Ji-Hae Kang Oral History Interview, May 28, 2014



NF: My name is Natalia Fernández I am the Oregon Multicultural Librarian a staff member with OSU’s Special Collections and Archives Research Center. Today’s date is May 28, 2014 and I am interviewing Ji-Hae Kang a staff member of the Asian and Pacific Cultural Center at Oregon State University. So, if you could state your name and please spell it out loud.

JK: My name is Ji-Hae Kang J-I H-A-E last name K-A-N-G

NF: And what is your home town or where is home for you?

JK: I was born in South Korea but my home would be Beaverton, Oregon.

NF: And when did you move there?

JK: I’ve lived there for almost all my life. I moved back and forth so the last time I moved back was since ten years old so fifteen years.

NF: And what is your age, year in school, and major?

JK: I am currently 25; a senior; and I am majoring in general science with a minor in chemistry.

NF: And what are your self-identities in terms of race and ethnicity?

JK: I identify myself as an Asian American.

NF: And in terms of your work at the APCC, what is your position, so what do you do and how many years have you worked for the APCC?

JK: This is my first year working here. I am a cultural center coordinator. We basically work with the program database where we input the events and what we did and evaluations for them. We also take care of the scrapbooks so we also have a little history of our center. We also have our own events that we hold, once per term at least. And we just, and for the most part everyone in the staff 00:02:00does housework around the center -that’s about what we do.

NF: And are there two of you, three of you?

JK: There are four of us.

NF: There are four of you, okay. So how do you decide how to divide the work? Or do you basically have specialized parts of the job that you do?

JK: So each term our internal coordinator, she will basically kind of pick a job for us to do for the entire term. So the first term I was in charge of listserve and scrapbooking, and the second term I was in charge of database, and this term I am in charge of the libraries and scrapbooking. It goes around, it rotates, and anything else if we just see something that needs to be worked on in the center we’ll do that. Or if anyone needs help in the center we just go and help them if we can.

NF: Great, have you worked for any of the other cultural centers?

JK: No, this is the only cultural center I’ve worked at.

NF: So why did you decide to work at the APCC?

JK: Well, this is the only cultural center I have really been to and I started coming here last year. I mean I have known about it for a while and last year was when I really started utilizing the space and I felt really connected I guess one, because I am of Asian ethnicity and the center promotes a lot of Asian cultures and it was really fun to learn about the events. Just coming here and getting to meet people and the staff and just becoming friends with them it was just a really nice experience and I wanted to kind of, I guess, spread that and you know, just kind of share my experiences too and make other people feel welcome. And I guess just continue that.

NF: So originally did you start coming to the APCC to use their services and resources, to attend the events, or both?

JK: It started off with the resources honestly because, and free printing -at the library it costs money - but eventually I started to get to know the staff members and we became friends; it just kind of happened in a sequence. Eventually it ended up me going to their events as well and just you know I just got really involved with the center after a while.

NF: And so, what were your expectations, hopes for your work, and were they matched, surpassed, not matched?

JK: My expectations, I guess, was to just really get to meet new people and I guess promote the diversity of the Asian cultures, or the Asian Pacific cultures to be more exact. And I would say, at the very least it did match or if anything 00:05:00it surpassed it, because I am really introverted so its hard for me to get to meet new people unless I am introduced to them by friends there is just a limit how much people you can meet. But working here I had to put myself out there and get to meet people first and it just, it was a lot of new experiences for me which I really appreciate because that will help me out in the long run, you know, where I can be confident about myself and say, “Hi my name is Ji-Hae Kang, what’s your name?” and “how is your day going?” You know, things that are really hard for me to do.

And, just working here and trying to come up with ideas for events and researching and all these, and researching to do a very good job at presenting the information we learned for the event in itself. It was a really big learning experience and I also learned a lot of about micro-aggression, you know just those little things that I didn’t think about before working here because 00:06:00racial slurs, jokes, they have been here for as long as I have been alive and even longer and for me, like before this I actually accepted them as they were but working here I started realizing that they are not okay, they do affect people and once I started realizing that I started noticing the small, you know, those little things going on all around me. And I, it’s really up to someone, someone needs to start, someone needs to stand up against it and fight it and so I was really glad that the center was working towards that and I also became more vocal about it; if someone did that I would be like, “that’s not acceptable, that was rude and you need to apologize” you just the little things. I feel like small acts can go bigger so definitely it’s been surpassed 00:07:00for sure if anything it’s been matched.

NF: And so can you describe the projects, events, activities during these past few terms that were especially meaningful to you that you worked on?

