"My parents really want to understand my situation, and my life as a lesbian, but they don't want to talk to other Korean parents, for fear of gossip or losing face. A book like this might be one of the few resources that could actually help them with their own 'coming out' process."

- Mina Chung

Beloved Daughter

Check out ten (10)stories in English & Korean -- reprinted from "Beloved Daughter," a 1998 publication from MAPLBN.

Timeline

Project schedule

Tell us your stories!

PO Box 31284
San Francisco, CA 94131-0284
info@queerkorean.org

The Queer Korean Family Project is committed to developing a culturally-relevant, bilingual resource for our parents, siblings, and ourselves. Few resources exist either in Korean or English that support our families -- to let them know that they are not alone when they struggle with their disappointment, fear, sadness and/or confusion about our queerness. Through the Queer Korean Family Project, we hope to nurture our relationships with our parents and siblings by encouraging a healthy dialogue about our queerness, and to educate the community about homophobia.

Who we are:

We are a diverse group of queer Korean Americans living in the San Francisco Bay Area. We came together to form the Queer Korean Family Project (QKFP) in early 2001. Some of us are enviously bilingual, while some of us simply keep trying. Some of us were born in the U.S. (or left before we cold talk), and some of us were born and raised in Korea. We come from all walks of life -- some of us are students, while others have real jobs as attorneys, activists, graphic designers, webmasters, etc. Collectively, we decided that it was time to develop a publication for our parents and siblings who continue to struggle with our queer identities.

This project was inspired in part by a booklet called "Beloved Daughter," published in 1999 by the Mandarin-Speaking Asian Pacific Lesbian and Bisexual Network (MAPLBN). The booklet contains stories by parents and siblings of Chinese lesbians in both Chinese and English.

NOTE: We use "Queer" as an umbrella term that refers to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people. "Transgendered" is a generic term for everything in the gender spectrum; a state in which a person shifts his/her gender, permanently or dynamically, to the desired gender which is appropriate at the time. Transgenderism, while overlapping with sexual orientation is a distinctly different subject altogether, and includes female and male cross dressers, transvestites, drag queens or kings, female or male impersonators, intersexed individuals, pre-operative, post-operative or non-operative transsexuals, masculine females, feminine males, all persons whose perceived gender or anatomical sex may be incongruent with their gender expression, and all persons exhibiting gender characteristics and identities which are perceived to be androgynous.