There are officially more than 300,000 foreign employees in Korea. According to unofficial comment, there are one million foreign employees in Korea. During the last fifteen years, they have contributed substantially to Korean economy. When many Korean employers have been troubled with manpower problems, foreign employment can be a kind of solution. But, nowadays employing foreign workers has serious troubles. Sometimes, many foreign workers are suffering under poor circumstances and their human rights being ignored by immoral company owners. There are three important reasons for foreign employees’ suffering.The first reason that makes foreign employees’ lives hard is the natural character of Koreans. They have very exclusive character because they are racially homogeneous. Also, Korea has been attacked historically by many surrounding countries. For this reasons, Koreans are wary of foreigners and cannot open their mind easily. Moreover, they are very shy because they haven’t seen many foreigners in their lives. Therefore, foreign employees feel that Koreans are unkind to them and dislike them.Another reason is cultural differences which Korean society practices. Many foreign employees have to adapt to customs, languages, and foods which are changed. They often make mistakes because Korean customs are very different from their countries. Language problems in the workplace are very dangerous for them. Actually, it causes industrial accidents which can lead them to death. Moreover, hot and spicy Korean foods make them more tired. Consequently, it can be very painful for them to work for a long time in a new environment.The third reason is unfair governmental policies about foreign workers. Many foreign workers haven’t been protected by laws because their position is illegal. There are some legal foreign employees in Korea but they can get only minimum wage which are lower than illegal employees’ wages. Furthermore, they have to go back to their own countries within three years, otherwise they become illegal workers. For this reason, most of them are willing to give up their legal position even though their human rights are infringed by bad employers. However, the Korean government is just overlooking this situation without any solutions.Foreign workers came to Korea for money. However, many of them cannot succeed. Unfortunately, they may fall into debt or even lose their parts of body in accidents, instead. Fifty years ago, many Korean fathers and grandfathers went to abroad to make money. At that time, they were also illegal foreign employees who came from Korea and they felt sad about their social position. Korean people don’t have right to make foreign workers suffer as they did. They, especially politicians, need to think foreign employees like their own. Now is the time to open their mind to the foreign friends.PAGE PAGE 2
Homework Composition #4How did Cyworld influence other events?Several years ago, in Korea, one computer engineer invented a personal Blog Web site which was named Cyworld. It was welcomed by young generations who are generally sensitive to new technologies and it made a big hit. Recently, this company expanded its business overseas and its members exceeded ten millions. Through the success of last 6 years, Cyworld has made many ripple effects on the market of digital camera, music industry, and the communication of young generations.Cyworld caused great changes on digital camera manufacturers. Members of this Web site can individually coordinate their own spaces which Cyworld offers to them. Members purchased digital cameras to upload their pictures and studied to get better pictures. During last 6 years, thousands of digital cameras have been sold in Korea. Also, their periods of buying new cameras were very short, so many digital camera companies made a lot of money in this time. Furthermore, as the consumers get experienced, their complaints about defective products were accumulated. At last, many camera companies competitively found their R & D center in Korea as a test market. Korea became one of the world’s largest digital camera markets now.Cyworld affected music industry which was in a big slump. Music companies had a hard time because of the Internet free downloads. However, they could share profits which are from paid music in the Web site by offering their music. Members of Cyworld can buy and set the songs on their homepages. They don’t even hesitate to buy songs and decorate their homepages although they haven’t bought any music albums for a long time. Cyworld sold great number of songs in the period of their business and this success could be a kind of oasis for the music industry.Cyworld created new communication styles between young generations. When members visit friends’ homepages, they leave their traces by writing a visitor’s book or adding their impressions in photo albums. In the process of these activities, many new ways of talking can be created. Someone who doesn’t know how to use this web site cannot easily participate in this kind of communications. Even nowadays, under the permission of each other, men and women visit his or her home page to get pre-information such as physical appearance before they really meet together.Even though 6 years are short time, Cyworld has greatly affected Korean economy and society, especially young generations. All of three that I explained are positive effects. However, there are some negative effects either. We have to know that excessive individualism, consumption, or addiction can be caused by using this Web site. It depends on Cyworld itself whether it will overcome the threats which it has and succeed or end in a kind of happening.
