Volume 2, Issue 1 November 2021, pp. 4–16 
Regular Articles
Collaborative witnessing: A North Korean’s immigration experience in South Korea
Amy Hutchinson 
1
1 College of Southern Nevada, USA 
DOI: https://doi.org/10.29140/mle.v2n1.482
Abstract
Collaborative witnessing is a form of “relational autoethnography” that allows interviews to be more informal and resembles a conversation rather than a structured question and answer format. Collaborative witnessing is the methodology utilized in this article, which is about the personal history of one North Korean defector, JeongOk Lee, who escaped to China twice and came to South Korea in 2004. Media and society refer to them as “North Korean defectors.” In this article, JeongOk shares her experience living in foreign countries through the stories and through three years of interviews. JeongOk provides stories and experiences in North Korea and South Korea. The conversations will reveal the hardships JeongOk experienced working in both North and South Korea. JeongOk experienced difficulties in language and work culture. Her experience resembles what many immigrants face when moving to a new country. These North Korean defectors, or refugees, should be viewed as immigrants through a multicultural lens rather than to focus on the controversial or political issues that arise when discussing North Korean refugees. North Korean refugees struggle to acclimate to South Korea’s culture, language, politics, lifestyle, and capitalist society. As a result, North Korea defectors feel alienated and isolated in South Korean society which makes it more difficult to build relationships. Viewing North Korean people through a multicultural lens could help promote better integration in South Korean society. For South Koreans to be more accepting and understanding of North Korean refugees, they must understand the hardships that North Korean refugees face.
Copyright
© Amy Hutchinson
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Suggested citation
Hutchinson, A. (2021). Collaborative witnessing: A North Korean’s immigration experience in South Korea. Migration and Language Education , 2(1), 4–16. https://doi.org/10.29140/mle.v2n1.482
Related Articles:
Promoting acts of kindness on campus: Views of Chinese international students in the UK
Ming Cheng, Olalekan Adekola
Intercultural Communication Education Published: 30 April, 2022, Volume 5(1), 17–32. 
Tasks, self-efficacy, and L2 motivational self system in an online emergency EFL speaking class: A mixed-methods study
Nguyễn Nhật Quang, Phạm Nhật Linh, Nguyễn Thị Thu Hiền
The JALT CALL Journal Published: 2 April, 2022, Volume 18(1), 1–33.
Implementing backward design to foster intercultural communicative competence in textbook-based curricula: A proposed framework for English language practitioners
Hiba B. Ibrahim
Intercultural Communication Education Published: 30 April, 2022, Volume 5(1), 1–16.
Challenges and responses: A Complex Dynamic Systems approach to exploring language teacher agency in a blended classroom
Grace Yue Qi, Yuping Wang
The JALT CALL Journal Published: 9 April, 2022, Volume 18(1), 54–82.
The effects of corpus use on learning L2 collocations
Yoshiho Satake
The JALT CALL Journal Published: 9 April, 2022, Volume 18(1), 34–53.
Captions and learnability factors in learning grammar from audio-visual input
Anastasia Pattemore, Carmen Muñoz
The JALT CALL Journal Published: 9 April, 2022, Volume 18(1), 83–109.
Chinese language learners evaluating machine translation accuracy
Li-Ching Chang
The JALT CALL Journal Published: 9 April, 2022, Volume 18(1), 110–136.
Statistical analysis of the impact of the e-learning platform Furago on French learners’ listening skills
Albéric Derible, Éric Wiel
The JALT CALL Journal Published: 9 April, 2022, Volume 18(1), 137–161.
Work integrated language learning: Boundary crossing, connectivity, and L2 affordances
Linda Febring, Alastair Henry
Migration and Language Education Published: 29 April, 2022, Volume 3(1), 1–22.
The role of literature in intercultural language education
Melina Porto, Michalinos Zembylas
Intercultural Communication Education Published: 10 December, 2022, Volume 5(3), 86–104.