KOREA FOUNDATION

For this issue, the KF met with Nam Seok-hyeon, who is instilling new life into Korea’s public diplomacy as the Director of SAYUL, an organization that promotes foreigners’ understanding of Korea through culture, and as a representative of Korean Bros, a tourism venture that publicizes Korean culture through creative media content. Nam spoke on how he first became involved in public diplomacy and the diverse activities through which he rediscovered the values of his native country.

Please tell us what first motivated you to engage in public diplomacy.

When my younger brother and I were backpacking through Europe in 2010, we were greeted with calls of “konnichiwa” and “ni hao” again and again, and we wondered how we could teach Europeans more about Korea. We painted the Taegeukgi and the map of the Korean Peninsula, the East Sea, and Dokdo Island on our T-shirts and hung them on our backpacks throughout our two-month travels. Some people reacted positively when they saw the flag and the map, and others approached us wanting to learn more about them. After we got home, we sought out more concrete ways of publicizing Korea and began to practice public diplomacy under the name of the “East Sea Keepers.”

Was there a special reason behind your choice to found an organization of your own instead of working for an established public diplomacy institution?

As one of the East Sea Keepers, I visited cities throughout the Americas and Europe for four months where I spoke on the Korean sovereignty over Dokdo Island and the rationale for using the name “East Sea” as an international name for the body of water bordered by Japan, Korea (South and North), and Russia. During this tour, I visited the International Hydrographic Conference held in Monaco in April 2012 and met representatives and foreign ministry officials from a number of countries. There, I received an outpouring of encouragement and advice, and I realized that we young men and women have an important role to play in public diplomacy.
  As I looked back on what my friends and I had been doing as the East Sea Keepers, it occurred to me that we had been engaging in one-sided dialogue about Korea and the East Sea with foreigners. There were things we should have considered before telling them about Korea, like gauging their existing views on these issues and confronting our own limited understanding of other cultures. I saw that young men and women needed to play a role in filling the gap that exists between our thoughts and theirs, so I decided to launch an organization that could support flexible, efficient cultural exchange between young people.

Would you brief us on the core activities of SAYUL, your cultural public diplomatic organization?

Earlier this year, the ninth SAYUL Global Public Diplomacy Ambassadors team went into action. The team is comprised of 70 students from a score of colleges and universities in the Seoul metropolitan area. The program was truly competitive, and we could only accept one student for every 4.5 applications. The team was then divided into seven groups, with participants tasked with gathering foreign students from each of their schools and leading them on a Korean cultural tour, including a visit to the demilitarized zone (DMZ). The KF has provided us with support for the DMZ tour, helping us lease the bus and providing the venues for our program. The teams plan out the activities they will undertake with the foreign students, including visits to folk villages and trying on Hanbok, the traditional Korean costume, while being responsible for conducting site surveys before the commencement of their programs.
  The SAYUL teams also hold forums to discuss the value of their activities in light of public diplomacy, figure out what they can improve to better serve foreigners, and share their findings and suggestions.
  Last fall, we held the fourth Korea Night Concert together with the Northeast Asian History Foundation at the Mugyewon cultural space in Jongno, downtown Seoul. About 100 foreign students with limited experience with traditional Korean culture were invited to see a gugak (traditional music) performance and calligraphy demonstration.

As a tourism venture registered with the Korea Tourism Organization under the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, Korean Bros creates media content introducing Korean culture. What kind of videos do you put out?

Korean Bros shares the different perspectives of foreigners on Korea via YouTube videos. We show people of diverse nationalities eating octopus and gwamegi, half-dried Pacific sauries, or traveling together around Jeju Island or Busan. The videos present their personal, unfiltered views of Korea as they experience its new, unfamiliar culture. Korean Bros’ online content also helps make up for the limitations of SAYUL’s offline activities, since the YouTube videos can quickly and easily deliver foreigners’ experiences of Korean culture to people all around the world.

What is your understanding of public diplomacy? What plans do you have for the future?

For me, public diplomacy means making friends. When the foreign students who joined SAYUL go back to their own countries, I would like to help other SAYUL members visit them and maintain their relationships. Helping people make friends is SAYUL’s motto and my ultimate goal.
  In order to expand the scope of public diplomacy, we plan to add tourism-related activities to our program. Foreigners’ perceptions of Korea, the inconveniences they experience, and their impressions of Korea as a brand are all closely related to tourism. Korean Bros plans to put out new content looking into the problems in the tourism sector and how things can be improved.

Written by Park Jiyoung