• Journal of the Economic Geographical Society of Korea
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.364-387
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• 2009

Female marriage immigrants have increased since the mid-1990s in Korea. Thus, their adaptation to Korean society has been a big social issue in Korea. There are a lot of academic researches on their adaptation to Korean society so far. We cannot sufficiently understand general main factors of their adaptation to Korean society because of methodological problems in the studies on the female marriage immigrants. Particularly, there are very few studies on female marriage immigrants' adaptation to their communities. This study analyzes determinants of female marriage immigrants' adaptation to their communities, using stepwise multi-regression. Data are collected from questionary survey on female marriage immigrants in Seoul, Gyeong-gi, Daegu, Gyeong-buk, Gwangju, Jeon-nam. Dependent variables are community life, spatial cognition and activities, and neighborhood relationship. Each dependent variable is analyzed with 30 independent variables through stepwise multi-regression. As a result, 16 positive determinants and 2 negative ones are selected. Positive determinants are resident identity, age, adaptation to home, number of Korean friends and same nationals' friends in Korea and so on. But, Korean language fluence is not selected as a significant factor. This is different from a general recognition. As exiting researches, the importance of social network and adaptation variables is also identified in this study.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.64 no.2
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• pp.325-354
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• 2012

The current research intends to analyse the construction process of gender in the biographies of migrant women. Ten autobiographical-narrative interviews with Korean female migrant workers in Germany were conducted and the following conclusions were ascertained through the analysis of Schutze's autobiographical-narrative interview: The genders in their biographies were constructed similar before their marriage, but different after their marriage according to the work-family balanced type and the family centered type. Before their migration the 'process of life' as female high school students and female workers showed that both types had partially deconstructed a sex-segregated gender. The process of life as female migrant workers after their migration showed that both types had partially constructed a sex-neutral gender. The process of life after their marriage exhibited that the former strengthened and strengthens a sex-neutral gender in a double position as female migrant workers and female marriage migrants, but the latter reconstructed a sex-segregated gender again and intensifies this in a process of time. Based on these results, some implications for the social work practice were addressed, which emerged from the understanding on the gender in the biographies of migrant women.

• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.393-408
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• 2009

The drastic growth of transnational marriage since the mid-1990s has been a new challenge to Korea. This article aims to provide a comprehension of new ethnicity by focusing on transnational marriage migration in Korea. A steep increase of foreign brides from China and Southeast countries such as Vietnam and the Philippines can be understood in terms of globalization from below. In this context, Korean trend is similar to Taiwan and Japanese ones. But, there are also some differences between them. The inflow of foreign brides has been gradually weakened since 2005 in Korea, as Taiwan has experienced since 2003. In the ratio of foreign brides among total marriage in Korea, rural area show in average two-fold higher than urban areas. However, most foreign brides have settled down in urban areas in aspect of absolute number. Korean Chinese wives most densely concentrate in urban area, followed by Chinese wives, Nevertheless, there are significant differences among foreign brides' residential areas with their nationalities. In this point, the geography of new ethnicity with foreign brides in Korea is likely to be a multi-dimensional space.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.12-24
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• 2017

This paper analyzed the representation of migrants in television with the example of KBS's My Neighbor, Charles. This primetime TV show with consistent popularity has showcased different types of migrants from other Korean television shows in terms of gender and race, and, partly the difference brought popularity to it. This study finds the major reason of the difference from changed migration patterns in Korea. Until recently, the main population of immigrants in Korea was composed of female brides and workers, but it became diversified to include male and the West migrants. This triggered the changes in media representation, but not thoroughly. Though the faces of migrant protagonists have been diversified, the remaining ideology of nation-centric that has been the main frame to regard migrants as someone to be integrated through traditional values persists. This study finds a few conflicts between the traditional and the change. For example, represented realities of migrants are extends to include their activities in public domain, disputes of multicultural society such as social differentiation and bias, and the criticism of Korean traditional culture. In a gender perspective, while all the marriages represented showed different kinds of vulnerability, discourses of traditional familialism were also clearly presented through different tools of representation. This study aims at contributing existing studies of media representations of migrants with a more complicated pictures in the context of social changes and migration population changes.