Koreans

Koreans

ETHNONYM: Koryo

Orientation

Identification. Koreans living in the former Soviet Union have traditionally identified themselves either as Koryo Saram (people who came during the Koryo dynasty, a.d. 932-1392) or as Chosun Saram (people from Chosun, an ancient name for Korea meaning "Land of the Morning Calm"). But the name "Sovetskii Koreets" (a Soviet Korean) has become widely used since the 1960s. This identification allows for a distinction to be made between the Koreans of the czarist and Soviet eras.

Location. Worldwide, approximately five million Koreans live outside Korea today. The largest number, 1,800,000, live in China; 700,000 live in Japan; 1,000,000 in the United States, and 500,000 in the former Soviet Union. Unlike Koreans in China, however, the Koreans in the Soviet Union never formed an autonomous regional political unit. Two-thirds of Soviet Koreans are settled in Kazakhstan and the other Central Asian republics of Turkemenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikstan, and Kyrgyzstan. The whole area stretches north to south from the Aral-Irtysh watershed to the Soviet-Iranian and Soviet-Afghan borders, and west to east, from the Caspian Sea to the Sino-Soviet frontier. The largest numbers of Koreans are concentrated in Uzbekistan, living on kolkhozy and sovkhozy with other nationalities. The climate of Central Asia is characterized by extremely hot summers and freezing winters but is pleasant during spring and fall.

Demography. In the 1989 Soviet census Koreans are listed as one of nine ethnic groups numbering more than 400,000. The Soviet Koreans numbered 439,000, ranking 28th in population of the 130 enumerated ethnic minorities of the USSR. In 1959 Koreans in Central Asia numbered 213,000 and in 1970 the numbers had increased to 250,568.

Linguistic Affiliation. Soviet Koreans speak the Korean language. Its affiliation with other languages is a subject of linguistic dispute. The 1989 census data show that 49.4 percent listed the Korean language as their native language. Nearly half of the total Korean population in the former USSR speaks Russian as their second language.

History and Cultural Relations

The history of the Korean immigrants can be divided into two distinct periods involving two very different locales: Koreans in the Far East Region (South Ussuri Maritime Province) from the 1860s until the time of the mass relocation, and Koreans in Kazakhstan and Central Asia from 1937 to the present.

In 1860, during the czarist era, the Russian Empire acquired the virtually uninhabited lands of the Far East Region—910,000 square kilometers of territory with only about 15,000 inhabitants—from China under the terms of the Treaty of Peking. The newly secured boundary placed Russia at the back door of Korea. Koreans provided cheap labor for this sparsely inhabited land, working as tenants, lessees, and farm laborers. Those without any means of support were sent by the local Russian administration to various parts of the region. The first large Korean village, Blagoslovennoe, was formed in 1872 as a result of such relocation.

In 1888 Russia made an agreement with Korea that gave Russian citizenship to Koreans who had crossed the border before 25 June 1884. This accounted for about 20 to 30 percent of all Koreans in Russia, most of whom later became merchants or contractors. In 1893 the regional governor general, Dukhovskoi, began accepting Koreans as citizens, allocating some land for them in order to colonise sparsely settled areas. After the annexation of Korea by Japan in 1910 and the unsuccessful uprising of 1 March 1919, Koreans fled to Russia for political reasons. The last major wave of immigration occurred between 1917 and 1923, with the majority of these new arrivals settling in the Maritime Province. The 1923 census counted 34,559 Koreans as Russian subjects and 72,258 as noncitizen residents.

Acceptance of Russian Orthodox Christianity was a prerequisite for naturalization, and citizenship was required to gain the right to receive an allotment of land. But this attempt to assimilate Koreans into the Russian social order did not succeed. Instead, the continuing flow of Koreans and the clustering of new arrivals brought about the formation of Korean villages, as those who came first paved the way for relatives and friends. This growth served to reinforce Korean culture and values within the Korean Community.

The October Revolution was welcomed by many landless Koreans as an opportunity to make progress on or settle the land question. In 1900 Korean workers had joined Russians in a strike in the Amur region and later participated in the Revolution of 1905-1907. In October 1917 Korean peasants formed Red Army detachments and actively participated in partisan activities, fighting alongside Russian units. The Revolution did not immediately improve their lot, however. It was only after 1923 that the new Soviet regime began to regulate the distribution of land among the peasants. By 1926, in Vladivostok alone, 10,007 Korean families had acquired property, whereas before the Revolution the number of households with land had totaled only 2,290. In fact, by 1926 a majority of the Koreans who had settled in the Soviet Far East had received Soviet citizenship. The hard work and effort by the early Korean settlers went unrewarded, however, when in 1937, under Joseph Stalin, all 182,000 Koreans in the area were ordered to relocate to Central Asia. Stalin reportedly did not trust the Koreans living near the border area and believed they would be used as agents for espionage by the Japanese after Japan's invasion of Manchuria.

