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Korean ethnic nationalism

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"Korean race" redirects here. For the Korean people themselves, see Koreans.
Not to be confused with Korean nationalism.

A BBC poll from 2016 of various countries, asking what the most important factor in self identity was. South Korea has the highest proportion given for "race or culture" at 23%.[1]
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Korean ethnic nationalism (Korean: 한국의 민족주의; Hanja: 韓國의 民族主義), minjok nationalism, or Korean racial nationalism,[2] is a political ideology and a form of ethnic and racial identity for Korean people. It is based on the belief that Koreans form a nation, a race, and an ethnic group that shares a unified bloodline and a distinct culture.[3] It is centered on the notion of the minjok (Korean: 민족; Hanja: 民族), a term that had been coined in Imperial Japan ("minzoku") in the early Meiji period. Minjok is a similar meaning to the Volk, officially translated as "nation", "people", and "ethnic group",[4][5] but critics of Korean ethnic nationalism are translating it as "race".[6][7][8][9] It has been described by several observers as racist, chauvinist, and ethnosupremacist.[10][11][12]

This conception started to emerge among Korean intellectuals after the Japanese-imposed protectorate of 1905, leading to Korea's colonization by Japan.[13] The Japanese then tried to persuade the Koreans that both nations were of the same racial stock to assimilate them, similar to what they did with the Ainu and Ryukyuans. The notion of the Korean minjok was first made popular by essayist and historian Shin Chae-ho in his New Reading of History (1908), a history of Korea from the mythical times of Dangun to the fall of Balhae in 926 CE. Shin portrayed the minjok as a warlike race that had fought bravely to preserve Korean identity, had later declined, and now needed to be reinvigorated.[14] During the period of Japanese rule (1910–1945), this belief in the uniqueness of the Korean minjok gave an impetus for resisting Japanese assimilation policies and historical scholarship.[15]

The concept has continued to be relevant after the colonial period. In from 1945 to the 1950s, there was the White Shirts Society, a far-right ultranationalist terrorist group. In the 1960s, South Korean president Park Chung Hee strengthened "an ideology of racial purity" to legitimize his authoritarian rule.[16] However, Korean ethnic nationalism is more prominent in left-leaning politics in South Korea,[17] because traditionally Korean ethnic nationalism has an anti-imperialistic nature that resists right-wing authoritarian regimes and foreign powers such as the United States and Japan.[18]

This shared conception of a racially defined Korea continues to shape Korean politics and foreign relations, gives Koreans an impetus to national and racial pride,[19] and feeds hopes for the reunification of the two Koreas.[20] South Korea is a highly homogenous society, but has in recent decades become home to a number of foreign residents (4.9%), whereas North Korea has not experienced this trend. However, a lot of them are ethnic Koreans with a foreign citizenship. Many residents from China, post-Soviet states, the United States and Japan are, in fact, repatriated ethnic Koreans (labelled "Overseas Koreans") who may meet criteria for expedited acquisition of South Korean citizenship.[21][22] In recent decades, discussions have continued to be held both abroad and in Korea on the topics of race and multi-culturalism.[23][22]

Reception

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According to the opinions of some scholars, pure blood theory is a common belief,[24] with even some South Korean presidents subscribing to it.[25] The debates on this topic can be found sporadic in the South, whereas the public opinion in the North is hard to access.[citation needed] Scholar Gi-Wook Shin claimed that, "to impugn or challenge the theory would have been tantamount to betraying Koreanness in the face of the challenge of an alien ethnic nation".[26]

Some Korean scholars observed that the pure blood theory served as a useful tool for the South Korean government to make its people obedient and easy to govern when the country was embroiled in ideological turmoil.[24] They argued that this especially applied during the dictatorships under Syngman Rhee and Park Chung Hee, when nationalism was incorporated into anti-Communism.[24]

Role in contemporary South Korean society

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According to one scholar, in South Korea, the notion of "pure blood" results in discrimination toward people of both "foreign-blood" and "mixed blood".[22] Those with this "mixed blood" or "foreign blood" are sometimes referred to as Honhyeol (혼혈; 混血) in South Korea.[27]

The South Korean nationality law is based on jus sanguinis[26] instead of jus solis, which is a territorial principle that takes into account the place of birth when bestowing nationality. In this context, most South Koreans have stronger attachment to South Koreans residing in foreign countries and foreigners of South Korean descent, than to naturalized South Korean citizens and expatriates residing in South Korea.[26] In 2005, the opposition Grand National Party suggested a revision of the current South Korean nationality law to allow South Korean nationality to be bestowed to people who are born in South Korea regardless of the nationalities of their parents but it was discarded due to unfavorable public opinion against such a measure.[22]

According to Jon Huer, a columnist for the Korea Times:

