A study by the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research indicates that, by and large, Koreans in America actually assimilate pretty well. Koreans ranked fourth when listing nationalities behind (suprise, suprise!) no. 1 Canadians, no. 2 Philippines and (suprise?) no. 3 Cubans. Behind Cubans?
Koreans also tied for the fourth spot with Vietnamese. The study found that the Vietnamese were ahead of Koreans in civic participation, but Koreans were ahead economically, meaning that Vietnamese were more likely to run for office whereas Koreans were more likely to have a white collar job.
Latin Americans and Chinese have a below mean score on the assimilation study.
You can read an executive summary of the report here.
53 Comments
I think the study is right. Koreans in the States do just fine. And at least in the Bay Area and Los Angeles I’ve been seeing a lot of Asian guys with Caucasian girls — a very good sign I think. At this point it seems to me that if Koreans don’t assimilate, at least in California, it’s largely by choice.
The really startling revelation from that study was the extent to which Mexicans don’t assimilate.
I live in a city with a massive amount of South Americans and very few Mexicans. One of the things that surprises me the most is the deep dislike of Mexicans and other central Americans that South Americans openly express.
Koreans do well economically but I don’t know if being middle-class in itself constitutes assimilation. They do tend to keep to themselves much more than other groups (less Mexicans). Oh well. We don’t really need kimchi in every 7-11 anyways. I’ve never felt any hostility from a Korean of any generation and get on quite well with most everybody from every group. If anything, the people that annoy me the most are young wannabe mafia types from NYC.
America still works as a “hub” (sorry Roh) for immigration.
“We don’t really need kimchi in every 7-11 anyways.”
Yes… but we do need soju in every 7-11…
Totally agree.
LOL @ the soju Big Gulp.
Not startling at all. Factors that work against assimilation include residence in ethnic enclaves, low English proficiency, low educational attainment, and unauthorized employment in unskilled jobs.
Our small community’s ESL population is mostly Hispanic - Mexican and some Salvadoran. A growing number of Mexican immigrants are indigenous peoples from the highlands of Mexico; they are often illiterate and speak passable Spanish. Most of the parents are not assimilated, but their children are. Our Hispanic immigrant population is large enough for newcomers not to feel isolated yet small enough not to constitute an enclave. Increasingly, new arrivals are settling in small cities and towns because that’s where the jobs are and because of lower living expenses and safer streets. I believe diversified settlement patterns will facilitate assimilation into American life.
Given that many Indian immigrants speak English and are highly skilled, one would expect higher assimilation, but many of my Indian-American friends in college were pressured by their parents to marry other Indians. I was bemused when an Indian-American boyfriend showed me matrimonial ads that his parents had given him to consider. Practically every ad included the descriptor “fair” or “fair-skinned.” He ended up marrying a white woman with three kids and is very happy.
LA, NYC, Chicago, have large Korea Towns. But I wonder how many Koreans exactly do live in them - are they not just mostly collection of shops, while most of the residents are Hispanics?
In Canada, Koreans are well dispersed. There are few small Korea towns here and there, but most Koreans just have shops and do businesses in them, but most do not live in them.
I also notice out marrying outside of Koreans is also significant - especially the 2nd generation gyopos.
What’s with the whole white girl with Asian guy or white guy with Asian girl crap anyway? Why is that important?
I know it’s important to Korean Klansmen and the whole Korean pure blood thing, but people who go on like that sound like primitive hillbillies or Nazi’s.
JohnT: The Caucasian girl with white guy thing is important because most Caucasian girls haven’t been so hot for Asian guys, until recently in California that is. And yet Asian girls were generally interested in Caucasian guys. For this reason there was the general feeling from Asian men that “they’re taking our women.” And that is important, and creates attitudes that extend into broader international relations since those relations are as psychological as anything else.
In fact I think that the dominant metaphor describing the US/Korea relationship has been that of American GI with Korean prostitute (or juicy girl). I don’t think this is an accurate metaphor, but I think it describes the sense that most anti-Americans have had about the US — that the US wants to take advantage of the Koreans, whose government periodically is found sleeping with the oppressor, just like a whore. You’ll sleep with a prostitute, but you don’t care about her. I mean do Koreans really believe that Americans would want to sell them beef that would kill them? That fits into the john’s phrase, “fuck ‘em and chuck ‘em.” Note that anti-US beef posters shown here recently display Lee Myung Bak as in bed with George Bush and a mad cow…
Now, that political metaphor finds traction in personal experience when Koreans notice that American girls, especially white girls, won’t date them (or other Asians) while on the other hand Caucasian guys parade around town with hot Korean or other Asian girls.
