In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

>> 35 2 Everyday Encounters One day of the spring of 2001, I went to a local flower shop to buy a bouquet for my paternal aunt’s birthday. My poor command of the language drew the attention of the female shopkeeper. The woman frowned, and her face darkened when I disclosed that I was adopted. Even though I told her with pride that the flowers were for my aunt who lived close by, she asked no further questions. Instead, she lowered her price, gave me the bouquet, and refused any extra money I tried to give her. Her husband came over and asked what the matter was. She grumbled an explanation and gestured at me with a sharp nod of her chin. She looked annoyed while he said nothing, and I left their shop confused. She knew I had found my Korean relatives, but that did not change the reality of my adoption abroad, which she deemed sad or shameful. This was the first of several similar encounters I would experience over and over again during my stays in Korea. Spending time in South Korea, I came to realize that the image of transnational adoptees was always put in relief by way of comparison with the image of the orphan, of emigrants’ children, and other figures of marginality . Either in fictional accounts or in firsthand and secondhand life stories , all categories of ethnic Koreans kept crossing paths, forming a hierarchy based on their degree of Koreanness. Put together, these discourses on each group described the dynamics of marginality as a system. They helped situate transnational adoptees in the stratified social landscape of modern South Korea. Defining Koreanness Because I had to learn Korean in order to conduct fieldwork, I spent months at different language institutes in Seoul in 2000, 2003, and 2004, which introduced me to very tangible representations of transnational adoptees. Language institutes are places where Korean teachers and young international students—the majority of whom are emigrants’ children and transnational adoptees—experience difference and debate about who and what they are. 36 > 37 foreigners of Korean descent: what made them different from true Koreans was what they lacked and what they did not know. This was the case with emigrants’ children (kyop’o) and foreign adoptees (haeoe ibyangin). Either directly or indirectly through short sentences improvised for vocabulary practice, teachers gradually subjected foreigners of ethnic Korean descent to open mockery and half-spoken criticism. One day, a kyop’o girl was called “tomboy” (namja katta) because of her unkempt appearance; another was given a cold smile and asked to conjugate “to be vulgar” (yahada) because her tank top was too revealing. Meanwhile, her friend, a foreign adoptee, received exaggerated compliments on her “traditional beauty” (chŏnt’ong mi-in). “She has a large and round face, an exposed forehead and neat makeup,” said the senior teacher. The recipient of the compliment smiled but was not pleased, as we had learned earlier that traditional beauty also implied a small chest and a wide waist “which looks like the larger part of a fish.” Because the definitions of beauty, modesty, and femininity obviously stemmed from ancient Korean standards, foreigners did not match these references . Instructors proffered harsher remarks on both the appearance and the behavior of foreigners who happened to display Korean features, and girls were always more targeted than boys. These remarks were based more on stereotypes than on facts; at that time, even South Korean youth did not match the ancient standards. * * * Theoretically, Koreans’ social life is based on the combination of three fundamental social ties. What differentiates overseas Koreans from South Koreans is their lacking one or several of the three ties. Once, the Chinese characters lesson drifted into a discussion of these three social ties.2 The teacher explained: First of all, there is the blood tie or hyŏl-yŏn (character hyŏl: blood). Then comes the soil tie or chi-yŏn (character chi: land, soil). In Korea, for the presidential elections, regions vote overwhelmingly for candidates born in those regions. Our president Kim Dae-jung comes from Chollanamdo, well, all the people of that region voted for him, or at least almost all of them. . . . Last comes the school tie or hak-yŏn (character hak: school, university). Students usually meet their future spouses at the university. That’s why girls start using makeup, growing their hair long and untied as soon as they enter the university. The school tie is crucial...

Share