OK, imperialism might be too strong a word, but check out this report in the NYT on Mongolian-Korean ties. Here’s some of it:
Today’s bonds reflect, to some degree, the solidarity of two small nations living on the edges of a rising China. Commercially, Mongolia is an outpost for Korean business. On an ethnic level, Koreans and Mongolians are like fraternal twins.
Advertising banners here implore “UB” girls to try a cosmetics line from Seoul, Ulan Bator’s new style maker. For advertising campaigns in Mongolia, South Korean companies do not bother to reshoot with local models.
Solidarity, my ass. Tell that to the 25,000 Mongolians living in this country - most reside here illegally and live in perpetual fear of deportation. Shit, my fiance gets interrogated like a criminal every time she steps off the plane from Mongolia, and her visa’s perfectly legal. And let’s get this straight - Koreans and Mongolians are not “fraternal twins.” South Korea has 40 million people, possesses one of the world’s most powerful economies, and counts among its close friends the world’s sole remaining superpower. Mongolia, on the other hand, has 2 million people, an economy notable only for being highly dependent on foreign aid, and is wedged precariously between the Bear and the Dragon. The relationship between the two nations reflects these realities, i.e., there’s nothing “fraternal” about it - paternalism’s the name of the game here.
Meanwhile, Language Hat takes issue with a number of the ethnic and linguistic assertions made in the NYT piece:
So what have we learned? Mongolians and Koreans are “like fraternal twins,” and their languages are so closely related it takes hardly any work to learn one if you know the other, sort of like Spanish and Portuguese. All of which is balderdash. The ethnic stuff presumably means that the Mongols interjected a few genes into the Korean pool during their stay, which is doubtless true but basically meaningless- they did the same everywhere they went, as do all conquering armies, without substantially affecting the local ethnicity. And the language stuff means that some people consider Korean part of the Altaic language family. Ethnologue is conservative (as am I), and includes only Mongolian, Tungusic, and Turkic languages in Altaic; it’s possible that Korean is related (which would of course have nothing to do with “Mongolia’s occupation of Korea”), but as Andrew Dalby puts it, “If so, it must have separated from the remainder of the family many thousands of years ago” - which means that any obvious traces have long been effaced, and it’s no easier for a Korean to learn Mongolian than, say, Chinese.
Anyway, the Chosun Ilbo (Korean ediiton) ran this article on “Mongol Tower” - a 10 story building in Kwanghui-dong, Chung-gu, Seoul housing businesses that cater primarily to Korea’s before mentioned Mongolian community.
(Thanks go to Peter of Oranckay’s Weblog)
6 Comments
O.K., then how do you explain this(?):
http://www.angelfire.com/games.....color.html
The weirder part of that map is the Ukraine. What the hell?
Marmot,
If you’re looking at Korea and Mongolia from a historical and genetic context, the article is true: Mongolians and Koreans are more related to each other than any other ethnic groups on earth. Because your Mongolian babe has a difficult time at Inchon does not prove this is untrue.
In point of fact, toolboy, I wasn’t referring to the “historic” and “genetic” context, I was commenting on the feel-good “we’re brothers” attitude taken by the article. If you would like to explain to me how the manner in which Korea treats its Mongolian community AND the arguably predatory business practices of Korean firms operating in Mongolia constitute “fraternal solidarity,” I’m all ears.
However, since you brought it up, it is in no way, shape, or form an established “fact” that Mongolians and Koreans are related, either ethnically or linguistically. Frankly, I believe they are, but for the NYT to report it like its common knowledge is simply misleading. Yes, Koreans and Mongolians “look alike” - or so I’m told by many Koreans - but so do Koreans and Northern Chinese, or Koreans and Japanese (yes, change their hairdos and give’em proper dental care, and Japanese look astonishingly similar to the Koreans). Certainly, Northern Chinese descended from Tungustic language speakers are as closely related to Koreans as are Mongolians. And as far as language is concerned, well, we run into more problems. Yes, sentence structures are similar, but then again, so are those of Korean and Japanese. Heck, Farsi and Hindi have similar sentence structures to that of Korean, and I hope you don’t intent to argue that Persians and Koreans are ethno-linguistically related. Korean and Mongolian, for two languages that are supposedly so “closely” related, are surprisingly devoid of cognates, and if the two are related (and I do think they are, mind you), they are so only distantly. Mongolians are MUCH (and I do mean MUCH) more closely related to other Central Asian peoples such as the Kazakhs and Uzbeks than they are to Koreans (heck, they’re more closely related to Turks living in Turkey than they are to Koreans, at least linguistically). If there’s an ethnic group Koreans are closely related to, it’s the Japanese - it’s fairly accepted that the current occupants of the Japanese islands are descended from immigrants / invaders from the Peninsula, they also speak a language that may or may not by a member of the Altaic language family, historically speaking, Korea and Japan are linked much more closely than are Korea and Mongolia, and the two share a great deal of cultural similarities (not including Confucianism, a late import to both), no matter how much both of them claim they don’t.
So in point of fact, you’re right - the fact that my Mongolian “babe” has a difficult time at Inchon does not prove the NYT piece untrue, but a lot of other questions prove it to be quite misleading.
I had always thought Mongolian and Korean were like distant cousins linguistically at least–kind of like Romanian with the other Romance languages. What I understand you to be saying is that there is not really any ‘there’ there. Is that true? I watch a lot of Korean soaps here (subtitled) and I’m always surprised how many Chinese cognates I can pick out–especially nouns. The two languages are completely unrelated but Korean did import tons of Chinese loan words…
I think there is too little research to make any sort of conclusions. In recent studies, facts show that Korean, Tungusic, and Mongolian Languages possess uncountable cognates. If you choose to know and learn more about the Altaic Languages, you will be surprised.