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Title: IDENTITY, AGENCY, AND LINGUISTIC MARGINALIZATION IN SOUTH KOREAN HIGHER EDUCATION: VOICES OF NORTH KOREAN REFUGEE                       STUDENTS

·          Presenter: Dr Mi Yung Park

·          Date & Time: Tuesday, May 28, 2024 [2 pm (Perth), 3 pm (Seoul); 4 pm (Sydney); 6 pm (Auckland)]

·          Registration: https://docs.google.com/.../1XjPl9mmNaIK6yWh8vdVS5wG.../edit

About the talk:

There has been an influx of North Korean refugees defecting to South Korea to seek freedom and better economic, educational, and professional opportunities. Thus, an increasing number of North Korean students are entering university in South Korea. Previous studies that examined North Korean students’ adaptation to South Korean universities have focused on their difficulty with English language learning. However, little scholarly attention has been paid to other challenges they encounter in their courses, particularly how they cope with linguistic marginalization and insecurity, which can directly affect their daily academic engagement and social interaction. In this presentation, I will highlight what strategies North Korean students use to negotiate and reposition their identity when they are discriminated against as linguistic and cultural Other, and their identity as Korean is delegitimized. I will end by discussing implications for educational policy and practice in South Korean higher education as a crucial space and context for refugee students’ identity (re)construction, and the support they need to integrate and participate more fully in academic communities.  

 

About the presenter:

Dr Mi Yung Park is Chair of Asian Studies and Senior Lecturer in the School of Cultures, Languages, and Linguistics at the University of Auckland. Her research focuses on migration, language use, and identity among immigrant families and refugees in South Korea and New Zealand. She is currently working on two collaborative projects entitled “Korean as a foreign language (KFL) learners’ motivation, demotivation, and language achievement: The Australian and New Zealand context” and “Linguistic diversity and discrimination in higher education” funded by the Academy of Korean Studies and the University of Auckland, respectively.