Culture
There was a time when I hated my culture. Welcome to the world of an American Born Korean.
At the forefront of what I saw then as a glorification of ineptitude was the giant clique that traveled en masse through all three major blocks of my education prior to college. There was never more than one Korean clique in any given school, because the very concept of existing apart from the mother ship (whence flowed all manners of alien nutrients, blue eyeshadow, blonde highlights and rules on how to act in unison) had yet to be discovered.
Once chosen for one of their own, they would swallow the poor lambs whole and the end result of soaking in their digestive juices was always eerily indistinguishable from the other processed entities. The same unnatural accent that was neither 'f.o.b.' nor 'valley girl' (Foblish), the same liking of the insidious mockery of music that is K-Pop, the same hobbies, hairdresser, eyebrow tweezer--They were the same all the way down to the way they tied their damn shoelaces (no, seriously).
It took a long time for me to recognize exactly why I had such a viscerally aggressive reaction against them aside from the fact of the Western ideal of individualism that had been ingrained in me. I hated them for their lack of Korean culture. I hated the entire country for its lack of Korean culture.
The West has had its fair share of intermingling, with both dominant and subordinate cultures having something in the way of exchange (besides VD). Yet what I saw then in Korea, what I still see today, is nothing other than an aversion to itself, seeking only to borrow from the West in an effort to displace its own assets.
Its greatest commodity at the moment? Its soap operas. The style of story telling might not be as twisted as its American counterparts, but my issue is with the content. Take away the Korean actors and the Korean characters off the street signs, and there is nothing left of Korea in those shows. All you would have instead, are dramas that emphasize two things: the greatness of the West, and the inferiority of Korea.
Oh, it's never as blatant as that, but watch just a little more closely. In all Korean dramas set in present time, there will always be one character who is the envy of all the other characters for most of the show's running time. Her shining moments? Without exception, the moments when she either answers her incoming calls in English, when she visits the States, when she has the ability to order her food in another language. Anything that allows her to be a little less purely Korean for a moment.
It's all over the place, this phenomenon. I know it, it's called westernization, globalization, a whole slew of things--and probably not even isolated to Korea. But this is a country that is a part of me, and it disgusts me just a little more to see it happening there and in all the people who came from there. It started in my parents' generation, and I'm happy that I won't see the result of it in mine. But I worry for everyone else who comes after that, who will think of Korea and see the face of Britney Spears.
___________________________
I really didn't intend for this to become a rant. Alas.
At the forefront of what I saw then as a glorification of ineptitude was the giant clique that traveled en masse through all three major blocks of my education prior to college. There was never more than one Korean clique in any given school, because the very concept of existing apart from the mother ship (whence flowed all manners of alien nutrients, blue eyeshadow, blonde highlights and rules on how to act in unison) had yet to be discovered.
Once chosen for one of their own, they would swallow the poor lambs whole and the end result of soaking in their digestive juices was always eerily indistinguishable from the other processed entities. The same unnatural accent that was neither 'f.o.b.' nor 'valley girl' (Foblish), the same liking of the insidious mockery of music that is K-Pop, the same hobbies, hairdresser, eyebrow tweezer--They were the same all the way down to the way they tied their damn shoelaces (no, seriously).
It took a long time for me to recognize exactly why I had such a viscerally aggressive reaction against them aside from the fact of the Western ideal of individualism that had been ingrained in me. I hated them for their lack of Korean culture. I hated the entire country for its lack of Korean culture.
The West has had its fair share of intermingling, with both dominant and subordinate cultures having something in the way of exchange (besides VD). Yet what I saw then in Korea, what I still see today, is nothing other than an aversion to itself, seeking only to borrow from the West in an effort to displace its own assets.
Its greatest commodity at the moment? Its soap operas. The style of story telling might not be as twisted as its American counterparts, but my issue is with the content. Take away the Korean actors and the Korean characters off the street signs, and there is nothing left of Korea in those shows. All you would have instead, are dramas that emphasize two things: the greatness of the West, and the inferiority of Korea.
Oh, it's never as blatant as that, but watch just a little more closely. In all Korean dramas set in present time, there will always be one character who is the envy of all the other characters for most of the show's running time. Her shining moments? Without exception, the moments when she either answers her incoming calls in English, when she visits the States, when she has the ability to order her food in another language. Anything that allows her to be a little less purely Korean for a moment.
It's all over the place, this phenomenon. I know it, it's called westernization, globalization, a whole slew of things--and probably not even isolated to Korea. But this is a country that is a part of me, and it disgusts me just a little more to see it happening there and in all the people who came from there. It started in my parents' generation, and I'm happy that I won't see the result of it in mine. But I worry for everyone else who comes after that, who will think of Korea and see the face of Britney Spears.
___________________________
I really didn't intend for this to become a rant. Alas.