Light and shade of multicultural education in South Korea

Analysis through Bourdieu’s concept of capital

Bibliographic Data

ID13017285
AuthorsSoo Jung Lee (0000-0002-4717-4871, Korea institute for curriculum and evaluation, corresponding author), Kyung Eun Jahng (0000-0002-7251-7864, Kyung Hee University), Koeun Kim (0000-0002-1678-655X, Sungshin Women's University)
Year2020
Volume14
Issue2
Pages149-161
Publication date2020-04-13
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal for Multicultural Education (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2053-535X • E-ISSN: 2053-5368
PublisherEmerald Publishing Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1108/jme-11-2019-0081
OpenAlexW3019565708
LanguageEN
Citations received7
References cited13

Purpose This paper aims to attend to the issues that remain veiled and excluded in the name of multiculture. Design/methodology/approach This paper problematizes South Korean multicultural education policies through Bourdieu’s concept of capital as a theoretical frame. Findings First, the paper discusses that material wealth is unequally distributed to most of the multicultural families, resulting in their lack of economic capital. Second, it notes that students from multicultural families are deprived of cultural capital, as they are racialized in Korean society. As a strategy used to distinguish and exclude a so-called different minority from the unnamed majority, race enables the possession of cultural capital. Third, insufficient social capital identified with resources emerging from social networks positions students from multicultural families as a perpetual minority. As the accumulation of various forms of capital secures power and privilege (Bourdieu, 1986), multicultural education in its current state would continuously reproduce the existing power dynamics where students from multicultural families are subordinate. Research limitations/implications Given this, policies for multicultural education in South Korea should cover a wide range of issues, including race, class and network and be redesigned to resolve realistic problems that have been hidden under the name of celebration of culture. Originality/value The Korean multicultural education policy has not been analyzed through Bourdieu’s concept of capital. Using a different theoretical viewpoint would be valuable to figure out the problems underlying the policy

Capital (architecture · Cultural capital · Geography · Multicultural education · Multiculturalism · Originality · Pedagogy · Political science · Privilege (computing · Qualitative research · Social capital · Social science · Sociology · Gender Studies · Global Education and Multiculturalism · Law · Psychosocial Factors Impacting Youth · Social and Cultural Dynamics

Tools

Open DOI