Educational Perspectives of Unpacking Racial Representations in Picturebooks about Korean Immigrant Children

Abstract

This study explores racial representations in picturebooks about newly arrived Korean immigrant children in the U.S. The study, framed within critical pedagogy, deals with visual images in the stories, focusing on Korean immigrant child protagonists’ identity construction particularly in the U.S. school context. Utilizing critical content analysis as a methodological tool for analyzing visual images in the picturebooks, the study questions racial positioning of Korean and/or Asian peers surrounding the Korean immigrant children’s socialization and their identity construction in the stories. From a critical perspective, the study unravels the lack of diverse racial representations, pointing out that Whiteness and White saviorism are implicitly embedded in the racial positioning of Korean immigrant children. Based on the findings of this analysis, the paper calls for language and/or culture educators to be sufficiently equipped with a critical pedagogical approach to the issues of challenging White normality and internalized oppression in the U.S. so that they can provide students with a space to become multi-cultural democratic citizens in the future. (Hankuk University of Foreign Studies)