What Koreatown Looks Like Across the US

08.12.2023 - 13:29 / cntraveler.com

This story about Koreatowns is part of Home, Made, a collection of stories honoring Asian diasporas creating vibrant communities by weaving their heritages with their American hometowns. Read more here.

As a Korean third-culture kid growing up in Singapore, I looked to my home country for a sense of my identity. I tried to keep up with the latest trends in music, culture, and food, but always felt one step behind. Then, when I moved to New York for college, I had to learn what it meant to be “American” for the first time. Sure, I’d grown up under the influence of American media, but I was constantly missing pop culture references, and using unfamiliar colloquialisms that invited blank stares. I simultaneously dreaded and celebrated this difference, but constantly tried to conform to a Korean American identity.

In third-culture kid research, there’s a concept called “cultural homelessness,” born out of a constantly changing environment. I felt that acutely throughout my life, but in New York, I created a home of sorts, furnishing it with close friends, intellectual ideas, creative endeavors, and other ties that kept me tethered to the city. When I had to abandon that once more to move to Los Angeles to pursue a career in film, it felt like starting from scratch.

The pandemic move to LA was a struggle. It was difficult to form a community in a time of isolation. Amidst the tumult, Koreatown presented itself as a reprieve from the disconnect I felt with a new city. The conversations I shared—and the photographs I made with small business owners—proved the common cultural identity we shared as people from a similar origin. As they shared their stories, served me fruit, and fed me, I felt the same nourishment I felt while growing up with my family. 

Koreatown became a spiritual home for me. Its very existence, in the heart of Los Angeles—as well as the existence of Koreatowns all over the country—serves to anchor the wandering souls of the many Korean diasporic people in this nation. Below, I’m sharing excerpts from my book Koreatown Dreaming: Stories & Portraits of Korean Immigrant Life that, I hope, explore the breadth of Korean American experiences in the United States through the portraits and stories of everyday Koreans.

In a time when attitudes towards the AAPI community can rapidly turn based on rhetoric by political leaders, Koreatowns remind us that there are safe spaces where we can take refuge, and nourish our bonds with each other. —Emanuel Hahn

Ms. Chon started Music Plaza in 1992 to bring Korean music to a community that missed home.

When Ms. Chon first arrived in Los Angeles in 1986, she wasn’t impressed. She thought the area was underdeveloped and that America was slow to catch up to the rest