Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: This paper examins Korean Evangelicals in the context of racial formation and geopolitics. I show that Korean evangelicals in the United States employ a far-reaching Evangelical Christian worldview to articulate their position as major actors on the world stage. Buoyed by the development of capitalism and democracy in South Korea, Korean evangelicals consider themselves uniquely qualified to carry out the mission of world evangelization. By positioning themselves as akin to white Christian missionaries, immigrant Korean Christians articulate their location in a global racial hierarchy—somewhere below whites, more fortunate than the notoriously non-Christian Japanese, and much better off than the “unreached people” in the Third World. Their religious worldview, I argue, influence the process of racial formation, understood in this paper as a matter of “both social structure and cultural representation.”

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This conceptual essay looks for a philosophical linkage between symmetrical worldview and um-yang paradigm. The symmetrical worldview provides a foundation in development of a normative model of public relations (e.g., two-way symmetrical approach). We found the symmetrical worldview shares some crucial common cores assumed in the um-yang paradigm that is embedded in many social values and morality in the Asian societies. Whereas many societies demand public relations expertise worldwide, practitioners worldwide also demand a metaphysical framework to judge what is ethical or morally acceptable in their practices. Our essay speculates on how societies that subscribe to different cultural heritages would reconcile in bringing other’s experience and knowledge into their practices. We show one way to make a metaphysical linkage between two different philosophical frameworks. Such a metaphysical linkage helps public relations practitioners in two different cultures recognize what they believed would be an illusory difference (cf. moral relativism). We search for a feasible reconciliation among public relations, ethical frameworks, and cultures.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper discusses the formation and evolution of the worldview of the Republic of China (Taiwan), whose government is being controlled by the party favoring Taiwan independence and denying the Chinese root of its past. This paper explores the formation of the ruling party's worldview, and accesses the transformation of such a worldview since May 2001. This paper indicates that there is a dual development in Taiwan's worldview: "realist" in security and "pluralist" in economics (and the former seems to win over the latter in practice). In the last section how Taiwan adjusted and carried out its East Asia foreign policy through the lens of worldviews is presented. It will be risky if Taiwan continues to conduct its foreign policy under such a seemingly dyadic worldview.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Social science scholars in recent years have rediscovered the role of religion in politics. With the increasing conservatism in the American electorate, plus the emergence of the Religious Right in the past few decades, the importance of religion in political behavior has become impossible to ignore. Researchers often focus on social issues such as abortion, school prayer, and gay and lesbian rights, in explaining the role of religion in political behavior. However, such conservatism in political behavior does not typically extend to religious and socially conservative Blacks. Considering the apparent difference seen between Whites and Blacks of similar beliefs, the question is, does racial worldview play a part in the political conservatism of White evangelicals? In my paper, I will give an overview of the previous research on religion and political behavior, and present a different theory which integrates racial worldview with religious interpretation to explain the political behavior of White evangelicals.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: On face, hymenoplasty as it exists with Islamic and Western cultures seems to reflect different world views. Yet, this paper argues that as a symbol, hymenoplasty reveals more similarity in the two cultures than differences. Hymenoplasty’s ultimate and desired outcome—acceptance and conformity to the patriarchal and heteronormative standards of culture—communicate disturbingly similar understandings of women’s position in both societies.