About

Hello,
I’m Phillip Cha, a Ph.D. student in sociology at Sogang University.

My research grew out of a curiosity that was both personal and sociological. At family gatherings during my childhood, I would sometimes meet Zainichi Korean relatives whose language and everyday practices felt unfamiliar to me, yet who were still recognized as family.

Over time, this experience developed into a broader academic interest in how categories such as “Korean,” “co-ethnic,” “foreigner,” and “migrant” are made, contested, and redefined in South Korea, a society increasingly shaped by migration and ethnoracial diversity.

My research has developed through studies of the Korean diaspora, diasporic return, and migrant labor markets in South Korea. Across these projects, I currently examine how new ethnoracial boundaries and hierarchies are being formed in an increasingly multiethnic and multiracial South Korea.