Week 7 - Crime in Korea-Town

This week my post is in response to Linna's week 7 blog post about korea-town:

http://streetlightslastnight.blogspot.com

Week 7 - Response to Korea-town and its problem with crime

Hi linna,

I was impressed with all your blog posts and was particularly interesting in your visit to Korea-town. One of my floor mates visits the area on a regular basis and I have always been interested to here how the food is…I here the Korean barbeque is especially good! I always find these areas extremely interesting. I have visited several ethnic enclaves around the world including Chinatown in both New York and Newcastle. I am led to believe that Korea-town in LA is home to the largest number of ethnic Koreans outside of Korea, which may explain why it was so busy!

With little knowledge of the area, I decided to ask my Korean friend about K-town as he called it. The 2 things he said were that there are loads of Korean people and it’s not a very safe place to visit. This point was also raised in the LA Times on the 25^th September 2012, when someone said, “it feels like this place is getting more dangerous. I hear tons more helicopters that sound serious. And I’ve been here for about 18 years.” I found this recurring topic particularly interesting and decided to investigate this issue further. I understand that you were poorly treated sue to the fact you were able to speak the language and therefore experienced some form of discrimination.

I feel your reference to David Sibley’s object relation theory was completely relevant to the topic and feel there may be some additional evidence to prove this. In Sibley’s view, these additional social boundaries “may be trying to keep the polluting other at bay.” This may refer to the local Korean population becoming a little more concerned about visitors due to the recent increase in the crime levels in Korea town. It seems as though they want to maintain a high level of social order and remain in control over the area. According to the local report in the Los Angeles Times, ‘in the seven days between Nov. 22 and Nov. 28, the number of violent crime reports dipped and property crime reports were about average.’ There were 9 violent crimes reported and 39 property crimes, which I find extremely shocking stats. The map below pinpoints all the crime locations. (Burglaries-Orange and violent crimes-Red). Over the past 6 months, Korea-town was ranked 58^th in violent crime neighborhood rank of LA. This emphasizes the increasing problems occurring in Korean town and an issue they may have to address in the near future.

http://projects.latimes.com/mapping-la/neighborhoods/neighborhood/koreatown/comments/

Sibley, D (1995) “Mapping the Pure and the Defiled” from Geographies of Difference: Society and Difference in the West