In , I also had a great opportunity to be at Pittsburg State University, Kansas, on an exchange program. I am a first-year doctoral student in American studies at KU. My main area of interest is Korean American communities in Kansas.
Exploring the lives of those who came to Kansas from South Korea, I tried to examine the Korean women's presence based on historical, gender, and cultural perspectives with individual narratives. I am currently working on exploring assimilation and Americanization processes of Korean immigrants in the Kansas City and Overland Park, and Junction City, Kansas in the post Immigration Act era.
Specifically, I am looking at how each ethnic community and culture is formed, maintained, and adjusted. In the past 40 years, Junction City, Kansas, has witnessed a growing Korean population, especially a steady influx of Korean women who were married to American servicemen in South Korea and came to settle in the city. The census shows that Koreans live in Junction City. This figure is down from in the census. The census indicates that were females.
Additionally, Korean women and their American husbands are believed to have sponsored for immigration from Korea most of the Korean men living in the city. However, the socioeconomic relationship between the two places is much closer in that the military base has provided the city with multiracial and multicultural populations, such as German, Korean, Japanese, and Filipino women who have been married to American servicemen in their home countries and have moved to Junction City.
It is remarkable to witness the visibility of the Korean presence in Junction City. The vitality of "Koreanness" in Junction City would not be possible without the hard work and struggle of Korean women who have lived there in the past forty years. According to Yuh, a Korean presence in "rural" America is often the result of the "presence of military brides and their families.
