Sejong Cultural Society

There is a wonderful group of people in Chicago that have created an organization for the promotion of Korean culture. They are called the Sejong Cultural Society. Their purpose is to promote Korean culture in the United States. They engage in three activities, primarily — a music competition, an essay contest, and a sijo writing contest. It is the last item, the sijo contest that has brought them into my realm of interest and activity.

For several years, off and on, I have been one of their judges in their sijo writing contest. David McCann, my “seonbae” from Harvard, has also been one of their judges. They have an essay writing contest where a short story translated from Korean is often the kind of subject matter — that brings the Korean cultural element into the essay. And they have a music competition to encourage young musicians — Korean-Americans, and otherwise — to compete in violin and piano. But it is the sijo contest, and the society’s sijo workshop, that has brought me into their work.

The music contest and the essay contest are for precollege students and the sijo contest, too, was aimed solely at the precollege student, until last year when they opened a second division, for those who are “adult” — college and beyond.

I have been impressed with the organization and their leader, the inspirational leader of the group is a semi-retired pediatric endocrinologist - yes, a scientist who has devoted her later life volunteer work to the arts.

Her name is Lucy Park and with the support of her husband, Ho Kim and a group of prominent Korean-Americans in the Chicago area she has contributed greatly to the enhancement of Korean culture in America and the spread of the awareness of Korea’s contributions to world culture.

The organization is small, and though it claims a national focus — and indeed the sijo contest and the essay contest bring in applicants from across the country — the core work is done in the Chicago area.

The president of the organization this year is You Shim Kim, a neonatal pediatrician and other officers of the organization are prominent Korean-Americans. Their mission statement says: “The Sejong Cultural Society strives to advance awareness and understanding of Korea’s cultural heritage amongst people in the United States by reaching out to the younger generations through contemporary creative and fine arts. It is our hope that, through this, the rich culture behind Korea’s colorful history will be accessible to people of any ethnicity and nationality while being a unique part of the larger, more familiar Western culture, and that such harmonizing of the two cultures will create a better understanding between them.”

Last week I attended their annual fundraising dinner. They asked me to be the keynote speaker. There, I got to meet the wonderful Korean-American support staff and membership that backup Lucy Park in her noble efforts. The fundraiser was a huge success and the dinner was complemented with entertainment by a beautiful soprano and a wonderful tenor, and a sixteen-year-old violinist who won the music competition.

They do wonderful work in helping to promote Korean culture in America. It is amazing that they get no governmental support. But rather, as a group of Korean-Americans, mostly, they raise funds from among the Korean-Americans of the Chicago area only — they ought to fundraise among the Korean-Americans of New York, Los Angeles and other cities, too!

I know their sijo program better than their other activities. I’ve written about the sijo contest before and how it truly has a national reach. This is a major step forward in what I think should be the goal of Koreanists and the Korean government — to see to the implementation of sijo writing in every school system across America. And lest this goal sound grandiose, please be reminded that Japanese haiku has achieved that very goal — haiku is taught in every school in America. And sijo should be as well.

We need many more helpers to implement sijo across America. But since haiku has been so successful, there is a role model for sijo. And sijo is a natural follow-on to haiku in that both are short forms, three lines in both cases, both come from East Asian countries and both have a great natural appeal. We just need more people to help move the ball along. It has already started. There are several schools, here and there, across America that teach sijo now.

And the greatest reason for the current success of sijo in America has been the Sejong Cultural Society.

Thank you, Lucy Park and your associates. Thank you to the Sejong Cultural Society. Keep up the good work.