Introduction

The TL Knowhow section is the sharing of insight that may not be readily available or from a personal standpoint as either an expert or deeply committed enthusiast. The purpose is to really focus on the practical application of "knowledge" and I've re-written this particular post about five times now to get down to the practical points. As some of you may know, I am writing out of my comfort zone of business related topics here, but I did want to make an effort to contribute to this section in it's scope. This is a particular topic which I think, may no longer be applicable, but it was something that I honestly went through with very little guidance. But this specifically deals with a cultural identity crisis as being Korean, but being born and raised in Canada. I do assume that the knowhow presented here would be applicable to those in a similar situation.

Cultural Identity

The first point is, if you don't think you have an issue with your own cultural identity, then you simply don't. It is part of the base that sets our fundamental base of personal identity such as being human, male or female and sexual orientation. If you were raised by wolves, or if you know that you are the wrong gender or have questions of whether you are straight or gay, these are issues that we can't help but wrestle with daily and it affects our outlook and relations in life. Simply put, its not something that ever just 'goes away'. One good think about the issues with cultural identity is that, I believe that out of the identity crisis you can have, it is one that can be resolved with simply more 'exposure' and reflection. Which to some may not qualify it as a crisis of sorts, but again, for me, it was something that did affect me every day right until then end of undergraduate.

What Culture is Home?
It is one thing to learn and adapt to new cultures on top of your primary cultural identity, it is an entirely different thing to question what culture you truly feel is "home". For those who travel extensively or have many friends of difficult cultures, you may think this is an irrelevant topic, as you also may feel that culture is interchangeable and if you're open minded enough, something to simply just "add on". This post isn't addressed to you, because whether you realize it or not, what you judge as good things about the new cultures you learn or bad things, is always filtered through your primary cultural identity. Someone from a different primary cultural identity with the same degree of international cultural exposure will naturally have a different idea or weighting of what is socially positive or negative, i.e. A well traveled person from Paris or from Shanghai.

Personal History
For me, my cultural identity was a massive and daily struggle for most of my life until about 21. I was born in Montreal Canada, grew up between Montreal and Toronto and graduated with my undergrad as well as completed (but not graduated) in a master's program in Canada. I then played national level rugby in Korea and graduated with masters in business from Korea and married a "native" Korean and have lived in Korea for the last decade. While I could get into a biography of why I had cultural identity issues to begin with, it wouldn't be helpful because what I've come to realize is that maybe I'm just a one off or maybe it isn't a common affliction, but for some people who are raised in immigrant households as the first born in the new country, or who have lived abroad from a young age, or who have really traveled extensively and married to someone other than their native culture, there is sometimes this affect of great confusion.

To that end, this is one of the areas of persona study and development where I received no guidance or reference materials to assist me. Part of that relates to the fact that I'm a young immigrant history for Eastern cultures in a Western context, and another part is that this isn't a major issue to most immigrants.

I can't actually articulate why I was culturally confused, but what I felt was that I was never comfortable and I would always question whether or not I was Korean or Canadian or Korean Canadian in a certain situation. Among my high school friends, we were just friends, but in greater society, I was always very sensitive to the differences in how society accepted me and how they reacted to me. I won't get into much detail of what this entailed other than I did get into a lot of confrontations nearly on a daily basis throughout my entire life in Canada.

Always Being Defined by the Context
I was very sociable for most of life, and had many different groups of friends from my rugby mates, my school mates, and my church friends. My rugby mates were all typical white Canadians, my school mates a mix of different ethnicities, and my church friends who were all Korean Canadian. And in the context of rugby, school and church, I was comfortable with them, but I realized that my interactions were always dictated by my surroundings to an extreme degree, that I felt as though I was always playing a part. Again, we adjust our personas according to the situation, but I never felt comfortable in all three situations because I'd always end up being offensive one way or another. So, I simply attributed it to having a non-conformist personality and left it like that for a long while.

Break this too
By the early 90's, there were an influx of a new wave of Korean immigrants as Korea had dramatically increased in it's economic world standing. And while my Korean was terrible and my only exposure to Korean culture was really my home life and church, for the first time I felt very comfortable. When I usually got angry, I'd need to express it by yelling or breaking something, at which point most of friends would tell me to "take a pill, or relax", but my native Korean friends would be like, "good, just get it out, here, lets break this too". Actions or thoughts which I thought weren't the norm, were the norm within the native Korean culture and it was refreshing and freeing at the same time.

