Karen Jiyun Sung

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About Work

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The margin between cultural appreciation and cultural
appropriation: Korea as a case study

Don’t try to do anything; all I ask of you is listen.
Cultural appropriation is defined when “members of a dominant culture adopt
elements from disadvantaged minority cultures.” As the definition suggests, it is often
associated with white racial groups for their historical dominance of The East. In modern
society, specifically within the digital realm, it is the descendants of white colonialists who
are hunted, identified, and accused of their disrespectful and often ignorant use of symbols
from cultures they have suppressed and destroyed. In fact, cultural appropriation is not a
new phenomenon, only more exposed with the aid of the internet. Using aspects of a culture
that the audience is unfamiliar with is an easy method for entertainers to provoke awe. The
modern notion of a circus by Philip Astley’s from 1768 centred around bringing exotic
persons and animals to entertain the ignorant audience with the illusion that they are
immersing in another culture by observing a choreography from a group of exploited people.
Cultural appropriation did not emerge; it simply became bad.
As a transnational immigrant within Asian racial group, however, specific targeting of
Euro-Americans neglects the range of appropriation that happens outside the West. While
modern accusations of cultural appropriation and the subsequent discussion around ‘what is
cultural appropriation versus appreciation’ is centred around post-colonialist Caucasians, the
bigger notion of cultural misrepresentation and exploitation is not a European invention, and
the struggle for justice happens in all parts of the world.
A prominent yet misguided argument from those accused of cultural appropriation is
that by highlighting certain aspects of an exotic culture helps to bring the said culture to
‘mainstream’ and opens venues for further appreciation. The first misconception of such
argument is a gross underestimation of the depth of culture the exploitee wishes to
represent. The popularity of a culture does not exemplify the extent of their history, people,
struggle and achievement. The second misconception of the argument is an unproven
notion that minority cultures are feeble. This applies to the accusee, often also of the white
racial group, who feel the need to fight on behalf of the misrepresented. While it is grateful to
have allies who sympathise, it is another to be placed on the victim’s chair, unallowed to
speak while the representer delivers the case as if they are responsible for undoing their
colonial past. The Korean War became a battleground between Communism and Capitalism
of the Soviet Union and the United States, with allied countries jumping in to ‘save their
beliefs.’ Then, when the war broke up, it was the male white representatives of the Soviet
Union and the United States who literally ‘drew a line’ in the middle of an independent
country to ‘aid in ending the war.’ To call the battle between the Soviet Union and the United
States a ‘Cold War’ is a misrepresentation: they had their war on someone else’s land, killing
someone else’s culture. And for them to assume that Asian minorities such as Korean called
for any kind of help is a foul misassumption of the Euro-American self-importance. Minorities
are not ignorant or feeble, regardless of their English proficiency. To act on behalf of a
culture with an assumption that they wanted, more unjustly needed, such help is yet another

form of cultural appropriation. In the end, such unempathetic press for justice that their
culture has committed in the first place feels nothing but patronisation that makes the
accusee feel good without having any measurable achievement for the appropriated.
Governance does not equate to empowerment.
Thus the modern notion of cultural appreciation is only an illusion for the exploitee to
avoid justified persecutions, and in reality, such kind of emphasis of a culture isolated from
its vast context is appropriation. A desire to learn more about a culture is not harmful; it is
harmful when a visitor shuns their own culture in order to cleanse or replace their own
identity with what they think is a ‘better option’ for who they wish to be. Such an act only
reemphasises the power relation from one country to another, from the dominant to the
repressed, and becomes nothing but another form of identity theft. A true appreciation can
occur in the form of cultural exchange, and such mutual cross-pollination is key to the
growing cultural transnationalism. In fact, very few cultures have stood alone in its
development. No culture needs representation or appreciation; it needs respect.
When the notion of culture is put on a pedestal, being represented a struggle or a set
of beliefs from people who have never experienced or inherited such events, becomes an
appropriation. The digital platform has paradoxically aided individuals to showcase their
ignorance of foreign cultures whilst being so constantly exposed to what is different, cool,
and pretty. It can be argued that it is then the corporations’ search for more provocation to
make more profit that drives more appropriation. Then, in turn, consumers should be warier
of what their decisions invoke and take beneficial actions not to feature someone else’s
culture but to empower the said persons to be more proud of their heritage.