JK: Fall term, the one that stuck out to me was, what was the name of the event?...I think it was our first dead week feast because, I mean, it wasn’t just the cultural coordinator that put it together but it was the entire staff that came together that put it together. Like start from planning to executing, just everything was planned all together. Also that was the first time we got to meet our two new coworkers because we were missing two staff when we started the year and so the two staff came in later in the term and that was the first time we actually had to work together.

So that was really meaningful to me in that sense and it was our first really 00:08:00big, big event. And for winter term, I don’t really have one for winter term. But for spring term the one that was really meaningful to me was the migration event that the cultural center had, all four of us had together. Because I am considered an immigrant because I was born outside of the country and just learning the history and what happened, you know, what’s going on right now, just those little things that came to me more personally I feel like. And I felt like everyone should know where their origins came from and what their ancestors or relatives had to go through for us to get this opportunity right now. So that stuck to me and was pretty meaningful.

NF: So what have been your challenges working at the APCC and how have you 00:09:00overcome them?

JK: This one I actually, I mentioned it earlier - I’m really introverted I have the hardest time saying “hi” to new people and one of the biggest challenges, if anything, was the events and having to say “hi” to people when they come into the center and say, “hi how was your day? Do you need any help?” Just that simple phrase was deadly to me, so I think that was my greatest challenge and also being very aware of all these, you know, micro-aggressions, whatever it was, just being very aware of cultural diversity that was, it was really new to me so I guess that was a challenge in itself.

NF: And in terms of overcoming them was it just a matter of practice that 00:10:00through your job you were able to work on the things you wanted to work on?

JK: Yeah, I think it was more of practice at sure, I mean at first I did say “hi” but I was just really shy; I would be like “hi, how are you?” and now it’s just “hey, welcome!” - You know it’s just, I still have room for improvement because I still have trouble doing this outside of work but it’s still a big improvement in itself.

NF: And what have been your successes working at the APCC?

JK: Being able to, I guess recognize what going on around me in terms of ethnicity or sexual orientation just whatever it is, any sort of aggression that I kind of used to just push aside and go, “Oh whatever, that happens all the time, it was just a joke, they don’t mean any harm from that” but those 00:11:00things are what really keeps the racism and those, you know, phobias here so that would be my biggest success - being able to be aware of them.

NF: And what have been your interactions with staff from the other cultural centers?

JK: This one unfortunately is something that I didn’t get to do much of because well one, we try to get the CCCC to work on the immigration event with us. We felt that it was because the Asians and Southern Americans are the biggest immigration group so we thought it was really appreciate for them to kind of collaborate with us. But what we found was that it was really hard to get communication going and responses that were quick enough to get things 00:12:00started so it just never really happened .That was kind of sad because I was hoping to get to know the other cultural centers more and work with them.

NF: and with your specific position it’s more internal

JK: Yeah it’s...

NF: It’s more based on like your work duties

JK: And just like, and I don’t know if you remember but I did say that there is internal coordinators that gives us our jobs, I don’t know I guess things to do for the term. So basically we were divided into two groups, ones under the external coordinator’s umbrella and one is under the internal the cultural center coordinators are the only ones that are what the internal coordinator, meaning we are more of the internal, we work with the office for the center specifically and the other ones are more outreach based. So that’s another reason why I think we haven’t been able to work with other centers as much.

NF: So let’s talk about the new center. Were you apart of the process for that, for the creation of the new center? Did you take part of the ground breaking ceremony that occurred earlier this term?

JK: I wasn’t part of the design process because when I found out about it, it was after the layouts came out and it was all online and I heard it from Aunty Sandy that it was done and what happened behind the scenes basically. I was a part of the ground breaking event so I was there supporting our staff members and helping plan what should be the little performances I guess for the ground breaking. That was pretty fun.

NF: What does the new center mean to you?

JK: To me it feels like it’s a new start; it’s like a kick off point for the APCC because right now we’re on the outskirts of campus where almost nobody 00:14:00knows about it. The fact that we are moving to the heart of campus next to the MU and Weatherford the two most well know buildings on campus. I think, I’m hoping this will be an opportunity to educate more people in our community about the diversity of Asian culture and not just, and we’re not all Chinese, we’re not all Japanese, we’re not all in the same group; each of us is so diverse and we want to be able to emphasize that. So I am really excited for the new center. It’s a new start for us for sure.

NF: I assume you plan to graduate this year, will you plan to return to see the new center?

JK: I have been telling the staff members that I will be back, they can’t get rid of me quite yet [laughs] I will be visiting often. And I am trying to come back for grad school or post doc so hopefully I will be back here enough to 00:15:00visit them and if I do come back as a student I will reapply. I want to be able to work at the APCC again for sure.

