A teenager stands in awe at a Goryeo Celadon (고려청자), a collection of pottery from ancient Korea. A testament to the complex history of the nation, this artifact sadly remains off the radar of many art lovers today.
Like many cross-cultural students, I only vaguely learned about my roots. Instead, Western art, music, and history, and the English language fill international school curricula. International school students are Korean by passport, but foreigners by culture.
Korean Studies, an after-school elective designed to catch up on missed educational opportunities, aims to inform local teens about their rich past. “At the end of the day, your identity is Korean, and to actually know the identity of Koreans, learning about culture is crucial. Culture includes history, and this is ultimately global competitiveness,” said DIS Korean Studies teacher Yun Jung Kim.
Yet, with a meager three hours per week, students can only scratch the surface of cultural understanding, especially when compared to public schools. It offers classes such as national history, literature, ethics, and Hanja (traditional characters). “We learned about Kim Hong-do’s ssireum (씨름) painting in school, a piece featuring two men wrestling each other. We were able to connect the piece to history and learn about ancient customs and societies,” Seha Heo, a second-year student from Daeryun Middle School, said.
Domestic schools also take their learning outside their classroom and visit various historically significant locations. “Our school hosted a field trip to the Gaya museum in Gimhae, to provide students an opportunity to learn about Korean traditional culture. We were able to look at ancient pieces from the Three Kingdoms period of Korea. Our school will continue to offer various activities to ensure that students can familiarize themselves with our culture in the future,” Heo said.
In contrast, international schools lack such elements, overlooking students who want to revisit their cultural legacy. While some attempt to incorporate Korean history as much as possible, the U.S. educational framework results in a strong emphasis on Western topics.
To tackle the gradual detachment of international school students from their nation’s culture, the DIS community tries its best to reconnect young minds with their roots through optional classes like Korean Studies.
Still, some claim that the after-school course alone does not suffice as a replacement. “I feel like that’s just not enough time for us to fully learn about Korea’s history and language since it is optional. Sometimes, when I talk to my friends online in Korean, I notice a lot of grammar mistakes and often, it gets really awkward. They end up not even understanding the most fundamental stuff,” freshman Elba Jekal said.
The DIS art department’s recent field trip to the Daegu Art Museum serves as another example. “We saw a few oil paintings from ancient Korea. They were well made, and because it was from old Korean culture, it explained a lot about history and held a lot of meaning,” sophomore Roy Kim said. Still, the museum mostly contained foreign pieces.
My trip to the Gansong museum represents a microcosm of the issue at large. For students who wish to dive deeper into local art history, the Gansong Museum provides an excellent location for a potential visit. Surprisingly, all pieces in the museum were collected by a single person. Jeon Hyeong-pil, born into a wealthy family during Japanese colonization, devoted his life to preserving ancient Korean artifacts. “It is most important to understand what kind of mindset Mr. Jeon Hyeong-pil had in protecting our cultural heritage, represented by the ‘spirit of cultural patriotism,’” Byung In Yoon, Gansong Museum curator, said.
The curator elaborated on the significance of safeguarding Korea’s heritage. “I believe that the culture we preserve today will become a creative inspiration for younger generations and the driving force for creating a new culture. Through this, the younger generation will uncover new, innovative ideas to lead the next generation,” Yoon said.
Besides off-campus elements, efforts within the school are crucial. If DIS starts to promote Korean history through elective classes and informative visits to different exhibitions, students will have the chance to gain a deeper understanding of their identity. Examples include the purchase of instruments such as the Gayageum (가야금), Jang-gu (장구), and Danso (단소) in music classes. An alternative would be to add Korean traditional games such as jaegi-chagi (제기차기) and tu-ho (투호) in P.E. classes. Korean language and history can briefly be addressed in advisory sessions as well. Plenty of online resources such as KBS documentaries provide lessons on history and are easy to access.
The current Korean boom only reminds us of the importance of ethnic background. “K-culture is expanding from music, movies, and drama to literature and classical music, receiving attention from all over the world. When we recognize the beauty and value of our heritage, which is the embodiment of our ancestors’ wisdom and artistry, it will become the driving force behind our new and unique cultural creation,” Yoon said.
