The Movement of Korean Immigrants to Promote the Korean Language to American Schools

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Abstract

This paper examines Korean immigrants’ movement to promote Korean language education in the New York-New Jersey area. This movement includes the efforts of Korean immigrant community leaders to include the Korean language in the SAT II and to promote it to public schools in the area as a foreign language. This movement entails many activities, including lobbying the College Board, school administrators, and school board members, and collecting donations from Korean immigrants, Samsung, and the Korean government to cover expenses for creating the Korean language test by the College Board and public schools adopting the Korean language. This paper is significant because no previous study has shown a similar example of an immigrant group’s efforts to promote its language to American public schools. The U.S. government’s multicultural policies, Korean immigrants’ strong transnational linkages to their homeland, the Korean government’s financial support (which has played a particularly vital role), and their linguistic and ethnic homogeneity have contributed to Korean immigrants’ successful movement to promote their ethnic language to American schools.

Key Words: heritage education; Korean language education; ethnic languages; the Korean community in New York; the Korean community in New Jersey; foreign languages in SAT II; Confucian Institutes

Author

• Pyong Gap Min, City Univ of New York-Queens Coll