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Marriage Migrant Women’s Experiences of Migration to South Korea and Social Integration Strategies: Biographical Conditions, Turning Points, and the Formation of a Settlement Foundation

  • The Journal of Multicultural Society
  • 2026, 19(3), pp.251~306
  • DOI : 10.14431/jms.2026.10.19.3.251
  • Publisher : Research Institute of Asian Women
  • Research Area : Social Science > Social Science in general
  • Received : August 7, 2026
  • Accepted : October 12, 2026
  • Published : October 30, 2026

Myunghee Park 1

1경북대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

This study examined how marriage migrant women’s migration experiences and social integration strategies are formed and transformed across the life course. In-depth biographical interviews were conducted with eight marriage migrant women, and the data were analyzed through within-case and cross-case analyses and iterative comparison. Six overarching categories were identified: migration decisions toward a better life under biographical conditions; early adaptation in South Korea amid protection and separation; recognizing the need for settlement strategies amid conflict and frustration; building a foundation for settlement through strategic choices and actions; stabilization and expansion of settlement; and expansion of the settlement foundation through the reconfiguration of transnational family relationships. These categories showed a general temporal tendency but did not constitute fixed sequential stages; rather, they recurred and intersected according to changes in participants’ biographical and family conditions. Marriage migration emerged as a biographical decision shaped by a combination of economic, educational, and career conditions, caregiving responsibilities, gender-role expectations, spousal relationships, and expectations of life in South Korea. During the early period after migration, support and protection from spouses and inlaws facilitated adaptation. For several participants, however, experiences of conflict and exclusion became occasions for recognizing the limitations of family dependence and the need to express their own views and draw on relationships and resources beyond the family. Participants selected and adjusted strategies such as Korean-language learning, education and economic activities, family relationship negotiation, communication with schools and institutions, and the use of social networks according to their biographical and family circumstances. Through these practices, they expanded their roles, decision-making authority, and scope of participation. Some participants also used the life experiences, information, social networks, and economic resources accumulated in South Korea to support the care, mobility, and residence of their families of origin. The core category was identified as “multilayered social integration strategies through the selective coordination of relationships and resources.” Social integration was understood not as a final state in which conflicts were fully resolved, but as a nonlinear process in which participants repeatedly adjusted relationships and resources in response to changing biographical and family conditions while expanding their foundations for settlement and participation.

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This paper was written with support from the National Research Foundation of Korea.
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