About the Author
Author Carol K. Park is currently a graduate student in the Department of Ethnic Studies Ph.D. program at the University of California Riverside. She holds a Master of Fine Arts from UC Riverside's Palm Desert Low Residency Creative Writing and Writing for the Performing Arts program. She is the author of two books including Memoir of a Cashier: Korean Americans, Racism, and Riots (YOK Center, UCR 2017) and Korean Americans: A Concise History (Korea University Press & the YOK Center, UCR 2019).
She is considered a Korean American Studies expert and is also adjunct faculty at UC Riverside and College of the Desert. Park is an award-winning former journalist who also wrote and produced two short documentaries: "The 1992 L.A. Riots: Reflections on Our Future" (2012) and "Footsteps of Korean Americans" (2018).
Park also has a cute dog named Gamja who loves to eat green beans and play fetch. Park is also a United States of America National Karate Federation licensed referee. Park is a second-degree black belt in Shitō-ryū Karate-Do; this just means she can run away quickly and effectively.
Book Blurbs
“It is said that we Koreans - the people of Hahn (everlasting woe) - had run out of tears by the time new waves of immigrants from the war-ravaged Land of Morning Calm settled in the seething inner cities of a city of Angels with their piggyback children. But to my astonishment, I found myself fighting not only tears, but rage, fear, and every emotion you can think of as I turned the pages of this memoir. At last, destiny has willed this born again, child of Sa-i-gu to stand up and shout at the Manhattan-based media honchoes on behalf of 2,300 Korean immigrant grunts in America's own killing fields whose elusive American dreams went up in smoke overnight on April 29, 1992. Carol is destined to become the first and last line of defense for her heroic mother’s generation of silence and sacrifice.” - K.W. Lee, godfather of Asian American Journalism and Founding president of the Korean American Journalists Association
“A Korean-American girl comes of age in the family gas station, where she rings up sales for pimps, hookers, and cops, learning math in the process, and reading Anne of Green Gables on breaks. In 1992, the LA riots erupt, and the station nearly goes down in flames. From her unusual vantage point, Carol Park has emerged to tell a brave and compelling tale about a little-known side of Los Angeles. Now, on the 25th anniversary of the riots, the time has come." - Deanne Stillman, author of Twentynine Palms: A True Story of Murder, Marines and the Mojave
About the Book
When the Los Angeles Riots began April 29, 1992, 12-year-old Carol K. Park was working weekends in her mother’s gas station in Compton, a suburb of Los Angeles.
The bulletproof booth that shielded the young cashier from physical harm could not protect her from simmering racial tensions that ignited after the acquittal of four white and Hispanic Los Angeles police officers in the beating of a black motorist. A total of 53 people died in the riots, thousands more were injured, and damage to businesses – particularly those owned by Korean and other Asian immigrants – and other property topped $1 billion before the violence ended on May 4.
Park recalls the “melting pot of violence and discrimination” she experienced in her youth in “Memoir of a Cashier: Korean Americans, Racism and Riots.” The book was published by the Young Oak Kim Center for Korean American Studies at the University of California, Riverside on February 1, 2017.
In the wake of continuing racial violence, “it’s important to continue the discussion and foster understanding through dialogue and publications such as this book,” said Edward T. Chang, director of the YOK Center and professor of ethnic studies at UCR. “The story of the Korean American experience before, during, and after the L.A. Riots, as told through Carol’s memoir, offers a platform for us to continue the discourse on race relations and ethnic identity. This is a significant story to tell, especially as we approach the 25th anniversary of the Los Angeles Riots. The YOK Center is proud to publish this book.”
“Memoir of a Cashier” is the second publication of the YOK Center and features an emerging voice in the field of Korean American Studies, Chang said. Park is a researcher at the YOK Center, filmmaker, and former award-winning journalist whose memoir captures the Korean American life and perspective with honesty, he said.
The book chronicles Park’s early life when she worked as a cashier at her family’s gas station in Compton during the 1990s. While ringing up sales from behind bulletproof glass windows, Park witnessed shootings, murders, and violence. Subject to racism and discrimination, Park candidly recalls her experiences and her journey to finding her Korean American identity.
“As a young girl, I had no idea that my Korean heritage mattered so much until the 1992 L.A. Riots made me realize, I am Korean American, born with a dual identity, whether I cared to acknowledge it or not,” Park said. “My parents’ generation had no voice during those tumultuous times and I realized, we have to stand up, speak up, and make ourselves heard and seen, otherwise, like a drifting log, we’ll be swept away by the currents of discrimination, the tides of violence, and the storms of oppression. I was compelled to write this book because I wanted to give voice to the Korean American community from a bird’s-eye-view.”
Park intricately weaves the story of Korean Americans through her family’s experience. K.W. Lee, the godfather of Asian American journalism, hailed the memoir as powerful, “I found myself fighting not only tears, but rage, fear, and every emotion you can think of as I turned the pages of this memoir,” Lee said. “Carol Park is destined to become the first and last line of defense for her heroic mother’s generation of silence and sacrifice.” - UC Riverside Press Release 2017