Clothing acculturation of North Korean female defectors in South Korea

Abstract

One of the main topics in acculturation is a reaction of immigrant group to clothing culture of the new society (Berry 1997). Clothing culture of a society is connected to visual tradition and cultural custom (Johnson et al. 2014; Yen and Hsu 2017), so it affects the members' appearance consequently (Jung and Hwang 2016). When immigrants enter into a new society, their appearance-not only physical attributes but also their clothesmakes a distinguishable or sometimes subtle distinction between new settlers and natives. The immigrants' behaviors of selection and compromise between two clothing cultures are related to factors such as aesthetic taste, consumption value, and clothing norms. The purpose of this research is to observe North Korean female defectors' clothing acculturation process in South Korea so that discussion about effective supports for their cultural settlement can be conducted. It is revealed that North Korean defectors typically undergo the acculturation period in South Korea because of cultural differences of two Koreas. Therefore, this research conducts in-depth interviews to investigate the whole clothing acculturation process including the topics like the attitude toward South Korean clothing culture, assimilation pressure, and the ways to adjust South Korean

Dissociative fashion practices and identity conflicts: local resistance as a response to clothing acculturation in the context of rural–urban migration

“…During the interviews, local youngsters emphasized the importance of personal image and aesthetics in defining and conveying an ideal cosmopolitan lifestyle in Guangzhou. For them, fashion sensitivity was a significant symbolic marker that visually distinguished the rural migrants from the local urbanites, who in their view possessed better grasp of the urban clothing culture (Jo and Ha, 2018). The pursuit of beauty and fashion was seen as an effective means to differentiate from the rural migrant consumers in their everyday consumption discourses (Sandıkcı and Ger, 2010).…”

“…Ample body of evidence indicates that consumers express a sense of agency in resisting, negotiating or even juxtaposing cultural meanings in their consumption strategies (choices and practices) to cope with conflicting demands of identity negotiation in the mainstream marketplace hegemony and to maintain a coherent sense of self during acculturation (Sandıkcı and Ger, 2010;Sobh et al, 2012;Tinson and Nuttall, 2010). As clothing is connected to visual traditions and customs that can signify one's ethnicity or cultural identity (Johnson et al, 2014), it is crucial for fashion researchers and practitioners to uncover the inner and outer conflicts interacting groups faced through unpacking their identification logics and Fashion practices and identity conflicts practices such as their clothing norms, aesthetic standards, body image and consumption habits (Jo and Ha, 2018).…”

“…Prior consumer acculturation literature has shed light on immigrants' international border-crossing experiences in negotiating their ethnic affiliations through consumption choices, practices and identity projects in a new cultural environment (Gbadamosi, 2012; Jo and Ha, 2018; Lam et al , 2020). Consumer researchers have recently shifted their attention to the acculturation experiences prompted by internal movement within a country (Veresiu and Geisler, 2018), such as those related to differences in regional affiliation (Dion et al , 2011), domestic tourism (Wang et al , 2019) and rural-to-urban migration (Chu et al ., 2015a).…”