At the Crossroads between Ethnicity and Nation: Korean-Chinese Settlers in South Korea

초록

At the Crossroads between Ethnicity and Nation: Korean-Chinese Settlers in South Korea Jeanyoung Lee (Inha University) During the last two decades, more than six hundred thousand ethnic Koreans in China or Korean-Chinese migrated to South Korea, temporarily or permanently. The number reaches more than a quarter of the total Korean-Chinese population. Despite the shared ethnicity, South Koreans and Korean-Chinese soon discovered differences in many ways. The firm belief of Korean ethnicity and Korean nation has been challenged in Korea. In this article, patterns and changes of Korean-Chinese attitudes towards the Korean ethnicity and nationhood will be discussed. And also, some factors such as the Chinese government’s reshape of a new national identity, zhonghua minzu, and Korean government policy towards the Korean-Chinese will be provided as key factors in forming a new identity of Korean-Chinese settlers in Korea. By these, Korean-Chinese settlers in Korea have changed their identities and now show a unique group identity which is rather different from Chinese as well as Koreans.