NF: So in terms of the ideas for the future and the bigger picture, what projects, events, or activities would you have liked to have seen or would you recommend in the future?

JK: I don’t know about anything I would have liked to see because we have a big diverse, we had a wide range of events that was just social to really educational and social justice based. What I do recommend is trying to, I mean we have a lot of events that talk about polices and just histories but I haven’t really seen any events that really talked about the diversity of our cultures as much.

I mean, I know it’s hard there are twenty plus Asian countries, so its hard to 00:16:00talk about the diversity of each one, but if there was a way to kind of like make that a termly thing where the first term kind of looks at these few groups. Just so people can see that were actually not all the same, you know how they say, “all Asians look the same” or they call the lunar new year the Chinese new year because it’s well-known to the Chinese people but several different countries celebrate on the same day; they all have different names for it. It’s just little things that we can educate people on. We did have a Lunar New Year event this year that, where we tried to bring that up but it was kind of hard to do that. We just have really short PowerPoint slides with different points but if there was a way to make them more interactive and fun I feel like if we really could introduce so that you know, every, or at least more people know about the diversity that exists in the eastern continent.

NF: So what advice would you give future APCC staff or OSU cultural center staff in general? And this could be for your position specifically or for anyone who comes to work for the CRCs.

JK: For everyone in general I do want to say that you know, be aware of your surroundings, be aware of what people are saying. And even if it may look like it’s a really small minor thing like the “Indians are better off dead” graffiti we had not that long ago. Other people are saying that “it’s a joke, why are you being so serious or taking it so far?” At the same time, even it’s a joke it’s there is always a line, someone always gets hurt from it no matter how light it may be. So really be aware and be ready to kind of, I don’t know, talk about it I guess like be able to respond to it appropriately. 00:18:00But the advice I want to give to APCC staff and everyone else I guess is: if you are working for the centers, you are the face of the center for the entire year.

I mean, yes, your personal life is your personal life, but your still, your representing your center so if you’re at the parties please act appropriately, don’t do anything that might kind of be like, “Oh, are other people at the center like that? Is that the type of people they are?” You know just, be very mindful of what you say or how you act, how you present yourself, and really just like, just because your clocked out doesn’t mean you can say the n-word or joke around about being homophobic you know just those things because it’s a given you should be aware of those even when you’re not working at the center, but if you are really working there you really need to act 00:19:00appropriately. I think this year the staff has been really good with that. But I don’t know who the next year staff is going to be so I just want to make sure that they be very mindful of how they act and how they present themselves outside of the center because who you are is what people will see the center as. That’s my advice I guess.

NF: And based on working at the APCC, what is the takeaway if you could say just one that you have gained that you would like to share with others?

JK: I would say definitely communication skills, teamwork. I guess this is really specific for my position too, we have to do an event with all four of us, if we were to do an event, we could do our individual ones but we are required to do one as a group. And that really taught me a lot because it was first 00:20:00someone needs to take initiative to get the group together and set a date and then set a meeting times we can all talk about. Just, and that all requires communication and during staff meetings we all need to voice our opinions and interact with other staff members, and when we are working with other people during our shift we have to be able to communicate with them to see what’s going on what needs to be done, what has to be done. And when people come in we need to communicate with them to see what they need if they want to just hang out. I think communication is the biggest thing I learned as a takeaway I have gained.

NF: And in terms of communication, this is a little bit of the tangent, I am curious about your work with the scrapbook specifically. When you are in charge of the scrapbook do you have others who are at the events give you the content 00:21:00or is it your job to go to the events, take photos and then put it together, can you talk a little bit about how that works?

JK: So that one we tried for each of us, it hard for us to go to every event so what we tried to do is if someone has an event at the staff meeting we will ask if anyone has time available to go and help out and try to see if anyone can take pictures during that time. And what we tried to do is have them send the photos to whoever is in charge of scrapbooking so we can look through the photos, print a few out, and make a page out of it. And this one also kind ties back to communication because it’s really hard to get people to send their photos in because they forget that they have the photos or they have the photos and they just don’t send it over.

So I am constantly nagging people basically to get their photos, and you know, to do this I have tried making a table of things like a checklist for each event that has been done and as I check it off its been done. It reminds them “Oh, I 00:22:00still have to send photos in I should do that” and then I have also made Google documents with folders so people can access to put the photos in themselves that they want to put in if it’s too hard to send it to me each time they can just put it in there and I can look at it and print it off myself. But yeah, that’s how we do scrapbooking here. So far I have had a few people send in photos so I can get started with the pages, have fun with it.

