1 Alshammari Sarah A.

Alshammari Professor Shaun Marsh Prov 105 AC3 26 November ,2013

Final Reflective Essay Korean immigrants in the United States of America is the research topic, which both my partner and I chose. I believe that this project will help me build intercultural competence because knowing a lot about a nation will expand my horizons and knowledge; and I will be able to engage in constructive conversations with people from other cultures about their norms, beliefs, taboos and traditions. I selected to present my final project on this specific subject because I have always been intrigued by the Korean culture and want to know more about how they are assimilating and living in the United States of America. Before doing this project I used to stereotype Koreans and think that all Koreans had office jobs and good financial status. Most studies talk about Asians undivided but do not specify certain countries. Therefore, choosing only Korea to focus on in my final project will hopefully help my classmates and I strengthen our knowledge about Korea and Korean Americans. My goal in this paper is to inform my peers about Korean Americans and how they have assimilated to the American culture by researching online interviewing Korean Americans and reading books about my research topic. I visited www.pewsocialtrends.org and learned that Koreans first immigrated into the United States through Hawaii, and were recruited for plantation work. After the 1965 Immigration law also known as the Hart-Cellar Act, many Koreans and other immigrants from third world countries moved into the United states of America. For my reading I choose a book that was written by Dae Young Kim an assistant professor of Sociology at GMU called Second Generation Koreans. Kim, Dae Young. Second-Generation Korean Americans. 2013. Print.Kim argues that educational and occupational success for Korean Americans does not translate into

2 Alshammari Sarah A. Alshammari Professor Shaun Marsh Prov 105 AC3 26 November ,2013

further integration and can be accompanied by exclusion in other sectors of society. One of the main reasons Koreans moved to the United States is to educate their children in an English spoken country and get an enhanced quality of education, obtain American citizenship, and work in improved environments, which contributed to shape them as the highest self-employed group among Asians in the United States. According to "The Rise of Asian Americans." Pew Social & Demographic Trends. N.p., n.d. Web. <http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/asianamericansgraphics/koreans/>., Koreans make an income of 50.000$ topping all Asian Americans and other races, which shows how hardworking Koreans are. The information gathered helped narrowing my topic and shaping my phrases and research questions. I asked my interviewee about her thoughts on Koreans topping all Americans when it comes to salary. My interviewee was not surprised and said that they are a hard working group, who give the majority of their time to work. Our interviewee is a Korean American who came to the United States for school but choose to live work and marry in the States. She therefore became an American citizen. The interviewee was very nice, informative, open-minded and well aware of our subject. She clearly answered our concerns and questions. Our interviewee first came into America as an international student; she then became a citizen, and had a lot of experiences in the United States as an American and a Korean. She now works at an English institute with international students . Our interviewees point of view, although somehow biased, gave me better understanding of Korea. I found out that most Korean immigrants do not have college degrees and office jobs as they are pictured in the media or looked upon as model minority. That is because when they immigrated into the United States they wanted fast cash and in order to have fast cash they agreed on working for small businesses like restaurants and Laundromats to get money and spend it on their kids education rather than them. This produced a huge educational and cultural

3 Alshammari Sarah A. Alshammari Professor Shaun Marsh Prov 105 AC3 26 November ,2013

as well as personal gap between parents and children, because many young Koreans suffered from identity crisis or have been thorough one at some point in their lives growing up in an American culture and assimilating while their parents are full Korean and speak a language their kids do not hear often or practice at school.

In conclusion, before doing this project I used to stereo type Koreans and think that all Koreans have office jobs and are financially secure, which I thought was a threat to Americans but after researching more about Korean Americans I found out that the term Yellow Peril is not accurate and is a racial profiling term that a minority of people unfortunately still use nowadays. Although they may not know anything about their origin other than it is where their ancestors came from. Many Korean Americans still face segregation in the work place.

4 Alshammari Sarah A. Alshammari Professor Shaun Marsh Prov 105 AC3 26 November ,2013

References Pew Social & Demographic Trends "The Rise of Asian Americans..(n.d. ). Retrieved from<http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/asianamericans-graphics/koreans/>.,

Kim, Dae Young. (2013). Second Generation Korean Americans: the Struggle for Full Inclusion LFB Scholarly Publishing LLC, El Paso, TX