 1990's is crisis and restoration of criticism genre. At that time criticism faced with what is modernity. Some critics insisted that criticism should to improve. So it was necessary to accept foreign theory. Then they were concerned postmodernism and deideology tendency. What was important thing is that they would find their culture identity. So few critics tried to communicated with world literature. Especially they emphasized communication with Korean writer who lives in other country. Ultimately they thought that Korean Chines literature must get literal universality and ethnic speciality. For example poet Nam-YoungJeon's totem poetry is representative work. The issues of Korean Chines criticism in 1990's are not directivity of literature but also directivity of culture identity. Korean Chines literature had departed from Socialistic realism little by little and had getting diversity. Above all things criticism aimed for international sense and ethnic culture identity.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• 제36권
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• pp.5-35
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• 2014

This study attempts to give a review of social media users' choice of a particular name for the sake of signaling identity cues and interaction with the others. The social media names could be classified into different categories such as traditional/cultural anthroponyms, nicknames and fictitious IDs etc. Out of these categories, it is the phenomenon of choice and construction of fictitious social media IDs by Pakistani social media users which has been reviewed and scrutinized in this particular article. This study examined fictitious IDs of Pakistani social media users from Critical Discourse Analysis and System Functional Linguistics perspectives and demonstrates how nationalistic, ethnic and religious identities are negotiated, constructed, deconstructed and reconstructed by the social media users through a particular ID choice.

• English & American cultural studies
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• 제16권2호
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• pp.29-45
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• 2016

The purpose of this study is to research how the writer describes characters of the text who overcome traumatic experiences and restore their identity through rememory in Toni Morrison's Beloved. The writer, Morrison gives the female characters their voices to recover their ethnic identities. By breaking silence, they establish their identities and become Americans from "unspeakable thoughts" to "speaking subjects." The ex-slave Sethe and her daughter, Denver have experienced trauma which works from traces of memory and history after slavery was abolished. Sethe and Denver are isolated from the community at the 124 Bluestone Road. When Beloved, ghost who was killed by Sethe, appears, Sethe and Denver are wondering who she is. Rememorying in Beloved is the important form of narrative that Morrison uses to recover their trauma. Morrison emphasizes the need to reconcile with the community and the aid of community for Sethe and Denver to heal their truma. Thanks to Beloved who leads Sethe and Denver to the community, they can be finally one of the community members in America.

• Journal of English Language & Literature
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• 제54권2호
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• pp.263-279
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• 2008

Arif Dirlik in Postmodernity's Histories sees the issue of re-ethnicization in the case of John Huang, China's alleged attempt at lobbying the Clinton administration. In this view, Americans with Chinese surnames were suspected by the US Justice Department to be possible spies working for Beijing. Reethnicization here seems to serve the mainstream society in reducing an ethnic minority to a group of aliens operating for their countries of origin. However, re-ethnicization is not necessarily a one-way oppressive operation; it is often made use of by the ethnic minorities in their efforts to adapt to their country of arrival. Haroon and Karim, the protagonists of Hanif Kureishi's The Buddha of Suburbia, are cases in point. They are portrayed as winning social recognition and securing a place of their own within the hostile host society through a strategic use of re-ethnicization, that is, masquerading as 'genuine Orientals.' This study brings to light possible fallacies or misguided expectations concerning the political position of first- and second-generation immigrants. One of the fallacies is found in the racist metropolis, which regards the ethnic minorities as a sort of resident aliens, no matter what immigrant generation the latter belongs to. Another fallacy is found in the kind of postcolonial criticism that automatically regards an anti-racist critique advanced by people like Kureishi as something motivated by a confrontational tactic, that is, an attempt at subverting the colonial power relations. The conclusion of this study is that Kureishi's agenda, as presented in The Buddha of Suburbia, is neither the preservation of an ethnic identity nor the subversion of colonial power relations but survival in the metropolis. On this account Kureish's agenda can be called a micro-politics.