Area of Interest:

Migration, Rights NGOs, Multiculturalism, Ethics/Politics of Difference, South Korea, Philosophical Anthropology, Visual Anthropology

Education:

BA in History, Ewha Womans University, Seoul, Korea 2001.

MA Asian Studies (concentration on Nepal and South Asia), Cornell University, 2003.

Professional Background:

Entered program in 2004.

Research & Activities:

My dissertation project aims at examining the practices and discourses of damnhwa, translated as "multi-culture" or "multiculturalism", which have recently emerged among various state and non-state actors in South Korea as a way of responding to a growing migrant population. I will explore the ways in which issues of difference and inequality and the meanings of culture and rights become rethought and redefined in Korean practices of multiculturalism, where the primary emphasis is given more on the self transformation of the native population than on the so-called political and or economic empowerment of migrants.