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Assignment 3: Research Paper on Koreatown
Write a two-to four-page paper on any community resource and/or
notable event in Koreatown focusing on, but not restricted to, the
following issues:
o Race relations (e.g., the L.A. Uprisings of 1992)
o Recent labor issues
o The Open Court System (in LAUSD)
o Educational Children’s Services
o Community Organizations
Feel free to include any personal experiences/history relating
to any of the community resources and/or notable events in Koretown.
You will need to do research for this assignment, so be creative!
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The Los Angeles Korean American Community
and Child Abuse
By Tina Bhaga
I chose to study this topic because it helped
me to better understand a particular community issue, Korean family
dynamics, and the relationship between a state-sponsored institution
and community members. Child abuse opens a forum where racial, generational,
and cultural factors interact among parents, children, and social
workers. The ensuing social dialogue is telling of how the State
traditionally addresses social problems and is also suggestive of
methods for change. I particularly chose Kay Kyung-Sook Song’s
dissertation study as a research source because she interviews 119
members of the Korean American community and allows their voices
to speak. Although she wrote her paper in 1986, her findings are
interesting to examine from a historical perspective and in a comparative
light, from the context of modern circumstances.
Song’s data reveals that the Korean American
population has child abuse rates that are significant, even accounting
for their infinitesimal presence in Los Angeles. Her explanation
for these statistics is multi-varied. First, she theorizes that
the Korean American population is at high risk for incidents of
child abuse, because of the profile of its members. The population
is mostly immigrant and in varying stages of acculturation. The
immigrants are under stresses that are absent from the typical native,
white population. These are: the process of immigration and the
depressed economic and social status that such a move entails, memories
of war or oppressive political regimes from the home country, language
barriers, and tenuous citizenship status. In addition, second generation
children, who acculturate faster than their parents, clash with
their parents regarding conflicting cultural standards for child-rearing.
Since stressed parents are more likely to abuse or neglect their
children, Song concludes that the highly stressed Korean American
community has the potential for creating child abusers. But Song
is less concerned with tracking child abuse cases, than in the community’s
awareness of it as a problem and its suggested responses to alleviating
the problem.
She discovers that Korean Americans are quite
capable of recognizing child abuse, and agree with their white counterparts
in their abhorrence of worse case scenarios of sexual and physical
abuse. However, the groups differ in their assessment of other child
rearing practices. Korean Americans view swatting a child’s
hand or bottom, and pulling his ear as forms of acceptable punishment,
while the white audience disagrees. On the flip side, whites view
disciplining children by having them eat or sleep by themselves
at an early age a normal practice, and Korean Americans consider
this too harsh. Clearly, family dynamics differ across cultures,
and Song criticizes the local social welfare system for its inadequacy
in accommodating diverse child rearing practices. Its child services
branch reflects a biased ideology by validating the white system
of child rearing. In addressing child abuse complaints, it imposes
a top-down stratagem of intervention that, Song argues, is ineffective
and further alienates parents from children, and whites from Koreans.
Song asks Korean Americans if they are satisfied
with the traditional system of state intervention that involves
removal of the child from his natural parents and potentially foster
or institutional care. They suggest intervention by family and relatives,
as opposed to the stranger from the social welfare office, and if
removal is necessary, they decree that the child should live with
relatives, rather than jarring the child by placing him in an unfamiliar
institution. In Korea, society and the extended family check the
occurrence of child abuse, and in their suggestions for improving
social services, Korean Americans reflect their cultural roots in
their alternative suggestions for handling cases.
Song proposes a bottom-up, local approach to
structuring child welfare services complete with bilingual social
workers and less regimented formulas for correcting abusive behavior.
She proves that the current system inadequately serves the community,
and that a change in tactics could prove more effective in raising
consciousness regarding child abuse. A community that implements
a resource program of its own design will work to sustain it because
it will be the direct product of its labor and vision. Every member
of the community has a vested interest in perpetuating social services
because he/she’s voice has shaped the program. Song’s
study is relevant for supporting grassroots activism in other social
arenas, like health and education. The Los Angeles Korean American
community actively engages in its social welfare and substantiates
the idea that others can do the same.
Reference:
Song, Kay Kyung-Sook. Defining Child Abuse:
Korean American Study. Dissertation from
the University of California Los Angeles. 1986
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