Eunhae Han’s Reviews > Koreatown Dreaming: Stories & Portraits of Korean Immigrant Life > Status Update

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Tereza Lee, an undocumented pianist and music student from Chicago, inspired the DREAM Act. In the late 1990s, her quest to attend a music conservatory prompted her church to contact Senator Dick Durbin, who then drafted a personal bill in 2001 that evolved into the broader Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act.

Korean immigrants had been narrowly focused on their own survival before, the shared suffering of the community and lack of support from the state made Korean Americans realize how important it was to become politically active.

Koreans began to identify themselves as Korean Americans after the riots, according to the scholar Edward Chang. Within a matter of days, more than thirty thousand Korean Americans in Los Angeles came together for a peace march that is said to be the largest gathering of Asian Americans in all of Asian American history. The march highlighted Korean Americans' desire for solidarity with Black and Latino Americans

When looters came, police offered no support. Store owners dialed 911 every 5 minutes and received no response… owners failing in tears over the dissipation of their life savings .. 2300 mom and pop shops damaged, close to 400 million in damages

Korean communities operated rotating pooled money investment schemes, known as kye, to allow participating family members to accumulate enough capital to buy or start a small business. Each participating member would contribute a sum of money to a pool at various intervals, taking turns to use the pot of capital to pursue their entrepreneurial endeavors. Through personal funds and investment schemes like

the fact that many third-wave immigrants were highly skilled professionals back home, upwards of 70 percent could not practice their profession in the United States because of a lack of proficiency in the English language and conflicting licensing systems.

Through extensive lobbying from the Korean community, mayor Tom Bradley was persuaded to put up Koreatown signs for the first time in 1982. Koreatown was officially designated between 8th and 11th Streets from north to south, and Western

KOREATOWN LOS ANGELES
Many Koreans arrived in Los Angeles in the
'70s and '80s and found low-cost housing in the Mid-Wilshire area. The Watts riots in 1965 led to white flight from a once-affluent area. Their exit allowed many non-white low-income residents to move. people like Hi Duk Lee, who envisioned Koreatown as a hub for the Korean diaspora to gather, many businesses sprung up. Lee opened Olympic Market in 1971

Third wave 1965 to now spurred by the immigration and nationality act of 1965. 1985 to 1987, 35k immigrated annually

Often the only Korean or minority in their area, these women faced culture shock and isolation, and meanwhile had to navigate the pressures of being the perfect American wife. "Bride schools" existed to teach them how to assimilate to American culture, with lessons on etiquette, cooking, and customs.