On the move for love : migrant entertainers and the U.S. military in South Korea

Resource Information

The work On the move for love : migrant entertainers and the U.S. military in South Korea represents a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in University of Missouri Libraries. This resource is a combination of several types including: Work, Language Material, Books.

Label

On the move for love : migrant entertainers and the U.S. military in South Korea

Title remainder

migrant entertainers and the U.S. military in South Korea

Statement of responsibility

Sealing Cheng

Creator

• Cheng, Sealing

Subject

• Military bases, American -- Social aspects -- Korea (South)
• Prostitution -- Korea (South)
• Foreign workers, Filipino -- Korea (South)
• Women foreign workers -- Korea (South)
• Women -- Philippines

Language

eng

Summary

"Since the Korean War, gijichon - U.S. military camp towns - have been fixtures in South Korea. The most popular entertainment venues in gijichon are clubs, attracting military clientele with duty-free alcohol, music, shows, and women entertainers. In the 1990s, South Korea's rapid economic advancement, combined with the stigma and low pay attached to this work, led to a shortage of Korean women willing to serve American soldiers. Club owners brought in cheap labor, predominantly from the Philippines and ex-Soviet states, to fill the vacancies left by Korean women. The increasing presence of foreign workers has precipitated new conversations about modernity, nationalism, ethnicity, and human rights in South Korea. International NGOs, feminists, and media reports have identified women migrant entertainers as "victims of sex trafficking," insisting that their plight is one of forced prostitution." "Are women who travel to work in such clubs victims of trafficking, sex slaves, or simply migrant women? How do these women understand their own experiences? Is anti-trafficking activism helpful in protecting them? In On the Move for Love, Sealing Cheng attempts to answer these questions by following the lives of migrant Filipina entertainers working in various gijichon clubs. Focusing on their aspirations for love and a better future, Cheng's ethnography illuminates the complex relationships these women form with their employers, customer-boyfriends, and families. She offers an insightful critique of anti-trafficking discourses, pointing to the inadequacy of recognizing women only as victims and ignoring their agency and aspirations, Cheng analyzes the women's experience in South Korea in relation to their subsequent journeys to other countries, providing a diachronic look at the way migrant issues of work, sex, and love fit within the larger context of transnationalism, identity, and global hierarchies of inequality."--Jacket

Member of

• Pennsylvania studies in human rights

Cataloging source

DLC

Dewey number

306.74/208995705195

Illustrations

• illustrations
• maps

Index

index present

LC call number

HQ248.A5

LC item number

C54 2010

Literary form

non fiction

Nature of contents

bibliography

Series statement

Pennsylvania studies in human rights