Learning to Think Korean: A Guide to Living and Working in Korea (The Interact Series)

I live and teach in South Korea. I have read at least five books on Korean culture and this is the best, by far. The author is a 50 year veteran of the Korean experience, and it clearly shows in his insights to Koreans and their culture. Practical tips for business people are included as well, along with specific examples of culture conflict situations. OUTSTANDING. If you are going to read ANY book on Korean culture, this should be it. One colleague mentioned that the author is now dead, and the book is "old". Culture doesn't change THAT quickly, and this book has insights that few of the others had, and as I said, I have read 5.

This book gets a solid four stars. Published in 2001, it is out of date, but it is certainly not a crime for a book to be old, so this will not be included in the review or the score as it can be assumed that everything within was true in the year published. Kohl's book is still the best at what it was written to do: provide a comprehensive account of why Koreans think and behave the way they do. In fact, it is a testament to the quality and extent of Kohl's research that the values of Koreans have moved in exactly the direction that he predicted they would a decade ago. This book takes a sociological look at Korea and explains the values and cultural parameters that create the foundation of the Korean mind, or rather the Korean minds. As Kohls points out, there is a large gap between the beliefs of the younger generation and those of the older generations. The younger generations, under the leadership of government mandated education programs, are boldly facing historic challemges in critical thinking resultimgnfrom decades of passive classroom learning, particularly in understanding causality which is vital as Korea begins to take a stand as a modern nation of science and technology. Kohls is right that the women's movement has hit what could be considered a dead end, as traditional values continue to be upheld by older and younger generations alike. It will be interesting to see how the massive failures and emarassment of Park Guen Hye's presidency and subsequent impeachment will impact the forward progression of women's rights. Women's rights have remained about the same as they were when this book was published, with laws about sexual harassment in the workplace, as well as other basic protections exist to protect the basic freedoms of women. Women largely continue to work in the service industry, although it is not uncommon for women to work in scientific fields. I feel that Khols gets too grandfathery in this book, to the extent that you feel you are being lectured about the good old days. In fact, the way he talks about the vast economic growth of the 60s and 70s (which were extroadinary), you wonder if he was aware that this was accomplished within the context of a dictatorship. In fact, he mentions several totalitarian or undemocratic methods with a verbal shrug of the shoulders. Besides this, Kohls is too general, in my opinion, with his stereotypes of both Americans and Koreans. He dismisses the character and values of Americans, and their historical contexts, while championing Korean values, even the less than noble ones. Kohls seems rather naive in much of the book as he defends Korean prejudices throughout. This is a good book to read if you want to learn about why Koreans think the way they do. More critical and logical thinkers will likely get annoyed by the uncritical writing and logical fallacies presented, but this should not dissuade them from finishing it, even if they must resort to skimming the last thirty pages, like I did. I would recommend that this book be read alongside books about the history of Korea, anthropological accounts of culture, and books on critical and logical thought.

I plan on going to Korea to teach English and want to know as much as I can about the culture. This book gives good insight into the societal norms in Korea as well as in proper etiquette. It actually gives different scenarios and the proper responses to not offend anyone. It gives a brief but detailed history of Korea and how the history effects Korean society today. I recommed it, its a good read and an easy read. I plan to take it with me and re-read as much as necessary. In addition, I plan to buy the author's other works involving Japan and Mexico.

This book has some valuable information in it, but it's a bit outdated. I'm now living in Korea and everyone has a smart phone or Samsung Galaxy Note and Koreans use Facebook. The book was published before there were smart phones and Facebook. This is relevant as in ten years time Koreans advance more than many other countries. They adopt technology quickly and it's a huge part of their culture now.

This book was very easy to read and really described the differences between the American and Korean cultures well. While I'm not there yet to verify the info, it gave me a good basis to understand what I'm likely to encounter. I plan to bring this book with me to Korea and refer to it often. I will share it with others and highly recommend it to anyone headed to Korea.

I bought this for someone who is going to Korea to live and work, and they liked it. If you want to buy something for someone who is going to Korea to live and work, this is probably a good thing to get. I say this because I trust the taste of the guy who I bought it for. As for specifics, I don't know; I bought it for someone else. I feel like I told this to Amazon when I was buying it, but they asked me to review the product anyway, so this is what they get.

At first I thought this would be a big generalization of people so I took it lightly, but there are some truths in it. Pay attention especially to the parts about communication.

I have found the book helpful as I continue to relate to the Korean members of my community. It allows we to see things from their vantage point more than I could on my own.