Take Korean students in the US. The female Korean student can probably find a date with whitey in about five seconds. The Korean male can maybe find a date with a white girl in about five months unless he’s particularly charismatic. This is my experience. But if you don’t believe me, start asking white girls if they’d date Asian guys. I’ll bet you the overwhelming response will be “No.”
In Korea this is also because Western women aren’t interested in fitting into a male-dominated society. White girls will also mention the size of the Asian guy’s hrum (to use Borat’s term), or they’ll just say “I don’t know,” or even make some racial comment or joke. Some of this must be economic, since women are probably biologically set up to seek men who can best support them and their offspring, but I’ve sen the same thing time and time again in Japan, land or the wealthy Asian dude.
I don’t have time to write this better here, but you get the gist. To me, Korean attitudes about the States can be changed by somehow negating or replacing this dominant metaphor.
Think I’m nuts? Agree?
Oops, that should have been Caucasian girl with Asian guy… sorry.
I’ll accept your bet. Most of my white female friends in Asia dated Asian men.
During my thirteen years in Asia not a single white woman expressed dissatisfaction with Korean men’s equipment. Not a single one. The only folks who ever complain about Asian men not being well hung are Western men. Hmmmm. I wonder why that is. None of my friends or acquaintances cracked racial jokes either.
Quit projecting, day4night.
The results of the study don’t surprise me at all. I always thought that “Fifth Column” stuff was total crap.
Agreed. However, what is said and what is done are often quite different. I never asked Caucasian friends in Asia, because I frankly never cared. But I do know that at least fifty percent of the attractive, professional, single, foreign women that I knew there did in fact date Asian men — and that’s only the friends who shared that with me.
Well OK then I take that as a very positive sign, Sonagi. Note also that I’m not talking about the reality of Asian men’s ‘equipment,’ but about the popular conception. Maybe you’re right, maybe it’s Western men who talk about that more than women, though I’ve heard it from both (and appreciate it from neither). But in my experience many white girls have not been interested dating Asian guys, especially Asian guys with accents, and I’ve sensed that changing–a change that makes me happy. I still think the metaphor holds, though if you can show me otherwise I’ll certainly change my mind.
It is almost comical to see the reputation of my and hundreds of millions of other Asian guy’s genitalia tarnished and restored. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go find a magnifying glass so that I can go to the urinal.
day4night, I’ll take that bet too. I’m kinda short on rent this month.
Under this study’s premise, can an ethnic group be highly culturally assimilated but ‘not so much’ (continuing the Borat thing) on economic assimilation?
Asian dudes would score more white girls if “they” (talking about the average, not all) had more confidence around women. White guys who are sheepish around girls are relegated to ‘friend territory’ too.
So now we’re Asian guys now? And their ’small equipment’? Does it matter much when soon ‘Asian’ guys (specifically Chinese) are going to be your new boss of the town?
Say hello to your new Chinese boss, white American man.
CNN bends over and takes it in the ass, as they apologizes to China.
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/c.....688594.htm
Numbnuts on both sides. This Cafferty guy is totally offensive by condescending to the Chinese, and cm is completely offensive for condescending to the Americans. Neither one realizes that global security, prosperity and advancement rely on a mature, professional relationship between the two countries — definitely not fuelling condescension or nationalism on either end.
Australia seems to follow similar patterns. Interracial marriages in Oz are pretty common (my own family is a mix of philipino, korean, caucasian, aboriginal and maybe soon to be lebanese).
(from http://omarfaruk.wordpress.com.....-marriage/)
In 2005 there were 255,481 live births in Australia. 71.5% of these infants were born to Australian-born fathers, and 75.9% were born to Australian-born mothers.
However the disparity is generally only marginal when the foreign-born partner is from Western Europe, New Zealand or the Americas. At an extreme there are 3.6 times more births to Australian-born men/Chinese-born women than to Australian-born women/Chinese-born men, while there are 2.7 times more births to Pakistani-born men/Australian-born women than to Pakistani-born women/Australian-born men.
In terms of variance between brides and grooms from particular countries in marrying native Australians, 36.7% of brides but only 7.9% of grooms born in countries defined as ‘North Asia’ (Japan and Korea) who married in 2005 did so to an Australian-born partner. (Conversely, 64.1% of grooms but only 43.8% of brides born in Lebanon who married in 2005 did so to an Australian-born partner.)
