KOREASCHOLAR

This study examines the awareness of traditional Korean food culture among immigrant housewives in multicultural families, with the aim of introducing educational plans suitably designed for them. Our survey shows that Korean traditional holidays most well-known to the immigrant housewives are New Year's Day and Chusuk. Sambok and Chusuk are at the top in terms of preference. Samgyetang, Ddukguk, and Ogokbab are among the best known festive food to immigrant housewives for holidays such as New Year's Day, Jeongwol Daeboreum, Sambok, Chusuk, and Dongji; Samgyetang is the most preferred food, followed by Ddukguk and Patjuk. In addition, a vast majority of immigrant housewives who have ever attended Korean traditional cuisine education programs found the need for such an experience, with the score of 4.16 out of 5. In addition, the survey shows the order in which the immigrant housewives want to learn: the recipe of Korean food (53.5%), followed by table setting and manners (16.5%) and then nutrition (15%). The recipe of interest for most respondents is the one concerning daily food (69.5%). And more than half of the respondents prefer cooking practice as a desirable educational method. The difficulties that they have when attending such an educational course are usually inability to understand the language, difficulty in identifying the ingredients (seasonal), and lack of cultural understanding. The most preferred educational method is direct lecture (71.5%), followed by written materials such as books and newspaper (10.5%) and the Internet (9.5%). Finally, strategies for promoting traditional food culture are suggested as following: developing educational resources (31.5%), making various educational programs more available (25%), narrowing the cultural gap (22%), and improving the educational environment (21.5%). Therefore, this study proposes that there is a need to develop and diffuse Korean traditional food culture first, and then provide many immigrant housewives with a variety of educational programs. It is expected that these efforts will solve the problems caused by cultural differences in the early stage of international marriages and eventually contribute to the harmony in multicultural families.

• 강윤주 | Kang, Yoon-Joo
• 정희선 | Jeong, Hee Sun