Mapping the intangible cultural heritage of ethnic communities: Designing an interactive cultural history of Koreatown

Abstract

This paper presents the interactive online cultural history “The Seoul of Los Angeles: Contested Identities and Transnationalism in Immigrant Space” (http://seoulofla.com/). Informed by interaction design and urban studies, this project examines and visualizes the sociocultural networks shaping immigrant communities and how local neighborhoods negotiate a sense of place within an increasingly globalized space. Geographer Doreen Massey recognizes space not as a static entity but as the product of interrelations from the immensity of the global to the intimately tiny. These interrelations are part of a story, an interpreted history that changes and develops over time. One could recognize cultural heritage in a similar way — as dynamic and part of a narrative trajectory that is not merely frozen in a romanticized or essentialist past. Much of what constitutes the dynamics of ethnic community formation is intangible as it is largely a lived experience rather than one that is necessarily documented or archived. As such, this project serves as a digital archive and platform for community storytelling that enriches our understanding of the city and the often intangible narratives that create a sense of place. Currently, Los Angeles has the largest population of Koreans in the United States living outside of Korea. Nicknamed the “L.A. district of Seoul City”, most visitors understand Koreatown as an extension of Seoul. But, what most people may not know is that the majority of inhabitants who comprise its residential and working class population are not Korean, but Latino. The everyday space of this community is inhabited by a mix of immigrants coming from Mexico, Central and South America, and other parts of Asia including Bangladesh. These networks of nationalisms converge in the urban space of Koreatown. This contests predominant conceptions of ethnic enclaves being understood as homogenous and makes us re-imagine what we think we understand about them-they are increasingly becoming polycentric in complex ways. Combining design, documentary and issues in contemporary media studies including global/local relations, ethnic and urban studies, this work uses new media and mapping to create greater awareness of our built environment and the peoples who populate it. Mapping is a dynamic system that changes according to the shifts in culture and community that characterize any geographic place. How can this system be visualized in order to read a space with newly informed imaginations? What kind of urban interfaces could be designed to communicate with the spaces we move through and what overlooked stories could be uncovered in order to enrich our understanding of cities and the intangible cultural histories embedded in them? Such questions are explored in this project.