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Blood types and hierarchies Racism against black people in Korea comes from many sources: Korean ethnic nationalism and xenophobia, which touch all foreigners here; centuries of isolation that kept Koreans apart from other races; a traditional valorization of the color white; Confucianism; and most of all, racism imported from the United States of America. It is still a widely held belief here that the Korean people are defined by their shared blood, according to Stanford sociology professor Shin Gi-wook. This belief is then applied to other countries — and for the U.S., that means Americans should be white. Many Koreans also believe that blood is a definer of personality — it used to be very common for Koreans to ask, “What’s your blood type?” even in job interviews. It still happens occasionally. Once blood is used as a personality indicator, it’s not a big leap to viewing races as inherently different, just as people with different blood types are, says Nadia Kim. Kim, who wrote the book “Imperial Citizens: Koreans and Race from Seoul to LA” (2008) on how Koreans perceive race, says using blood as a definer of personality “biologizes race.” “It creates a category system based on a biological division and hierarchy of humans that has been totally disproven,” she says. But Korea still invests ideas in blood type — “that it determines intelligence, character, athletic ability, morality and so on.” Kim points out that the idea of “race” itself is merely a social construction. People look different because of social evolution and where their ancestors are from, not because of blood or blood type. Despite proof that there are no biological differences between races — beyond skin color, eye shape and other superficial differences — race is still used as a means to justify racism and affects how people interact with each other. Koreans have also historically elevated white as a “pure” color, which benefits the light-skinned nobility over dark-skinned peasants, Kim says. The pure white hanbok was also associated with the Korean ethnicity. “There were meanings associated with the color white — peace, being a peaceful people, purity,” says Kim, who notes this judgment has been carried out in many societies worldwide. “I don’t think this is unimportant, particularly when it intersects with an American and global order that puts white people on top.” Confucianism, which has been Korea’s national ideology since the 14th century, orders everyone into five unequal relationships. It does not have a category for race. But race can be applied to the equation, and certain races can be seen as higher or lower in the Confucian hierarchy based on their perceived job status, income or similar factors. “Even if ‘immigrant status’ or ‘racial status’ is not explicit as one of the five relationships (the hierarchy system) informs it,” Kim says. www.groovekorea.com / February 2014 32 Edited by Elaine Ramirez (elaine@groovekorea.com) InsIGhT Blackface became associated with comedy in Korea with TV’s popular ‘sikeomeonseu’ routine. It was stopped before the Olympics for fear of upsetting African athletes, but reemerged in force in 2003 with the Bubble Sisters.