NF: So what is the biggest issue for you in terms of the purpose of the APCC and why is it so important?

JK: Purpose of the APCC...I think for now, the biggest issue would have, is the placement on campus. Because we have so much that we can give that, we have so 00:23:00much resources that is not being utilized because of lack of, people just don’t know about the center, I mean people know about the CCCC and especially the Longhouse which is right there everyone knows about the Longhouse and we say, “Do you know the APCC?” And they go, “Oh, is that a club?” and we say “Oh, we are a resource center too” so I guess that’s my biggest tissue but it’s going to be fixed next year so, yay! And I feel it is important because the school kind of analyzes each year you know the usage of the center and why it needs to be here and how the budget should be allocated to us. And if we don’t have that many students knowing about it or realizing us then the school is going to see us as being useless and you know, and I feel like we really need to be around to be able to educate people and provide resources and 00:24:00be a place where they can feel at home and just secure and safe. So I think that's the biggest issue for the purpose of the APCC; it’s a resource center for students that’s not being utilized as a resource.

NF: So how would you describe the impact of the APCC on Asian Pacific Island students?

JK: I can’t speak for everyone, but for the students who do come here even if its not regularly they know it’s a safe place where they can come, they are feeling included. Nobody goes, “why are you here?” Nobody is judgmental here so I feel like its little home away from home, for me for sure it is. I know some people who come here, they are not staff but we see them here every single day. It’s where they can feel included where they feel like they get the 00:25:00attention when they need one. So I feel because a lot I mean there are some students who come from a white dominant areas or, because you know there is a very, very, very low like percentage of Asians where they come from. And when they come here they may feel out of place but we provide a space for them where they feel at home and they have friends that’s just like them that went through similar problems you know, I feel like that’s what we are able to do for the students here that are of Asian and Pacific Islander decent.

NF: And how would you describe the impact of the APCC on the OSU and local communities?

JK: For the OSU and the local community we collaborate a lot with the API Student Council which is comprised of several or multiple Asian and Pacific 00:26:00Islander student leaders from their organizations. We put on events where it’s fun and social while know you they get free food, but it’s also a chance for people to learn about different cultures in Asia and the Pacific Islands. And that’s when the OSU and the community around us really get to know about us more than us having our own little events because it’s a collaboration of twenty some different groups for that one event.

And so word gets out more we get much more people coming several hundred people at a time you know, I feel like by doing that OSU and the local community is able to learn more about our cultures but also you know what we like or just 00:27:00what food we eat in the most simple scale because its, because there is a stereotype where Asian food equals noodles and rice, you know? And then with these food events for example we are able to showcase different types of food we have it’s not all fried rice it’s not all just chow mein even if its noodles we can do this with it or that with that or we have this that comes from what we have never even seen before. So I feel like the APCC has a really big impact in the sense that we are able to I guess the best word of choice would be educate the community even if it’s a little bit at a time, it’s still something. And I feel that’s what’s important, doesn’t matter if it’s a big impact or a small impact, just the fact that someone is taking a message out of it is the impact that I like that the APCC has.

NF: And what suggestions or ideas do you have for continued or future 00:28:00collaboration with the OSU and local community?

JK: I would say take advantage of all the resources you can get. Because I think this is one of the few times we actually collaborated with the MUPC, for mom’s weekend, I mean I think it’s an annual thing but it’s the only time we do it. But we really noticed the immense amount of help we can get from them. And, what ‘s that word? publicity I guess, it’s just the MUPC is such a big group on its own and there is such a public place that if we’re able to work with them for example we can get publicize we have a lot of people that didn’t know about the APCC come to our event and get to know what we were all about and join the event.

And I feel like this year we tried to work with a lot of the other cultural 00:29:00centers if we were collaborating, I think they should really try and expand that and just try to get anybody from around the community to collaborate with us. Because that’s going to get exposure on so many different levels than what we have so far and it’s going to be a learning experience for both parties if we do that; we learn more about school policies and they learn something about us and then the public gets to learn about both of us, right? So I feel like I would really say if there is any chance, just take it, don’t even hesitate, just go for it and most likely you’re going to get them to collaborate with you and it’s probably going to end up pretty well.

NF: Can you describe your thoughts on why sharing your stories is important to your identity if it is?

JK: I think that for me it’s more of, our voices don’t get heard as much because if we I mean growing up as a minority and when people say things, I mean they don’t, it’s just a joke and if we react kind of negatively at it then people will go, “why are you being so serious?” So I was at least told to keep my mouth shut when it happened to just keep quiet and let it go. But I feel like it’s really important for people to know the history and what’s going on -that this is reality and just to experience you know, if you hear it, it might have something, it might spark an idea in someone that they didn’t hear before. So I feel like expressing anything any experience that I have, any thoughts that I have, and having a record of it is a really good idea for people 00:31:00to go back and go, “Oh, so this happened this time” or “Hey, that was just last year and it’s still going on?” or “Hey, that something I never thought of; I can try that.” And that’s why I think it’s kind of important.