So Korean men tend not to marry white girls, but white men often marry Korean girls.
Alot of people are putting this down to the preference of white girls, but I think one major factor is the preference of the Korean man’s family. I know one white Australian girl who went through hell with her Korean mother-in-law, who was going to have her son marry off to a western girl over her dead body. Maybe that plays a part.
It’s not about the ‘equipment,’ that’s just one part of an overall stereotype. If I said that too many hold the attitude that Mexicans are lazy, would you tell me that I think Mexicans are lazy?
The real point, the important point, is that many Koreans evidently hold a biased and emotional attitude toward America which doesn’t fit the facts. To me the cultural metaphor that holds this together is that America wants Korea to be its prostitute. For years the only Americans that Koreans saw were GI’s, and those GI’s were screwing Korean prostitutes, and this became the predominant metaphor that happened to fit into an anti-American view: that America was turning Korea into its prostitute. Is it my personal view? Absolutely not!
I want more white girls to date Asian guys btw, specifically Korean guys, because I think it can do a lot toward getting rid of the anti-American metaphor in general and because I abhor racism. Unfortunately, despite my wishes, I feel I’ve noticed a tendency among white women to not be interested in Korean or other Asian men. When I’ve asked American, French, English, German girls I know why this seems to be the case, I’ve heard the same answers over and over.
To Sonagi, if all of the white women you knew dated Korean guys then first, I think it’s a very good and healthy thing, although part of me still wonders if the white women who choose to spend a year in Korea aren’t already those who’d be less averse to dating Asian guys–otherwise they might have sought a different employment. But maybe it’s not the case, maybe the majority of white Western girls would be totally thrilled to date Korean guys. I honestly hope so. And let me also say that I’ve seen many white girls date Korean guys (I have a lot of Korean American friends), and in California I’ve seen more and more Asian guys with white girls on the street for example, and that was the original, upbeat point. But I’ve seen it as a relatively recent phenomenon, and I’ve talked to far too many white girls who’ve told me point blank that they’re not interested in Asian guys, and I find that sad, and hope it continues to change. Does that make sense?
Oops, sorry about the bold. A loose html tag…
And thanks, Hoju-Saram, for the empirical evidence.
Asian women are the least discriminatory when it comes to racial biases in dating & mating.
Sad but true, white women just don’t give an asian brother a fair chance.
Even worse, black women won’t even give us the time of day.
While a black brother has a more than optimal chance with a white woman proportional to white male/black female relationships, this isn’t enough to reduce the white man’s prospective mating pool by upwards of 40% as what happens to the Asian brother.
Maybe the mamacitas will give us a chance? I heard they also like teh rice!
@18
“CNN bends over and takes it in the ass, as they apologizes to China. ”
CNN apologizing for an incredibly unprofessional, racist comment openly made by one of their correspondents against an entire nation should hardly be construed as CNN kowtowing to China, or symbolic of the (non-existent) developing Chinese domination of the USA, as you seem to be wanting to suggest.
@25
I agree 100%. The guy should have been fired on the spot for spouting off that kind of crap. The backpedaling (At that time the network stated that Cafferty was offering his “strongly held” opinion of the Chinese government, not China’s people) is also a big steaming pile of poop as well.
“In early April, Cafferty said in a live show that Chinese products were “junk” and the Chinese were “basically the same bunch of goons and thugs they’ve been for the last 50 years.”
I can’t see how that the first part about Chinese products being junk is a reflection of the government.
To me, it just shows that some bigotry is still publicly tolerated
Cafferty serves a useful function. If he were fired, another would pop up in his place. His views are common enough that having them publicly stated keeps other like-minded morons from having to state them. The Olympics are approaching, and it’s going to get worse. China’s gonna have to deal with its rising status, including being a larger target for kneejerk, strongly biased criticism.
The mic Cafferty was using on that day was made in China.
@24: Try Asia. 1+ billion Chinese prove Asian men have a chance with Asian women.
@11: Some years ago, a white woman named “Cedar” who lived in Korea blogged quite openly about the endowment of her Asian men.
So does this mean cm is Chinese?
IMO China has a long way to go before telling anyone what to do.
Just a quick lesson in economic power. You gain power by opening up your markets. You close off your markets, no power.
That said, if the Chinese can actually compete in terms of creativity then maybe we’ll see an open market. I highly doubt it, and I predict China will become another Japan on a larger scale, a big xerox machine that copies everyone else’s ideas with ultra protectionism protecting their lack of creativity.
