Good Morning America AANHPI Month Feature: Talk To Me In Korean
Combine K-dramas, K-pop, and K-language into one story and you’ve got my attention! Add Talk To Me In Korean and now I’m really hooked. TTMIK is one of the first places I went to when I decided to try to learn Korean. I have their books and listen to their podcasts regularly. I also follow TTMIK on Instagram so when they shared in their stories that Good Morning America had done a feature on them I couldn’t click the link fast enough.
May is AANHPI Month. As in Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander. So in honor of AANHPI Month GMA did this feature on TTMIK. The graphic bug running in the bottom lefthand corner says, “AANHPI Heritage Month.” Cool!
The story starts off with clips of K-dramas, K-movies, and K-pop and then mentions the Korean language boom that’s happening because of the rise in popularity of the aforementioned. Also highlighted is the fact so many are “riding the crest of the Korean wave.” That definitely includes me!
Sun Hyun-woo, a native Korean and the founder and CEO of TTMIK says he started the program in 2009. Hyun-woo learned to speak English primarily on his own without living in an English-speaking country and thought he could help people in other countries learn to speak Korean on their own.
One young woman says she wanted to learn Korean to connect with her family history. Another Korean language learner loves BTS (the most famous band on the globe right now). And when it comes to starting to learn the language we hear Hyun-woo say, “…take it slow, no stress. Remember to continue doing it just because you enjoy it.” while we see a picture of a man studying.
I’m gonna be honest. When the story ended I was saying to myself, “WTF?” I thought this was an AANHPI Month feature. I fired off a DM to my kids saying whoever thought this story had anything to do with AANHPI Month is tone-deaf. This 3-minute-long story did not feature one person from the AANHPI community. That first young woman who wanted to connect with her family history was not Korean American, her great-great aunt was a missionary to Korea, and after the Korean War, her grandparents moved to Korea to help rebuild the country. The second person who loves BTS and has made friends all over the world mentions that learning Korean is a really important facet of her life and likes the challenge—but she’s also not Asian American. And the man we see studying while Hyun-woo talks at the end of the story? Not AANHPI.
Let me first clarify that I LOVE the fact all of these people are learning Korean. I too have made friends from all over the globe who are learning Korean. When I was growing up half the people around me had barely even heard of Korea. Never did my kids or I ever think everything Korean would be on-trend. So I am thrilled to see the country where I was born being recognized and embraced in such positive ways.
But back to the GMA story. As much as I love Korean content one of the things you’ll hear me say over and over— “I should not have to go to Korea to see people who look like me.” Had this story featured Korean Americans who are trying to learn Korean it would not only have been quite poignant but also very educational—something AANHPI Month is supposed to be about. Focusing on AANHPI's history and raising awareness of issues surrounding the community.
Language is one of the things that has caused so many Asian Americans to have internalized racism. To be ashamed and embarrassed by the country where we were born or where our ancestors are from. Asian accents have been weaponized to make fun of Asian Americans. Many Asian immigrants discouraged their kids from speaking their native tongue because they wanted them to fit in and be more accepted in America. Korean adoptees old enough to be fluent in their native language when they were adopted were immersed in American society and told not to speak Korean—and now they can’t remember it. An Asian accent in American movies and TV is the standard way to get a laugh or make an Asian character look like they’re stupid. I’m always amazed that Americans can be so ignorant in assuming the person speaking with an accent is not intelligent. As if the person who speaks a second language (with an accent) is supposedly not as smart as the person who only understands one language (English).
The rest of the graphic banner showing throughout the story says, “Korean Language Boom Quickly Becoming the Country’s Biggest Cultural Export.” Imagine if the story had featured Korean Americans learning a language that has been lost to them. Despite the fact I only heard Korean for the first year of my life, there are zero remnants of it in my brain. The struggle is real. I have a K-Adoptee acquaintance who talks a lot about only realizing in his early 30s the internalized racism and hatred he felt toward himself as he’s just now discovering all the wonderful things about being Korean. I only discovered K-dramas during the pandemic and they changed my life. When I see his posts come through IG I can totally relate—except I’m probably old enough to be his mom—so the time I lost is even more significant.
American media is riding the Korean wave all right. So much so that they’ll offer roles to actors from popular K-dramas and promote K-pop but we’re lucky if we get one or two projects on TV or in the movies featuring Asian Americans. 2023 Oscar winner Ke Huy Quan has told the story over and over this year about how he dropped out of acting for 20 years because there were so few roles. And there’s not one Korean artist who’s mainstream in America despite the fact they’re quite popular in Korea and around the globe: Eric Nam, Jay Park, Woosung (aka Sammy), and Kevin Oh just to name a few. And guess what? They all had to learn to speak Korean when they went over to Korea!
This story in honor of AANHPI Month had nothing to do with the AANHPI community. As I was writing this post I was surprised to find out the story was told by a Korean American journalist. Was that supposed to be the connection? We never saw her on camera, her first and last name are not Korean, and there’s no mention of her being Korean American. I’m hoping it’s a story she just pitched in general and it was some tone-deaf assignment editor or producer who thought it was a good idea to use for AANHPI Month. As a former broadcast journalist myself, I know it had to go through at least a couple of people before it was signed off on for GMA. Representation matters. GMA—and the rest of the American media you MUST do better.
All that said, if you’re interested in learning Korean, TTMIK is a really good place to start. It’s definitely helped me on my journey trying to learn the language of the country where I was born.
Click the photo to see the GMA story