Not Native, Just Korean
But logically, I tried to find some middle ground here, after all, I was not or ever going to be "native Korean" and there is no doubt that for the most part I thought and behaved like a Canadian, so I simply kept on trying to find a middle ground. In the end, I did come to identify myself as "Korean", while not native South Korean or Korean Canadian, but simply "Korean" as my primary cultural identity. From there I judge what is positive and negative and while I think I'm quite culturally lonely at times, I feel free, and defiantly confident to express myself without any confusion.

While many of my non-Asian colleagues tend to assume I'm very Canadian because of my fluency in English, they usually change their mind when they see me in my native environment of drinking. ^^

It's A Long Road, Sorry.
If you are confused about your primary cultural identity, then the road isn't short or easy, there are no silver bullets, because this is a long process to come to a deliberate conclusion to what is innate for others. Much like one's own sexual orientation or gender, if you're not confused, it's a non-issue, but if you are then life be hell. Thankfully I would say that cultural identity confusion is far easier to deal with that the above too, and if you don't make it an issue, it eventually goes away on it's own.

What I mean by that is, eventually you'll get married, have kids and the cultural identity of your spouse and your children will usually just bring you into line. I would think though if you were a foreign adoptee (adopted as baby outside your home country) or bi-racial (parents who are different in physical racial appearance, i.e Indian+Korean, German+Japanese, African+French, etc), the issue would be unavoidable at times. But for the most part, it can just "go away" unlike other more primary identity issues. That being said, resolving it adds to one's confidence in self awareness.

My Point of Reference

There are few key points of Knowhow that after many years of struggling I came to understanding and really it wasn't until I actually decided to write this have I ever articulated it, but these were critical in resolving the issue for me. And for me, the title, "The Chrysanthemum and the Sword" sums it up for me.

I bought this book when I was visiting my friend at Oxford. My Korean friend, a sociologist PHD candidate had already read this and said that it was a great book: a classic essential. The reason I bought the book wasn't for my own cultural development; the book is about Japan's culture during the first half of the 21st century. I was having a bitch of a time with some ongoing Japanese business negotiations and wanted to get a bit more understanding — if only to take my mind off the bitch of time I was having.

The book was written during the late stages of WW2 by Ruth Benedict. She was commissioned by the US Office of War Information to do an analysis of the Japanese culture so they could better understand "the enemy." But by the time the work had been completed, the war had ended and instead the work done by Ruth was used as a reference on how to manage the occupation of Japan during the subsequent rebuilding period.

What is curious to note was that Ruth was unable to visit Japan at the time, due to the war, and she did not speak or write Japanese: all she had to go on was previous writings as well as interviews with Japanese American immigrants.

While there are many critics to the book, and I'm not a sociologist or an academic, I feel as though this book finally put to rest and articulated the approach to my own understanding of coming to a conclusion of cultural identity, a framework to peg my own process and understanding.

1.Ruth isn't judgmental

She is especially aware that during war time, there were a ton of stereotypes and a lot of strong opinions — even by those who were considered authorities who had worked with the Japanese as ambassadors for many years. She didn't look to existing expressions of Japanese culture in war time, but sought to put into context the key values which made up the Japanese cultural identity.

Cuz I'm not, I am
Whenever you talk about culture, stereotypes are to be found. It is very hard to avoid that, and when it is your own personal cultural identity, it is extremely hard not to be judgmental about others who are in different situations and contexts. What happens is that once we are judgmental and critical of others because we stereotype them, we usually say: "they are wrong, and therefore we are right." This becomes cultural self identity based on our group association rather than actual self-realization. It is the equivalent of basing one's identity on the basis of skin colour or looks only.

In the case of Korean Americans, every 5 years or so a new set of stereotypes emerge from the community. It has to do with the influx of new immigrants, developments of the old country, and the effects of those on the existing immigrants. Regardless of what these stereotypes are, most of the time we identify which we are and which we aren't. As a result, we never get around to defining ourselves by anything more than the process of elimination via the disassociation of stereotypes.

