My Journey into Korean

Korean was the first foreign language I studied without ever taking a class and the second foreign language I studied with some intensity after Spanish. I grew up in an area with many 1st and 2nd generation overseas Korean people (교포). My exposure to Korean was thus often sporadic— I knew many people that spoke some Korean but many didn't feel comfortable reading or writing, let alone getting into the intricacies of grammar. Thus, my early entry into Korean was learning a lot of words and being able to understand a good deal, but I lacked in ability to string together sentences aside from relatively formal sounding textbook sentences, e.g. using the -(스)ㅂ니다 verbal ending.

I became interested in Korean before it became super popular, similar to how you probably decided on your favorite indie rock bands. For me, it started with learning the Korean alphabet, hangul 한글, it evolved into reading the Bible (성경) in Korean, and then it metasticized into diving into the Korean internet. At the time I'm writing this (December 2020), my interest in learning Korean is mostly sustained by momentum—continuing something I've started, rather than having any pressing questions to investigate or things to do with it.

Nobody ever asked me to learn Korean, so I suppose most of my Korean learning can be considered a time-draining LARPing exercise. Of all the languages that I've studied, Korean has the fewest native speakers. The Korean language is associated with a particular ethnicity (Korean) of which I have no known connection (genetically). Contrast this state of affairs with learning a language like Spanish, Russian, or even Arabic—someone or some institution might ask you to learn one of these languages even if you lack any ethnic connection with them as they are practical languages for things like business, religion, etc. Korean is not significant like Latin, Russian, or Spanish as a language of empire.

However, for my personal history and my place in the world, Korean does occupy a special place.

Korean, Culture, and the Crumble of Western Civilization

Studying Korean was my first journey away from the "default" culture I was born and raised into. Growing up only speaking English, I was largely "colorblind" to the differences of Korean, Chinese, Taiwanese, Hong Kong, and so forth. There was Asian stuff which was foreign to me, and I knew I belonged to Chinese stock. How exactly that differed from the places peers around me came from was unclear.

It was from Koreans that I learned Korea is not China (Taiwanese friends also echoed a similar point). I saw what might be called "nationalism" for the first time—watching events like the World Cup or the Olympics, Korean friends would cheer for Korea—the people representing Korea would look similar (ethnically) so the physical connection was obvious. Korean-Americans seemed to really enjoy an "American plus one" identity— enjoying all the (legal) benefits of being American but then also being able to flip to a Korean identity as convenient.

K-popium for the masses

Over the past decade or so, the popularity of the Korean language has skyrocketed as a new species of Consoomer has spawned, even more terrible than weaboos (AKA weebs, fans of Japanese stuff). The Koreaboo subsists off a diet of drama, mass produced drum beats, and powerful vocals.

Reasons for studying Korean differ for every individual of course. However, I think it would be a disservice to the reader to not mention some important generalizations about who learns Korean and why. Here goes: people are attracted to the aesthetics of Korea—that is, they think Korean people, Korean stuff, Korean food, is pretty.

Compared to much of the stuff pushed in the West, the people and products of Korea have a very... standard appeal. Go vegan or planet earth dies? Fak that, how about some kimchi stew (with meat). Mumble rap? How about some nice sounding ballad showcasing singing rather that some probably drug-influenced rhythmic talking. Diversity? Korea is practically an ethno-state, and I think many people living in cosmopolitan Western cities are rather jealous of that (the less other foreigners they see while visiting Korea, the happier they are—secretly).

While Japanese anime is often associated with nerds, Korean mass entertainment has been designed to target a wide lowest common denominator—not just cartoon watching oversized children. Your mom might buy Korean cosmetics. You might follow a handful of idols. Your colleagues at work might discuss the plot of some drama and who their favorite actors/actresses are. It is like the mass entertainment of the West, but with prettier faces and often with less overt occult/evil influences.

Theatre States

You may have heard North Korea called a "theatre state" wherein performances are put on for foreign visitors to make life there appear much nicer than how it typically is—rather than people starving under a Godless authority, you are presented with smiling people living in an orderly society... In many Western minds, South Korea occupies a similar position. Particularly for those in ethno-nationalist crowds, South Korea is held up as a homogenous state full of beautiful people. If only the West could return to that ideal, say the ackshual racists.

Thus both Koreas stand as a kind of symbol of what a society of relatively homogenous people could look like in the twenty-first century—a time when the historical identity of many nations have eroded under agendas of globalization.

Hyper-literate Technocracy

South Korea has emerged as a strange kind of hyper-urban, hyper-connected cyberpunk place—especial in big cities like Seoul. The products of a handful of major corporations (재벌) are ubiquitous. There is faster Internet and smaller apartments, compared with most of the United States. There is mass literacy—we can probably give some credit to the hangul 한글 alphabet for helping in this.