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Volume 39, 2018 - Issue 5: Discrepant Knowledge and InterAsian Mobilities – Unlikely Movements, Uncertain Futures

Aspirations, ambivalence, and performances: the hyphenated identities of Indonesian worker-students in South Korea

Suray Nugrohoa , Younghan Chob and Francis L. Collinsc

Faculty of Cultural Sciences, Universitas Gadjah Mada (Yogyakarta), Yogyakarta, Indonesia; b Graduate School of International and Area Studies, Department of Korean Studies, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, Seoul, South Korea; c School of Environment, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand

ABSTRACT

 This paper explores the lives of Indonesian migrant workers undertaking study through the Indonesia Open University in South Korea. Drawing on interviews, participant observation, and social media, the paper explores the rationales, experiences, and identity performances of these worker-students, placing emphasis on how these individuals challenge their socially constructed position as migrant workers. In doing so, the paper extends scholarship on the significance of migration in Asia and the way this is tied to the differential valuing of migrants, as low or highskilled and workers or students. We draw particular attention to the transformative potential of migration but also the ways in which changes in subject position are negotiated in relation to existing social structures and identity positions. In the context of the focus on discrepant knowledge mobility, then, the paper shows how boundaries between types of migration are blurred through their connection with knowledge and the making of unexpected Inter-Asian connections.

KEYWORDS

Migration; migrant workers; identity; knowledge; Indonesia; South Korea

포부, 양면성, 그리고 퍼포먼스: 한국에서 인도네시아 노동자와 학생의 신분

  이 논문은 한국의 인도네시아 오픈 대학을 통해 연구된 프로젝트로 인도네시아 이주 노동자들의 삶을 탐구한다. 또한 이 논문은 인터뷰, 참여자 관찰 및 소셜 미디어를 활용하여 노동자이자 학생인 이들의 합리성, 경험 및 정체성을 탐구하여 개인이 이주노동자로서 사회적으로 구성된 그들의 위치에 어떻게 도전하는지를 강조한다. 이 같은 행동을 통해 본 논문은 아시아에서의 이주의 중요성과 이것이 저숙련, 고숙련 노동자 또는 학생으로서 이주민들의 차별적 가치평가와 연계되는 방법에 대한 학문적 범위를 확장한다. 우리는 특히 변화되고 있는 이주의 잠재력뿐만 아니라 기존 사회 구조와 정체성의 위치와 관련하여 주체 위치의 변화가 협상되는 방식에 관심을 가진다. 모순된 지식 이동성에 초점을 맞춰 본다면 이 논문은 지식과 예상치 못했던 아시아인 간의 연결을 통해 이주 유형 간의 경계가 어떻게 모호해지는 지를 보여준다. 

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https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01596306.2018.1458417