Korean Canada in the 70's
So up until the early 90's, most East Asians referred to themselves as Oriental. And that was in the context of appearance and one's heritage. For the early Korean immigrants in Canada, from the 1970's, it was matter of simply assimilating, as most children who were born in the 60's were born in Korea and not in Canada. They had no doubt that we were different, they didn't expect equality, they knew that they had to go above and beyond to earn it. But kids born in Canada in the 70's were raised to understand themselves as Canadian: they had been raised entirely in the Canadian school system and they developed an identity of being "Second Generation" Korean Canadian, not just Korean immigrants in Canada. For most of the 80's, there simply was very few immigrants at that time, as Korea was rapidly industrializing and the option to immigrate has narrowed.

Korean Canada in the 90's
Up to the mid-1990's, people were fine with being Korean Canadian, it basically meant that we went to a Korean church, ate Korean food, but otherwise that was as far as it went. But with the influx of a new wave of Korean immigrants in the mid-late 90's, the term "FOB" — Fresh off the Boat — popped up, meaning those fully Korean immigrants who basically were like "our parents" (1970's immigrants), but with a key difference: Korea was no longer considered a backwards place, and Koreans didn't come to Canada looking to fully assimilate.

Rather, they came with with their own pop culture: K-Pop, kdramas; and modernized Korean social fun: Norebangs — "Korean Karaoke", HOF drinking houses, and PC bangs. They came with some level of pride, and due to insecurities and ignorance, they were critical of the "Second Generation" Korean Canadians who couldn't speak Korean properly or even at all. They couldn't understand why "Second Generation" Korean Canadians weren't really Korean. At this point, most Korean dramas reflected this "rebelliousness" of the Second Generation Koreans. Second Generation Korean Canadians didn't want to be associated with these rude and culturally backwards people who seemed as though they didn't really want to be in Canada anyway.

At first there was a curiousness on both sides, but this quickly turned into a division as Second Generation Korean Canadians didn't understand the pressures of being an immigrant, and the new immigrant community didn't understand the conditions of a mature immigrant community that was basically cut off from the Home Land for almost 20 years. Around this time is where the terms "banana," "whitewashed," and "wannabe FOB" started popping up; and of course there were the "Asian Americans" who didn't want to be associated with the term "Oriental." (oriental was actually how East Asians had referred to themselves right up until the mid-90's and this term excluded South East Asians and East Indians).

Korean Canada by 2000
By the early 2000's this had settled down and the new immigrants had created an identity for themselves: as the 1.5 Generation. This is unique, because unless those in the 1970's basically felt the need to fully assimilate as much as possible, this wasn't the case of the 1.5 Generation who, in many cases, were forced to immigrate by their parents and who still held on to their Korean identity first. But as Korea had grown wealthier, there became another group of fully Korean Koreans: visa students.

These early visa students were just coming to Canada to learn and were usually wealthy. They had no reason to interact with Korean Canadians, or even 1.5 Generation Koreans because they were there to study or enjoy their freedom as a visa student. There wasn't too much interaction between Second Generation and visa students, but there was between 1.5 Generations and visa students. Animosity arose from the fact that that the 1.5 Generation were fundamentally immigrants and led an immigrant life, whereas the visa students were basically just living as Korean foreign students and there was generally no real social commitment to where they were studying.

Times Have Changed
While I haven't been back to Canada for many years, many of the conditions that affected me probably wouldn't nowadays. In the 80's and 90's, we really didn't have any exposure to Korean culture unless we visited there for the summers, and even if we did, we only hung out with our relatives. It wasn't until the early 90's when K-pop and Korean dramas really start being interesting and modern. Nowadays there are things like YouTube and kids learning Korean in school for credit. Visiting Korea now is a great thing, not a burden. Korean modern culture with its gaming, food, and drinking has gained international recognition.

+ Show Spoiler +

But for those who maybe are living in smaller communities, or for one reason or another feel cut off from the cultural cross over, or hate K-pop and Korean drama or don't want to be pigeon holed with the Asian crowd...maybe this point of being judgmental is still valid. Because it's not what you aren't, but rather what you are. And this is a an extremely difficult matter if you do not have any frame of reference other than to say what you're not.

