Korean Culture Research Paper

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Examining Korean Culture The assigned readings of this week collectively examine various aspects, concepts, and trends pertinent to the culture of contemporary Korean societies. To start with, an important trend identified is that the modern-day Korean society is continually and rapidly undergoing the inexorable and irreversible process of converting into a multicultural society. The argument behind this phenomenon is the ongoing influx of overseas laborers as well as foreign brides (A. Kim 82). This means that the primary causes of the emergence of multiculturalism in Korea are international migration and international marriages. An interesting issue discovered from the reading is that these migration and marriage trends have been fueled by…show more content…
The Korean cultural system is capitalistic and patriarchal in nature, and these attributes define a discriminatory and oppressive culture that promotes gender and sexual prejudice against women. Choi records that, despite active and vibrant participation in economic and political as well as social affairs, Korean women are still suffering from gender partiality due to the power imbalance in all societal domains emanating from patriarchal dominance and gender hierarchy (106). The gender inequality realized in Korea may also be viewed as a result of Confucian values. According to Duncan, these values were used in the past as the basis for enforcing strict rules barring married women from working, and they require women to express total submission to their husbands (66). Undoubtedly, the perpetuation of gender inequality through patriarchal dominance, Confucianism, and capitalism queries the authenticity of the Korean constitution that advocates equality between men and women. Even with the politically-initiated abolishment of the gender hierarchy, family head systems, and marriage ban as well as family register system meant to the weaken patriarchal dominance (K. Shin 114), gender inequality still persists in Korea. All the same, Korean feminists, perhaps motivated by feminist liberation movements elsewhere, anticipate and continue pushing for social change that…show more content…
Besides the globalization of migration discussed by A. Kim, the Korean society has embraced economic, industrial, and trade globalization. Hae-Joang concurs with this by asserting that the Korean people were stimulated by the Korean Wave to develop novel senses and perspectives of globalization (149). In that case, it is certain that Korea faces challenges of adapting to revolutionary changes and other challenges that come along with globalization. However, the country has means and mechanisms of addressing these challenges successfully, just as they productively addressed challenges of industrialization and modernization (G. Shin

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