In trying to understand [South] Korea and [South] Koreans, we must recognize how important blood is to [South] Korea. [South] Koreans love blood, both in the real sense and metaphorically. They like to shed blood, sometimes their own in cut fingers and sometimes animal blood, in protest. They hold "blood relations" as supreme, above other links and connections. They often add "flesh" and "bone" to their rhetorical statements and preferences. In short, [South] Korea is quite fond of thinking of itself and its people in terms of blood...[28]

Many political parties in South Korea, such as the Democratic Party of Korea, support and adhere to the ideology in their policies, by opposing immigration, for example.[29]

Changing attitudes

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Emma Campbell from the Australian National University argues that the conceptions of South Korean nationalism are evolving among young people and that a new form is emerging that has globalised cultural characteristics.[30] These characteristics challenge the role of ethnicity in South Korean nationalism.[30] According to Campbell's study, for which she interviewed 150 South Koreans in their twenties, the desire for reunification is declining. However, these who are in favor of a Korean unification state reasons different from ethnic nationalism. The respondents stated that they only wanted unification if it would not disrupt life in the South or if North Korea achieves economic parity with the South. A small number of respondents further mentioned that they support a "unification on the condition that it did not take place in their lifetime."[30] Another reason stated for the wish for unification was the access to North Korea's natural resources and cheap labor.[30] This notion of evolving nationalism has been further elaborated by the meaning of uri nara (Korean: 우리나라 our country [sic!]) for young South Koreans, which only refers to South Korea for them instead to the whole Korean peninsula.[30]: 488–489  Campbell's interviews further showed that many young South Koreans have no problems to accepting foreigners as part of uri nara.[30]: 492 

A poll by the Asan Institute for Policy Studies in 2015 found that only 5.4% of South Koreans in their twenties saw North Koreans as people sharing the same bloodline with them. The poll also found that only 11% of South Koreans associated North Korea with Koreans, with most people associating them with words like military, war or nuclear weapons. It also found that most South Koreans expressed deeper feelings of "closeness" with Americans and Chinese than with North Koreans.[31]

According to a December 2017 survey released by the Korea Institute for National Unification, 72.1% of South Koreans in their 20s believe reunification is unnecessary.[32] Moreover, about 50% of men in their 20s see North Korea as an outright enemy that they want nothing to do with.[33]

