Week 8 Discussion

I think Kwon’s ‘work of waiting’ shows that there is a lot more emotional baggage and anxiety in the family members left behind in home countries then was previously thought. As a result, I think immigration policy should reflect this idea of a family or spouses as a single unit and do their best not separate families from each other in order to seek out better opportunities. This could be achieved through allowing the working family member to travel more easily between the two countries, or having an expediated application process for spouses with existing work visas. I myself arrived in the United States through my parents work visas and the process was excruciatingly long. We remained separated for years at a time as my parents were forced to work across the country from each other in whatever jobs they could find and I lived with relatives temporarily, while they make enough money to afford renting an apartment.

Also, I find Korea’s policy that welcomes all overseas Koreans, except those working manual labor jobs extremely hypocritical because many South Korean industries are short manpower and without this immigrants, some businesses would not be able to survive.

I think an accurate map to reflect migration patterns would be one where the borders of the countries where migrants are coming from, and the countries they are entering are blurred or flow into one another. Because as Kwon’s article mentioned, the people who are left behind still dream and long for the country their spouses immigrated to as a representation of a better life or freedom from their involuntary prison of waiting. Also as we saw, many of the immigrants who arrive in their desired countries yearn for their families back home, so the thoughts of those at home and overseas tend to transcend borders in their separation anxiety. Another way to illustrate the ‘work of waiting’ might to not only represent the number of people immigrating into countries, but also the amount of people who are left behind, and the number of families that have to be separated as a result of global migration. Also statistics about the amount of money that immigrants make that is leaving the country as a representation of their love or effort towards a better life for their families in their home countries could be helpful.