In this respect, going to Korea for many Korean Canadians or Americans, as a young university student is now such an eye opener, that once they land and get exposed to the very attractive pop culture that is Korean fun, night life and drinking (Korean fun being that we aren't shy about going all out to have fun, so no one tries to be cool or make an impression, we're just out there to be nuts and cut loose, if we're going to be embarrassed, then hell, we do it together!). But what many foriegners and Korean Canadians assume is Korean culture, is merely our pop culture and while its great for getting everyone to do the Gangnam Style Horse Dance, it has its limits.

2. Ruth isn't about pop-culture

Not that there was pop-culture at that time, but Ruth steps away from the propaganda on both sides and gets right into what the values for family and the values that dictate the relationships. I think that is the key point: the values that dictate relationships.

I really dislike K-pop, in fact, most of the time I hear it is when I'm abroad in Taiwan and they force me to try to sing it or dance to it cause I'm Korean. I absolutely hate Korean dramas (and most Korean men do), they are just ridiculous and I'll tell you right now, a son of the owner at a chaebol (massive conglomerate level), will never ever even know the name of the mid-manager let alone the secretary or even cleaning lady.

But if we based our cultural identity, solely on pop-culture, we really do not come any closer to understanding the relationships that define us. Pop-culture is a great place to start and gain interest, but to just to stop there or feel it is enough, is simply scratching the surface. For many people, pop-culture is what they define as culture, and while I meet many foreigners who speak Korean far better than me and know the names of all the celebrities, but their ability to interact is usually elementary apart from their novelty. Meaning that I wouldn't trust them to actually advise someone on what is really going on between two Koreans in a slightly more involved setting other than having fun or an obvious cultural faux pas which has created a pressured situation.

It isn't to say that pop culture doesn't have its joy or use, or wouldn't get a lot of cultural understanding and also begin to understanding more about yourself, but it isn't enough.

3. Ruth is all about the Chrysanthemum and the Sword.

For me this is critical which defines what is your base primary culture and just adapting other cultural aspects to your primary one. When Ruth titles the book, the Chrysanthemum and the Sword, it is about the contradictory nature of how Japanese were described at that period, "polite and demurred but also aggressive and arrogant,", the good and the bad, i.e. the Chrysanthemum and the Sword.

Good Bad and the Ugly
In much the same way, one's primary culture identity is a inherent unconscious mix of this Chrysantemum and Sword. We do not choose to be only the Chrysantemum when it is our primary cultural identity, we are both. When immigrant or very well traveled people state, "I am many different cultures, I simply choose what is good about that culture and discard the rest, or I chose the best from both cultures". It points to cultural adaptation on top of a primary cultural identity because ultimately by what criteria is one choosing what is good or bad? Are you choosing what is good or bad as a Korean or as a Canadian?

Sorry said the Scorpion to the Frog...
Whereas for a primary cultural identity, we don't have the option to make that choice, good and bad are not two sides or choices, but it come part and parcel as simply as a whole, we simply are Korean or Canadian for all it's pluses or negatives. Of course we can minimize the negatives and maximize the positives, but we do so in relation to what we inherantely believe to be negative about our own culture and our exposure to the standards of other cultures. For adapting new cultures, we can pick and choose what we think is nice or not, but it just becomes another way we express our primary culture and not really an inherant part of us. Meaning than when you are sleepy and grump or stressed and not conciously dictating your behavior, what comes up, the Chrysanthemum and the Sword.

As an aside, + Show Spoiler +

In this respect, the application is really allowing you to explore and express even the "bad" things of the culture without labeling or judging it as bad. I binge drink with my father-in-law once a week, but in Korea, I don't see it as binge drinking, rather I only see it as spending quality time with my father-in-law as we drink copious amounts of alcohol over a period of 6 hours until one of us happily passes out.

I am extremely macho and chauvinistic by the Canadian standards in which I was educated with, and my level of abuse to my staff would likely get me sued in Canada. But why do I freely continue to be do, when I'm sure I'll be told that "I should know better" because I am not ignorant of what is the expectation in Canada. But that is what it has become to me, just another standard, because my primary cultural identity isn't Canadian, I don't judge what I do a negative in this light, in fact, I don't even think of it at all as something to be judged or articulated. While I will always make allowances for whatever cultural situation I'm in, as to not cause unnecessary issues, as that would just be ignorant and culture insensitive, I do not feel any need to switch cultural gears.

