Growing Up in Transit by Danau Tanu

Author:Danau Tanu
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Berghahn Books
Published: 2018-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

David

Jeong Tak, who went by the name David, said that his parents wanted an international education for him due to “all the advantages” that would equip him in an increasingly globalized world. David said of his father’s views:

He wants me to speak English. He wants me to have a broader scope, broader mind, but he doesn’t want me to be an American. … So, he wants me to have all the advantages, I guess, about the broader scope, international friends, and English, all that. In education here, he can really see, for example in science. In Korea, science is like memorizing rather than understanding concepts and do experiments. Well, they do experiments, but not as much as they do here. Here is sort of like a discussion education, where the teachers ask questions and they’re sort of like, “Isn’t it this? Isn’t it this?” Give idea and we understand later. And the teachers analyze it, “Blah, blah, blah, blah.” In Korea, it’s not like that. So I guess my dad wanted me to get more, like, a creative science, I guess, of education.

David’s parents wanted David to have the educational and cultural capital that TIS offered, such as “broader scope, international friends, and English.” At the same time, they had concerns that David’s exposure to TIS’s school culture could potentially turn him into “an American” when they wanted him to retain his Korean identity. “I’m open-minded, but I’m still more to the Korean thoughts, and beliefs, and so on. … I think they [his parents] educated me sort of like that. ‘You’re a Korean, you’re a Korean. Although you’re going to an international school, you’re a Korean.’” David explained that his father impressed upon him that Korean cultural capital was also important for his future economic success:

It’s not that swinging [on a] chair is really bad [something I saw him do in class on several occasions while interacting casually with his teachers], or American beliefs are bad, but then it’s just different from Korean beliefs. Since he wants me, and I want it too, to work in Korea, live in Korea for the rest of my life, it’s better to have Korean beliefs rather than American beliefs. …

Being educated in American school, be part of American teachers, international students, I think he [dad] was … not scared, but he was worried that I’ll have those American sort of system of thought, international beliefs, which I don’t think they’re bad, I just think they’re different.

David’s parents felt that it was a combination of “international” and “Korean” capital that would help David “work in Korea.”

David conflated educational advantages with “international” or “international beliefs,” which he in turn conflated with “American” or an “American sort of system of thought.” This conflation indicates that international schools are seen as providers of high-quality education that reproduces cosmopolitan capital in their students, but also that cosmopolitan capital overlaps with Western capital. For David, becoming “international” ran the risk of becoming “American.” As a result, his father was concerned about his Korean cultural retention.

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