It took three months, from September to December 1937, to relocate Korean families on freight trains from the Far East to Central Asia. Thousands perished on the way, but some survived the ordeal of being forcibly transplanted thousands of miles from their original homeland to a territory totally alien to them. They became the pioneers of this virgin land and once again had to begin cultivating undeveloped territory. A number of exemplary collective and state farms were organized and run by Koreans. Many of them also participated in and perished during World War II in the defense against Nazi Germany.

Today's Soviet Koreans, many of whom are doctors, professors, lawyers, agronomists, and other professionals, are the descendants of these "punished, silent" people who have survived.

Settlements

The first thirteen Korean families came to the South Ussuri region in 1863 and settled along the Tizinkhe River in search of work. In 1869 the first mass immigration took place as 4,500 Koreans moved into the region as a result of a poor harvest and the famine that followed in Korea's northern province of Ham Kyung. Korean immigration to the Soviet Union is characterized by the multiplication pattern that produces "chain settlements."

Those who survived the mass relocation lived in compact groups in an enclosed boundary for nearly two decades, mostly in Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. In addition, there are a substantial number of Korean residents in the Caucasus and Ukraine. They organized collective farms: in the Tashkent region, Politotdel under Kim Suk Bon (1890-1969); Poliarnaia Zvezda under Kim Byung Wha (1905-1974); Pravda and Leninskii Put' in the Kzyl-Orda region; the IIIrd International and Avangard, headed by Choi Kwon Hak, in the Tselinograd region; and 18 let Kazakhstana under Kang Tae Han. In 1957 the first state farm, Raushan, was established in the Kungradsk region of Uzbekistan. It was modeled on the Korean collective farms. Only since the time of Khrushchev have Koreans enjoyed freedom of mobility and been able to leave the area of forced settlement. In 1959 more than 70 percent of the Koreans in Soviet Central Asia lived in rural areas, but by 1970 the census data show that 59.5 percent lived in cities. In 1970, 58 percent of the Koreans in Uzbekistan lived in cities, in contrast to 20 percent in 1959. City dwellers accounted for 64 percent in Kirghizia, 89 percent in Tajikistan, and 71 percent in Turkmenia.

Economy

The Soviet Koreans have managed to establish themselves economically in spite of the obstacles they have encountered. Initially, Korean immigrants consisted mostly of peasants and laborers who performed cheap farm labor. Koreans in the Far East region engaged in various types of hard labor including cultivating different kinds of crops, fishing, silkworm breeding, and mining. Rice was sown for the first time in 1917 in the Maritime Province by Koreans who had brought the seeds from Korea. Koreans were successful rice growers and rice production grew rapidly. A sizable settlement of Koreans in the 1930s made an important contribution to agricultural development in the Russian Far East Region (Ussuri-Khanka plain) by struggling on lands previously thought to be unsuitable for farming.

Koreans victimized by Stalin had to rebuild their lives with their bare hands once again. They transformed the virgin soil into tsvetusushchii gorodok (a blossoming city), and many were awarded the title Hero of Socialist Labor, including Kim Byung Wha and Kim Man Sam, for their efficiency and productivity on collective farms. On these collective farms Koreans engaged in cultivating rice on previously barren land as well as growing cotton, maize, sugar beets, vegetables, and fiber crops. They also acquired a knowledge of animal husbandry from the local inhabitants.

In Uzbekistan there are more than 100 ethnic Korean farmers who have been honored as heroes of Socialist labor. The hard labor of Koreans systematically increased the income for the collective fund, which made possible the establishment of schools, hospitals, restaurants, libraries, sport teams, and cultural activities within their community.

Kinship, Marriage, and Family

The Koreans living in the villages rarely marry non-Koreans; in the cities mixed marriages among the educated younger generation occur more frequently. Most often, a Korean man marries a Russian woman. The Koreans living in the villages are still endogamous, and the Korean custom of prohibiting marriage between two persons from the same clan is also strictly observed. Marriage is monogamous; couples traditionally had numerous children, usually three to nine, although recently the younger Soviet Koreans limit their offspring to one or two.

As in Korea, family names often precede given names, and many women keep their maiden names even after marriage. Third-and fourth-generation Koreans, however, now follow the Russian practice of taking the father's name as a middle name.

The Confucian worldview, emphasizing respect for the hierarchal order determined by patriarchy, is maintained at home, especially among the older generation.