Of course I do try to minimize what I know would be considered negatives in other cultures when I'm with non-Koreans, but I never deny it or judge it as something that I can just choose to cast off whenever I think it is morally wrong by another standard. And I'm not defensive about this either, that I'm subscribing to a single idea of what it means to me to be Korean. As Korean society also is still evolving myself as part of Korean society my cultural identity also is evolving, along with the society, as we all jump on the "well being health bandwagon" or stop focusing on regional differences between provinces as it is now domestically faux pas to do so.

4. Ruth tackles the cultural aspects that don't really make any sense.

Cultures are not so simple as to read a book and get it. You can say Americans are aggressive and you can say Koreans are aggressive, but they are different types of aggressiveness and the French can chime and say, hey our people are aggressive too, but at what degree or in what circumstances.

Ruth breaks up her chapters to deal with the cultural traits that seem contradictory and foolish to the eyes of an American, but in the struggle to make sense of it, do we really being to stop interpreting those cultural aspects thought our own framework but start to get new points of reference in the culture itself.

It is a critical turning point when you can start to build on understanding from within the cultural framework rather than interpreting from your own cultural framework. And that only comes when you tackle and grasp and can understand a cultural contradiction with it no longer being a contradiction, because obviously those "contradictions" make perfect sense to those in the culture. And part of that is a step from just seeing both the good and the bad, but why the bad isn't bad in that culture.

Concluding Remarks

What I enjoy about The Chrysanthemum and the Sword is that it is dated. It is written in a period without all the modern advances, before Sony, and Capcom and Toyota and Cosplay. Even before Mighty Atom (Astro Boy) was conceived. It is as much as a historical snap shot as it is a commentary, but if you can navigate through all the historically dated material, what you're left with is some very naked non-current event justified insight into the Japanese culture.

Some of the best insight that I've gotten into Korean culture have come from comparing where Japanese and Korean culture differ and it's because while our two culture are probably the most similar in many respects, when we are different we are extremely different and that points to a lot.

It almost goes without say, but you can read all you want, but if you really have this cultural identity issue, you need to visit the "home country" and actually live there, not as tourist, but as a native. Modern Korea is not a place for the weak of heart and there is a good reason why, even with the wealth of Koreans, a lot of Koreans still migrate, but, for me this is where I am most comfortable.

Most Korean Americans who come and actually work here outside of teaching conversational English rarely last a full year and go back to America really appreciating the standards of living and the sacrifices their parents made. Others like me, really felt as though there is no other place more comfortable. It did take me a few years for my actual integration into Korea to be to the point that I really did see everything as a Korean, rather than what I assumed was Korean, but the deciding factor for me was that I was always comfortable and accepted at a certain level.

At the end of the day, even if you do feel cultural confused, a big part of it is having the knowledge and actual exposure. The Korean Americans /Canadian who leave after a year realize that they really are Korean American / Canadian, not Korean, and while they may not be able to define what is "Korean American / Canadian", they know they aren't just a 'Korean'. But then again, likely they weren't confused about being an overseas Korean to begin with and just wanted to explore what the Korean side was.

If you don't have that exposure to actually know your 'heritage culture', I think it is easy to classify yourself as Asian, but of course, no one calls themselves Asian in Asia. We are clear that we are Korean, Japanese or Chinese, with the exception of probably Singaporeans who call themselves Asian as more of PR tool for foreign FDI than anything else.

To Summarize:
If your primary cultural identity is an issue (and a rare issue at that), the following is a list of knowhow that may help you in your process. If they seem obvious, then good, knowhow is meant to cut to the heart of things, but I'll tell you, they didn't just pop into my head one day, they are a lot product of a lot of reflection and actual decisions.

1. Only you really know if you are confused or not.
Confusion of your primary cultural identity is something only you can really know, and how knows where it stems from. I don't, but I do know that from high school onwards, I was always uncomfortable, angry and confrontational because of it.