Steven Denney from the University of Toronto said, "Younger South Koreans feel closer to North Korean migrants than, say, foreign workers, but they will feel closer to a native born child of non-Korean ethnicity than a former resident of North Korea."[34]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ "Global Citizenship a growing sentiment among citizens of emerging economies: Global Poll" (PDF). GlobeScan. 27 April 2016. Archived from the original (PDF) on 21 October 2016. Retrieved 20 October 2016.
  2. ^ Gi-Wook Shin, Ethnic Nationalism in Korea: Genealogy, Politics, and Legacy (Stanford University Press, 2006), p. 223.
  3. ^ Gi-wook Shin, Ethnic Nationalism in Korea: Genealogy, Politics, and Legacy (Stanford University Press, 2006), p. 2.
  4. ^ "민족 (民族)". National Institute of Korean Language's: Korean-English Learners' Dictionary (in Korean). Retrieved 14 February 2024. people; ethnic group
  5. ^ "민족주의 (民族主義)". National Institute of Korean Language's: Korean-English Learners' Dictionary (in Korean). Retrieved 15 August 2024. nationalism
  6. ^ Doolan, Yuri W. (June 2012). Being Amerasian in South Korea: Purebloodness, Multiculturalism, and Living Alongside the U.S. Military Empire (Thesis). The Ohio State University. p. 63. hdl:1811/52015.
  7. ^ Lee, Jin-seo (2016). North Korean Prison Camps. Radio Free Asia. p. 26. ISBN 9781632180230. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
  8. ^ Em, Henry H. (2013). The Great Enterprise: Sovereignty and Historiography in Modern Korea, Part 2. Duke University Press. p. 77. ISBN 978-0822353720. As noted earlier, the word minjok (read as minzoku in Japanese) was a neologism created in Meiji Japan. When Korean (and Chinese and Japanese) nationalists wrote in English in the first half of the twentieth century, the English word they generally utilized for minjok was 'race.'
  9. ^ Choi, Hee-an (2015). A Postcolonial Self: Korean Immigrant Theology and Church. SUNY Press. p. 24. ISBN 9781438457352. The word minjok (민족,民族) translates as race.
  10. ^ Kelly, Robert E. (4 June 2015). "Why South Korea is So Obsessed with Japan". Real Clear Defense.
  11. ^ Denney, Steven (February 2014). "Political Attitudes and National Identity in an Era of Strength and Prosperity" (PDF). A Primer on a New Nationalism in South Korea. Dominion of Canada: Department of Political Science of the University of Toronto. South Koreans do ascribe a relatively higher value to race than do other nations.
  12. ^ Denney, Steven (1 April 2015). "Workers, Immigration, and Racialized Hierarchy". SinoNK. Archived from the original on 3 January 2016. Racism is as much, if not more, a problem in South Korea as it is in the United States.
  13. ^ Schmid, Andre (2002). Korea Between Empires, 1895-1919. New York: Columbia University Press. p. 174.
  14. ^ Sheila Miyoshi Jager, Narratives of Nation Building in Korea (2003), pp. 15–16; Andre Schmid, "Rediscovering Manchuria" (1997), p. 32.
  15. ^ Hyung-il Pai, Constructing "Korean" Origins: A Critical Review of Archaeology, Historiography, and Racial Myth in Korean State-Formation Theories. Cambridge: Harvard University Asia Center, distributed by Harvard University Press, 2000), p. 1.
  16. ^ Nadia Y. Kim, Imperial Citizens: Koreans and Race from Seoul to L.A. (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2008), p. 25.
  17. ^ Myers, Brian Reynolds (20 May 2018). "North Korea's state-loyalty advantage". Free Online Library. Archived from the original on 20 May 2018. Although the change was inspired by the increase in multiethnic households, not by the drive to bolster state-patriotism per se, the left-wing media objected ...
  18. ^ Sang-hoon Jang (20 January 2020). A Representation of Nationhood in the Museum. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 978-0-429-75396-1. Korean ethnic nationalism which tended to be against authoritarian regimes and foreign powers
  19. ^ Gi-wook Shin, Ethnic Nationalism in Korea: Genealogy, Politics, and Legacy (2006), pp. 1–3.
  20. ^ Gi-wook Shin, Ethnic Nationalism in Korea: Genealogy, Politics, and Legacy, chapter 10: "Ethnic Identity and National Unification" (pp. 185–203).
  21. ^ Kwon, Jessie Yeung, Jake (15 May 2023). "They left South Korea for the American Dream. Now their children are moving back". CNN. Retrieved 4 December 2023.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  22. ^ a b c d Park, Chung-a (14 August 2006). "Myth of Pure-Blood Nationalism Blocks Multi-Ethnic Society". The Korea Times. Archived from the original on 25 July 2011. Retrieved 25 July 2011.
  23. ^ Kim, Nadia Y. (2008). Imperial citizens: Koreans and race from Seoul to LA. Stanford University Press. p. 24. ISBN 978-0-8047-5887-1. Koreans' beloved trope of tanil minjok—'the single ethnic nation'— would soon come into its own (see Shin 1998). The centrality of "blood" has been revived in more current times as well.
  24. ^ a b c Kim Sok-soo, professor at Kyungpook National University, cited in Park Chung-a, "Myth of Pure-Blood Nationalism Blocks Multi-Ethnic Society Archived 2011-07-25 at the Wayback Machine," The Korea Times, August 14, 2006.
  25. ^ Myers, B.R. (September 2017). "What the West gets wrong about North Korea's motives, and why some South Koreans admire the North". The Conversation. Archived from the original on 16 September 2017.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  26. ^ a b c Shin, Gi-Wook (2 August 2006). "Korea's ethnic nationalism is a source of both pride and prejudice". aparc.fsi.stanford.edu. Retrieved 16 January 2024.
  27. ^ Lim, Timothy (2010). "Rethinking Belongingness in Korea: Transnational Migration, 'Migrant Marriages,' and the Politics of Multiculturalism". Pacific Affairs. 83 (1): 51–71. doi:10.5509/201083151.
  28. ^ "Korean Blood, Real and Imagined". 3 July 2009.
  29. ^ Myers, Brian Reynolds (3 January 2024). "No, Kim Hasn't Given Up on Unification". Sthele Press. Busan, South Korea. Archived from the original on 8 January 2024. [The] Minjoo Party, [is] a nationalist, anti-immigration, pro-Chinese, Ukraine-indifferent, none-too-LGBT-friendly party
  30. ^ a b c d e f Campbell, Emma (22 June 2015). "The end of ethnic nationalism? Changing conceptions of national identity and belonging among young South Koreans". Nations and Nationalism. 21 (3): 483–502. doi:10.1111/nana.12120.
  31. ^ Cheng, Jonathan (26 January 2015). "In South Korea, Reunification Call Misses the Jackpot". WSJ. Retrieved 31 July 2019.
  32. ^ "As Olympics open door to reunification, young Koreans are tuning out".
  33. ^ "Reunification with North Korea unappealing for young South Koreans | The Star". The Toronto Star. 28 January 2018. Retrieved 29 July 2019.
  34. ^ Diplomat, Clint Work, The. "What Do Younger South Koreans Think of North Korea?". The Diplomat. Retrieved 29 July 2019.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)

Further reading

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