The right to life is one of the most important values in the world. Of course, most people know this fact. However, abortions occur frequently in this society even though some people insist that it should be banned by the law. They believe abortion is a kind of crime. On the other hand, some people say we should be able to have abortions under exceptional circumstances. Those who support abortion suggest that it should be legal because raped women, unwanted children and young girls are suffering from the prohibition of it.To live as a raped woman is too hard in this society. If a woman was raped by somebody and she got pregnant, what can she do? She doesn’t have any choice except to bear a baby. In this case, most women might lose all hopes of having a normal life because of the fact that they have to give birth to and bring up the child of this foe. This will afflict her throughout her life. Furthermore, she will not have equal chances to get a well paid job compared with other women. Even though there is a society that guarantees social equality, invisibly, inequality still exists.Unwanted children also get hurt from this environment. Children of raped women feel they haven’t been really loved by their parents, especially their fathers. They may not have had any male role model. They think that they are useless because they know the fact that their parents didn’t want their birth. Once they begin to think that they should have been aborted, they may become very weak and succumb to many bad temptations and some crimes. Consequently, their negative self-images from inappropriate home environments mean a loss of human resource for society.The pregnancy of juveniles is a serious problem as well. They are too young to be a mother. When young girls are forced to have babies, their dreams which they have dreamed all their lives are disappear. Though they are not ready to take care of their children, they have to quit everything because new born babies need their mother’s affection every second. After all, young mothers are afraid of this fact that they have to be a mother too early and they show a tendency to avoid the responsibility easily sometimes, it even occurs that some of young mothers abandon their children. It might have been better for the mother to have aborted the child in the first place.There are many countries in the world, which have conservative idea about abortion. In these countries, abortion is generally illegal. Also, many women who need to have abortion are suffering under this circumstance. Most people say that there is nothing prior to human life. If so, we have to be concerned about them more than now.PAGE PAGE 1
About the New HarmonyHave you ever dreamed about constructing your own ideal society? Actually, there were many adventurous trials to create new world in human history. In 19th century, there was an ambitious person in Scotland, whose name was Robert Owen. He founded the community, New Harmony, in 1825. Now I’m going to talk about the New Harmony’s historical background, the process of continuance, and the meaning.Beginning of the 19th century, European society was unstable. Because of the Industrial Revolution, many rich people appeared. On the other hand, there were very poor people at the same time. Robert Owen had had very skeptical idea about this circumstance that he decided to create model community which educational and social equality would prosper. At last, he bought nearly 2,000 acres of land which was located in Indiana and settled there with 900 of his followers.Early in the New Harmony, everything progressed satisfactorily. All members could get equal chance of education and feel free from religion, marriage, and personal wealth in the community. They worked hard and cooperated each other. Therefore, the community could be organized well for several years. Also, members were increased continuously. Many people, including famous scholars, wanted to participate in the New Harmony and they were accepted regardless of their nationality and social position.However, the New Harmony couldn’t be a perfect utopian society which Robert Owen had dreamed. There were some problems in it. Firstly, most of the members were unsuited to new life. As a result of the fact that the community accepted new members unrestrictedly, there were many villains and vagabonds. As the settlement became overcrowded, the chaos developed. Furthermore, few people had necessary skills to farm the land or run small industries. Finally, Owen’s experiment was ended up with failure in 1828.In 19th century, a great number of utopian communities were created. New Harmony was the one of these most influential utopian communities in the United States. Although the New Harmony left something to be desired and was far from the reality, it is very suggestive that they were going to guarantee equal chance to be educated for everyone and be free from the social values like religion, marriage and personal wealth.PAGE PAGE 1
A couple years ago, A Korean popular drama, “Winter Sonata” was exported to Japan. Beyond expectation, “Winter Sonata” was a great hit in Japan. Furthermore, the Korean actors and actresses who performed in “Winter Sonata” became celebrities. Especially, the leading actor of the drama has been called “Sama” that is a title of honor in Japan. The success of drama has made many Koreans surprised because most Koreans had understood that there were many differences between Koreans and Japanese.Originally, Korea and Japan have been influenced by old Chinese philosophy “Confucianism”. It consistently has taught us to respect older person and to be dutiful to their parents. For that reason, most people of two countries are very polite. Also, this is the reason why there are so many honorific expressions in each of the two languages.Another similarity which two countries have is a strong patriotism. Most Koreans are interested in national events about politics, economics, etc… than any other nation in the world. When international sports events take place, many Korean people want to be known as a surpassing people in the world. Not only Koreans but also Japanese are famous for patriotism. We can understand the suicide pilots who attacked Pearl Harbor in World War Ⅱ.Strong patriotism which two countries have comes from a team spirit. Korean and Japanese think much of a group. When we are born, we begin to belong to our country. After that, we belong to many groups like schools, companies, a religious group or the military, while we are growing. Through the group life, we learn about a spirit of cooperation and taking care of others. If someone cannot be adapted to the group, he will be called “Wang-tta” and excluded by the members of the group.There are differences which Korean and Japanese have. Korean people are franker and more direct than Japanese people. Sometimes it makes other person embarrassed but, through this process, The Koreans open their minds. On the other hand, Japanese people preferentially consider other person’s feeling no matter how bad they feel. They don’t express their resentment to the other man. Therefore, foreigners who do not know about this attribute are confused about their real emotion. This is the biggest difference of character which two nations have.Korean and Japanese have called each other “near but distant country” the while because Japan geographically adjoins Korea and at the same time two countries have an unpleasant feeling related with past history. But, right now they are endeavoring to overcome their unpleasant feeling through various cultural exchanges. This is the time when Korea and Japan must work to become to not just better neighbors but also true neighbors. As a matter of course, understanding about mutual cultures, traditions and characters will be able to be preceded.