2. Stop judging others people's progress/state of cultural identity
It is actually harder to do than it sounds, whether it be you meet and attractive Korean Kyopo girl who says that she hates Koreans and only dates white guys, or, some Korean whitewashed guy who suddenly found K-pop or visited Korean for the first time, and now is this walking pop-culture stand or even the guy who speaks fluent Korean and English, but looks down on Korea as if it was a third world still, they are who they are. It's cool and it shouldn't have any bearing on your own identity. + Show Spoiler +

Depending on so many different factors such as exposure and travel and up bringing, this is a very personal journey and really, whatever their own level or progress of cultural identity shouldn't matter to you at all. Unless the reason why you hang out with other 'Asians' is simply because you're 'Asian' and use chopsticks and like the same kind of food. Aside from me being judgmental there, ^^, if your cultural identity is dependent upon reassurance from others, well, it's a pretty fragile one at best.

At the end of the day, really, we are just people and maybe you want to be part of a certain community, but hating or forcing or preaching this on to anyone just is distracting.

3. Pop-Culture isn't enough.
Pop-culture is great for introducing a culture, but it has it's limitations, rather the focus should be on making friendships outside of the shared interest of pop-culture and to learn about the history, family and other cultural aspects. Basically making friends with those who are not from the same cultural situation as you. I know guys who can name all the dramas and sing all the songs and speak much better Korean than me, but I wouldn't trust them them even have a clue what is going on when it comes to Korean social or political movements, e.g. the mad US cows protests. Korean Americans/ Canadians still have no idea what it was really about, hint, it wasn't about the beef.

4. Chrysanthemum and the Sword.
I would think this is the most critical knowhow in that one doesn't judge a cultural expression as good or bad but takes it as it is. Most Koreans who live abroad can tell me why being chauvinistic as well as "binge drinking" in Korea culture is bad, but when I ask them, can you tell me why it would be considered "good or accepted" they usually draw a blank other than saying, "because it is tradition". But understanding both sides is critical and without it, we usually are never scratching the surface beyond our own interpretations.

5. Making Sense Out of Contradiction.
The things that make the least sense, things that are not even a matter of good or bad, but just seem completely irrational is really the break though point whereby if you can really get it, it now becomes a point of reference that is independent of your current cultural frame. That means, if you understand what seems to be contradiction without it being so any longer, and it simply makes sense without having the need to articulate why it makes sense, then it is definitely a turning point in progress.

6. Live like a Native.
Pretty straightforward and I'd say if I had to choose between learning the language and living like a native, I'd go with living like a native. You'd pick up the language in any case, but really, my eldest girl cousin speaks Korean fluently and you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who says she understands what being Korean is about.

At the end of the day, most Koreans I meet, over time, they stop thinking of me as an overseas Korean (Kyopo) and not because we are friends, but while I'm not native Korean, I am Korean. And maybe that only makes sense to me, but really, it is the only person it does need to make sense to. For me it means that I live a life where I never have to wonder if what I'm saying or acting is appropriate and that use to be an issue. When I get a speeding ticket in Korea and need to speak with the police or government officials, I'm totally cool. There is no misunderstandings or missed expectations of how I will be treated.

I work with Aussies, Brits, Scandis, and all sorts of Asians and a few Americans here and there, and other than the Americans and Canadians, I am much more mindful and deliberate in how I interact. But whether or not you have a cultural identity issue, the points outline would be above and beyond for approaching a new cultural basis.

To finally close, yes really...
If you're interested in Japan, or a historical perspective, or understanding a cultural approach, then I think this is a gem of a book.



I'd also like to recommend a book that has a lot of press in the last year, "Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother." I think it is a very honest account of a Chinese American mother who has her cultural and obsessive compulsive nature on overdrive. If you don't judge her and take it not as a cultural guide, but as a really an honest memoir, it gives a snapshot of that cultural immigrant identity.



As part of the TL Knowhow section, this thread is both a "discuss everything and ask me anything" related to the topic and books. I'm recommending these books as they did provide me a framework and something honest as an experience. In terms of Korean books, the books that I've read dealt with Korean history, politics, sociology etc, in terms of getting more knowledge about Korea. I never actually read about Korean cultural identity except in comparison to Japanese or Chinese approaches whether in business or historically.

Brought to you by the TL Knowhow Team
Written by: MightyAtom
Edited by: tofucake