Not to mention China is still begging the Russians for military tech.
@29, I’ve seen the equipment of some white guys in the campus gym. IMO most of you are not packing.
There are some that are much larger than the average though, but in comparison to Koreans I haven’t seen a difference.
Seeing how America is a melting pot of various people from Europe, I wouldn’t be surprised if there were larger numbers in the tail regions of the distribution just due to the fact that the US population is 6x larger.
since providing a direct link holds up the post, i will tell all of you to go to youtube and look under ‘taylor goes korean’. i can’t identify the show but i thought it was funny and pertinent to the topic at hand even though the topic at hand is not the topic of this thread.
Either way for you dogbert, it sounds like you aren’t getting any.
You’re funny when you try to discuss economics, stacked. Who has more power over their economy- Hu Jintao or George Bush? Raoul Castro or Gordon Brown? Robert Mugabe or LMB?
OK, that was easy. Now let’s try something a little more subtle.
Who has more power over whose economy - China over South Korea’s, or South Korea over China’s?
More subtle yet - China or America’s, or America over China’s?
http://www.health24.com/sex/Gr.....,32493.asp
Hey, why stop at Jack Cafferty? Is CNN also going to apologize for the “biased coverages” against China on Tibet and torch runs? Why not? I guess all those death threats against Western reporters have ‘changed their minds’? Or did the Chinese sites like this which exposes “Western media bias, distortions, and lies”, achieved their purpose? I have a feeling a lot of Chinese are laughing with giddiness at how much influence they’ve gotten over the superpower like the US.
http://www.anti-cnn.com/
What? The Japanese are better hung than Americans, and the French better hung than us all?
The paradigm through which I look at the world has been completely shattered.
“http://www.health24.com/sex/Gr…..,32493.asp”
Yeah yeah, we’ve all seen that 9cm Korean size stats (which I think is a seriously flawed “study”). And Koreans are always being accused of not thinking critically… You shouldn’t feel all that proud, according to that study, Japanese men have bigger tools than white American men.
So has anybody watched Japanese porn? Do they really have meat that’s bigger than American men in porns? Not that I care what the size of meat is, but why does this matter so much for white men? Is it some kind of a obsession based on psychological needs to thump their chests that they are the best?
i too find the stats suspicious and it ain’t because of what they say about korean men; japanese guy is bigger than the white guy? i don’t believe it since the average size of a male is dependent on the average female’s ability to accomodate. women determine the collective size of any group of men. i’d bet my bottom dollar said study was conducted by some expat in korea.
anyway, thanks for to cm for the link to the chinese side of the story. it seems the chinese do have some valid points.
@#37
So, does that make French guys most insecure?
Well, the statistics was gathered by a doctor who performs penis enlargement surgery… meaning that the sampling bias is towards men who feel their penis is sexually inadequate.
“Try Asia. 1+ billion Chinese prove Asian men have a chance with Asian women.”
X-D can’t put it better than that.
All this penis talk has triggered the Gay Asian Singles Ad.
Could we please stick to the original topic or at least shift the off topic stuff from big dicks to hot chicks?
‘Could we please stick to the original topic or at least shift the off topic stuff from big dicks to hot chicks?’
actually, it was started by a poster who loves to talk about these kinds of things.
Pawi, I’m still waiting. Especially after your insensitive comments about the poor kid who died in 대구. Actually you’ve behaved yourself on this thread, but I fear you will slip again, so please email me. I’m not kidding, you need my help. pawis.conscience@gmail.com
i’ve just e mailed you. can’t wait for your advice!
Hey, just one more comment about penises…
Do you think that perhaps the reason why the pornography culture in Korea has not flourished is precisely because of that reason (9.6 cm)? I mean, you find alot of ethnic Korean female actresses in American porn, but no Korean male actors.
I’ll spare you all the self-description and empirical evidence, and just say the following. I don’t know much about Korean peni, but I do suspect that SOMEONE in this country must be buying and managing to squeeze into those condoms in convenience stores and TESCOs. Hint: This country is ~98% Korean and ~99% Asian.
Perhaps the Chosun Ilbo can set us…ahem…straight.
http://photo.english.chosun.co.....p;idx=1635
Oh…maybe nsfw?
Not the diversion I foresaw…
I haven’t received anything. Remember there’s no apostrophe in the email address: pawis.conscience@gmail.com.
You’ll be glad you did.
Wow, our country ranks 2nd? Dang!
It’s cuz you guys come the the states already speaking english. That sorta helps, you know.