Sociopolitical Organization

As members of the Soviet republic, Koreans chose to join the Pioneer group, Komsomol (the Young Community party), and the party organization to gain access into the Soviet society. The Soviet Korean intellectuals were active participants in the Communist party apparatus. A higher level of education, fluency in the Russian language, and greater representation in nonagricultural occupations allowed Soviet Koreans to become eligible for party membership. It was reported that nearly 30 percent of Koreans living in the Tashkent region belonged to the party. The high ratio of party membership is indicative of their efforts to participate in the Soviet political system. Yet actual political representation for Koreans was relatively low compared with other ethnic minorities. Only one ethnic Korean served on the Supreme Soviet and two as people's deputies.

The sweeping changes of perestroika and glasnost influenced all aspects of life in the Soviet Union. Korean cultural centers have been newly established in various cities where Koreans live in large numbers: Tashkent and Samarkand in Uzbekistan, Kharkov in Ukraine, Nalchigo in Georgia, and Chimkent and Alma-Ata in Kazakhstan. In May 1990 the National Korean Cultural Association of Soviet Koreans was formed with attendance of 300 Soviet Koreans from all parts of the USSR. Its newly elected chair, Professor Mikhail Pak of Moscow State University, considers the revival of Korean culture to be its highest-priority task.

Religion and Expressive Culture

Religious Beliefe and Practices. Koreans who settled in the Soviet Far East and were later deported to Central Asia came at the end of the Cho-Sun dynasty, with a 500-year history guided by Confucianism. During the czarist period a number of Koreans accepted Orthodox Christianity. The majority of "landless" Koreans, on the other hand, hailed the October Revolution, denouncing Orthodoxy. Most Koreans in Central Asia are atheists.

Korean shamanism is mixed with Confucian and Buddhist beliefs; superstitions are common in rural areas. Among elderly people some elements of shamanism and Confucian traditions of ancestor worship still remain. In celebration of Hwan-Gap, one's 60th birthday, young people bow to their parents, wishing them long life. On Han-Sik day, rites for the ancestors are observed—the whole family visits the tombs of its ancestors to pay them respect. Funeral services were traditionally performed with complex rituals, but now they have been simplified and have lost any religious significance except for respect for the elders. There is an old custom in celebration of a child's first birthday, called dol. At the party the child is seated before a table, on which are displayed objects such as a book, a pair of scissors, thread, or money. The child's fate will be determined by what she or he picks. For example, the child who picks up a book will become a scholar. On the table at a wedding ceremony is placed a cock cooked with a red pepper inserted in its beak as a token of love and decorated with blue or red threads as symbols of long life. Korean cultural traditions and customs are being preserved through the efforts of older Soviet Korean intellectuals, who are concerned about their gradual disappearance in the course of urbanization and modernization.

Arts. Lenin Kichi (the Banner of Lenin), a newspaper in Korean published in Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan, is the most important source of information on the changing aspects of Soviet Korean cultural life. The historic Korean Theater, which was formed in Vladivostok in 1932, is being operated in Alma-Ata with performances of such Korean classical plays as Chun Hyang Jun and Shim Chyng Jyn. The founding of the Korean Theater contributed to the wide use of the Korean literary language and to the promotion of Korean traditional culture. Korean-language radio broadcasts are aired three times a week in Alma-Ata. About fifty Soviet Korean writers and poets, some of whom are members of the Soviet Writers' Union, write in Korean and are being printed in Tashkent, Alma-Ata, Kzyl-Orda, and Sakhalin. The Zhazushy publishing house in Alma-Ata published annually one book in Korean: Haibaragy (The Sunflower, 1982), Hangboky Norai (The Song of Happiness, 1983 by Yon Song-Yong), Soom (The Breath, 1985 by Kim Joom), Ssak (The Sprout, 1986 by Kim Kwang Hyun), and a novel by Kim Chul. Many Soviet Korean writers manage to publish their work in the literary section of Lenin Kichi. Anatoly Kim, a third-generation Soviet Korean and the popular author of the novel Squirrel and other works, writes in Russian. He can be characterized as a symbolic representative of successful Soviet Korean descendants after half a century of suffering and endurance as he strives in search of an image of a future human being, an embodiment of human goodness.

Bibliography

Kho, Songmoo (1989). Koreans in Soviet OCentral Asia. Helsinki: Finnish Oriental Society.

Suh, D. S. (1987). Koreans in the Soviet Union. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.

Volodina, L. M. (1981). Bibliografiia Korei, 1917-1970 (Korean bibliography, 1917-1970). Moscow: Institut Vostokovedeniia.

CHEY YOUN-CHA SHIN