NF: So can you talk a little bit about your experiences at OSU pertaining to your racial or ethnic identities? You mentioned this already a little bit regarding the micro-aggressions that you have experienced so can you expand a little bit on that in terms of your own personal experiences or the general OSU experiences?

JK: So I mean I guess I can’t speak for everyone and I don’t know, I haven’t seen too many aggression towards others, so I can’t say, and for the most part you know it’s been a really positive experience here. It’s really diverse and most people are very accepting of diversity so I am really happy for 00:32:00that, it’s just that I have noticed that people say things without harm that can be harmful to the person that’s taking it. I mean I would be walking down the street people say “Oh hey, Ni Hao” and I’m just “I’m Korean” and some others “Konichiwa” “I‘m Korean” -you know, they are trying to be really inclusive by saying those things to me but they don’t realize that they are categorizing us thinking we all fit into that one group if you look a certain way.

It’s just like how I can look at a Caucasian person and go, “Hey, are you British?” but they may be Irish, or you know, from somewhere completely different and so luckily that hasn’t happened too much, maybe within my ten 00:33:00fingers, less than ten times, but for the most part it was really positive but I do think there is room for improvement and people need to learn that those things can be offensive because the first few times, “Oh, you’re cute” but after a while it just kind of makes you think about it, you know, it’s “What am I? Am I just any other Asian to these people? Because I have my identity and I’m proud of my culture.” But they don’t recognize that and they think all of us are Japanese, all of us are Chinese, all of us are Vietnamese. And then another experience I’ve had was, I don’t know if this happens a lot but you know like, I would have guys just driving by and they would kind of make noises, so I wasn’t sure if that was supposed to be a very good thing or a very bad thing because is it, “Dang, you’re hot?” or is it “Oh, yellow monkeys,, go away”? I just don’t know which one it is, like are they trying to be 00:34:00funny and witty or are they just being really aggressive toward me? I really can’t tell. So I guess those are my experiences for my ethnic identity.

NF: And when you, if you did, if you confronted people and tried to educate them, did you, do you find that people are responsive and they are positive, and they say, “Oh, I’m sorry” or do you find that for the most part they don’t do that? What’s the response like?

JK: For me, at least for me, they’re, they apologize, they don’t realize that what they did was really offensive, they were just trying to be very inclusive, just done in a very unfortunate, slightly different direction than it should have been. I don’t even want to say “wrong” because it’s not really “wrong” -they didn’t know, you know, so that’s why I feel it’s really important that the APCC and we have events where we can educate people so that these things don’t happen anymore, where people are educated enough to 00:35:00know that, “Oh, she may look this way but that doesn’t mean she is, and I should be more careful” or you know, when they ask questions like, “Where are you from?” you know, if you are an Asian American who’s grown up here, you’re going to say, “I’m from Beaverton” but they go, “No, where are you from?”-“Oh, you mean am I from Korea?

Yeah, I’m from there.”So it’s just more on the education, it’s just more than people trying to be aggressive or being, not aggressive, what’s the word? I forgot my word now; it’s offensive, offensive. It’s not that they’re trying to be offensive, they’re trying to be really friendly. That’s why I feel bad even saying anything about it a lot of times but I try to say, “Oh, you know” so when they ask, even though I know they’re probably asking the other one, I say, “Oh, I’m from Beaverton, but I was born in Korea” or “my family’s from Korea” And I kind of try to let people know that, not in 00:36:00a very harsh tone, that, “Hey, you know, by the way, that this can cause that?” So it’s been a pretty positive response for sure.

NF: Great, so before we close, is there anything that we have not discussed that you would like to talk about or anything that we have discussed that you would like to add to?

JK: I don’t think I have too much. I guess I’m just hoping for the new center because next year is the first time we are opening up in the center of campus, it’s especially important for the new staff members next year to really be mindful of how they present themselves. I said this before but I’m really emphasizing it because this is the first time we’re getting major exposure to the community and if we don’t present ourselves right the first time it will stick around for a while and one mistake can lead to detrimental, I 00:37:00don’t know, I don’t want to imagine what’s going to happen if we were to do that, so really I just really want to emphasize that people need to be very mindful of who they are and what they represent.

NF: That’s great. Okay, well, thank you so much.

JK: Thank you.