Starting from October 9, 2019, “Hangul Day” will now be annually recognized as an official public holiday in the state of California in the United States.
From the request of Korean American Dong-woo Park, California Assembly member Sharon Quirk-Silva introduced the measure to the California legislature, and it was unanimously authorized this year on the 9th of September. Through this holiday, Park and Quirk-Silva hope to bring identity and pride to the Korean American community as well as “acknowledge the great contributions of the Korean American community [and] … the importance of not only the Korean language, but their influence to [the Californian] community.”
In an interview with Park, he mentioned, “The Korean language is one of the five languages the National Security Agency encourages Americans to learn. Students can also choose the Korean language of ten other foreign language exams for the college entrance exam. Currently there are more than 50,000 people learning the Korean language in the United States. The establishment of this holiday will give Korean Americans an identity and sense of pride. It will also contribute to informing America of the Korean language’s origin and history, as well as promote the language at the same time.”
“Hangul Day” is a public holiday celebrated in Korea when they celebrate the creation of the Korean language’s scientific alphabet created by King Sejong. Before the creation of Hangul, Koreans used Chinese characters to write. However, because of the difficulty of the writing system, only the royalty and rich were able to have access to information. King Sejong saw this problem and made Hangul, an alphabet for everyone to understand and use. Hangul Day is celebrated as a federal holiday in Korea, but it will be recognized as a state holiday in California. This is the first time the creation of a foreign language is celebrated in the United States and through this, hopefully gather more interest of Korean culture within the country.
California is home to the second-largest Korean immigrant community in the world, with 452,000 Korean Americans residing in the state. It is also the home of many Korean culture organizations, such as the King Sejong Institute, and is a crucial part of the spread of the Hallyu wave, with annual K-pop concerts being held there regularly.
Korean culture centers in California are planning to hold events on October 9 to celebrate this significant day and continue to spread the Korean culture.
Written by: Erica Vinluan
Originally from Los Angeles, California, Current 4th year university student, Candidate for a Bachelor of Arts in the Korean Language and minor in Business Administration at the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa, Exchange student at Korea University and Intern at VANK (Voluntary Agency Network of Korea)