Abstract
ABSTRACT While high rates of intra-Asian migration have rendered foreign migrants physically “invisible” in the past, migrants of increasingly racially diverse backgrounds have started to enter South Korea in the past decade. Through in-depth interviews with sub-Saharan African migrants, this article examines the effects of colourism on three levels of migrant adaptation: (1) host government legal policies, (2) host societal reception, and (3) resources within the migrant community. Findings reveal that African migrants, compared to their lighter skinned Asian counterparts, are more vulnerable to precarious living conditions regardless of their legal, educational, or occupational backgrounds. In addition, Africans also lack resources in South Korean civil society as well as within the African migrant community, and thus face formidable barriers in collective resistance. Harsh discrimination in everyday life causes many to adopt maladaptive behaviours – resisting linguistic acquisition and adopting a sojourner orientation – triggering a negative feedback loop that exacerbates their oppression.
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