Oakland: University of California Press, 2022. viii, 211 pp. (Graphs, maps, B&W photos.) US$30.00, paper; US$30.00, ebook. ISBN 9780520384248.
This monograph illustrates the articulated nexus between geopolitics and individuals, reflecting the characteristics of contemporary critical geopolitics. Belonging in a House Divided demonstrates how macro-level power penetrates micro-level lives in complicated ways. The research discusses the various forms of violence experienced by North Koreans who left North Korea, settled in China or other countries, and eventually came to South Korea.
Author Joowon Park’s diverse background—leaving South Korea at a young age, growing up in Kenya, attending college in the US and serving in the South Korean military—enriches the autoethnography method used to study North Koreans in South Korea. This positionality enables readers to view these North Korean defectors’ stories from a transnational perspective, distinct from the perspectives of the host community in South Korea or the often monolithic views presented by Western scholars and journalists on North Korea.
The key themes explored in this work are violence, citizenship, and belongingness. While previous studies commonly associated violence with North Koreans’ lives in North Korea and their escape, this book sheds light on the often invisible violence that emerges during the North Korean embodiment of South Korean citizenship. It deeply explores the violent experiences of the consequences of separated families due to the division of Korea, continuous inspections and suspicions, phenotypical normalization, and North Korean deservingness.
The argument posits that the violent processes of belonging, becoming, and self-making during the settlement of North Koreans to South Korea contribute to further theorizing the concept of citizenship in relation to violence and global debates on refugee resettlement. Despite South Korean constitutional law identifying North Koreans as South Korean citizens upon entry, the book argues that their struggle is not solely about legal status and rights claims but also about their embeddedness within the overlapping layers of violence that constitute citizenship.
The book is organized as follows: chapter 1, “Enduring Legacies of Division and War,” provides rich information on the historical background of the Korean War and the division of Korea. Chapter 2, “The Chinese Dimension of North Korean Migration,” discusses the gendered migration of North Koreans as a pull factor and a midway point to South Korea, emphasizing the significance of their stay in China for their mobility and settlement. Chapters 3, 4, and 5 focus on settling in South Korea, highlighting discrimination, assimilation pressure, and the role of migrants as economic agents for their societies of origin. These chapters differentiate North Koreans in South Korea from other migrants and explore the particular pressures and opportunities faced by people of the same ethnic background.
Chapter 3, “The Body and the Violence of Phenotypical Normalization,” delves into the assimilation pressure faced by people of the same ethnic background, particularly discussing how the North Korean famine has not only resulted in the loss of life but also altered survivors’ bodies. This chapter emphasizes how malnourished North Korean bodies are subject to phenotypical normalization, which is also combined with South Korea’s reputation for plastic surgery.
Chapter 4, “Remittances and Transborder Kinship,” discusses how North Koreans send remittances to North Korea despite institutional barriers, illustrating their “absent presence” through remitting. Brokerage systems developed throughout East Asia and telecommunication technology have made remittances to North Korea possible. These actions allow North Koreans to maintain citizenship ties to North Korea even after becoming South Korean citizens. At the same time, the author argues, these ties create demands, burdens, and obligations that are embodied violently.
Chapter 5, “Constructing North Korean Deservingness,” examines how South Korean and international societies portray North Koreans as victims, shaping the situation as a humanitarian issue. The chapter argues that this construction depoliticizes North Korea and frames North Koreans as exceptions deserving of financial and social support. The conclusion questions the notion of belonging within a “house,” asserting that invisible violence persists and is enforced through the very incommunicability of violence in the Korean language.
This monograph contributes significantly to various fields of knowledge, including Korean Studies, anthropology, geography, and migrant studies. Previous academic and journalistic works have predominantly focused on a human rights discourse, which has often faced criticism for generalizing and victimizing. In recent years, increased attention has been paid to the representation of North Korean women’s agency, critiquing perceptions of North Korean women as passive victims.
Research has succeeded in linking North Korean gendered migration to the geopolitical situation, such as highlighting the gendered division of labour between the public and private spheres as an enabling factor of women’s participation in informal economy. This illustrates how North Korean women have become new breadwinners in the transitional economy, which has affected the growth of their economic activities. The book effectively describes how China’s biopolitics has been a significant pull factor for North Korean women towards rural areas in China. It also discusses how, due to the imbalance in the male-to-female ratio resulting from sex-selective abortions under China’s one-child policy, Joseonjok and Han Chinese men use brokers to traffic women. Even after the end of the one-child policy in 2015, the policy’s consequences continue to influence relationship dynamics and marriage patterns. The subjects exhibited agency by rejecting potential husbands and choosing their partners, even in the context of arranged marriages. Most importantly, these marriages provided security for North Korean women, for whom the fear of arrest and deportation was a critical concern, leading them to view China, rather than North Korea, as a place devoid of freedom. These points are more puzzling than the black and white criticisms of marriage trafficking.
This book effectively challenges the monolithic discourse on North Korean violence and provides a more nuanced understanding of North Koreans’ resettlement experiences in South Korea. It critiques the portrayal of North Korea as evil, while South Korea is presented as a dream destination. The book argues that, in addition to their escape and stay in China, citizenship for resettled North Koreans involves another violent process of becoming South Koreans through self-making. The legacies of national division and the unresolved war continue to permeate the lives of individuals across time and space.
HaeRan Shin
Seoul National University, Seoul