Julia Weatherford's Seoul Serendipity

Senior Julia Weatherford entered OU as a biomedical engineering major, but her longtime love of different cultures was pulling her in a different direction: toward international studies. “At some point in the first two weeks I realized, ‘I don’t want to do this,’” she says, “so I delved into my prior interests. I had a background of loving different cultures, and I always had an interest in traveling abroad. I just felt that [international studies] would be a good fit personality-wise.”

Weatherford, who is originally from San Antonio, Texas, chose to double major in international studies and economics and minor in German, a decision that has led to research opportunities, a semester abroad, an internship with CIS Risk Management, and an award. In spring 2022, she received the OU Libraries Undergraduate Research Award, which includes a $1,000 scholarship and the publication of her project on OU Libraries ShareOK database. Her project, an interactive paper and StoryMap titled “Seoul: A Dilemma of Modernity or Affordability,” originated in IAS Assistant Professor Emma Colven’s spring 2021 course — Land and Environment in Asia.

“The project is about Seoul’s real estate crisis, which has been going on over the past few years,” Weatherford explains. She notes that the city’s rapid growth in the 1970s and ’80s started the trend, exacerbated in recent decades, of people being displaced and priced out of housing. “My project goes into exploring the causes of a lot of people that are displaced in Seoul, why housing is so expensive, and I also go into what displacement and gentrification are. It’s an overall exploration of how Seoul has grown and what lies in the future. We don’t really know what’s going to happen, because there are a lot of challenges related to overpopulation and the aging society.”

Weatherford also has the distinction of being the first to win the OU Libraries Award with a digital project. She created her work with the platform ArcGIS StoryMaps, which she learned to use in Colven’s class with the help of an OU library tutorial. Weatherford enthusiastically recommends the tool to other students looking for an interesting new way to publish. “It’s an interactive way to show off your research and show your creativity,” she says. "I’m not a very artistic person, and using that platform really helped me to develop new skills and gave me the ability to draw maps and incorporate videos into my research. It’s a lengthy process, but the results were just awesome.”

Weatherford’s interest in Seoul didn’t stop when she completed her project. In a twist of fate, she ended up enrolling in a study abroad program at Korea University in Seoul for the fall 2021 semester through affiliate provider TEAN (Education Abroad Network). “Originally, I was supposed to study abroad in Germany because I’m a German minor. Those plans kind of fell through — COVID changed all my plans. But I don’t think it was a bad change,” she says. “I ultimately decided to go to South Korea because I thought the language was cool, the cultural aspects I really enjoyed, and it was such a pretty country. I’m glad I was able to adventure and take the chance.”

While in Seoul, Weatherford realized her research project had provided her with a much-needed base of knowledge for one of her courses in particular, Government and Civil Society in Korea. “Our professor was actually someone who worked in the Korean government until a few years ago, and he was probably one of the smartest professors I’ve ever talked to,” she notes. “For one of our projects, we had to present on something that we would like to see changed in the Korean government. Something we talked about in my group was the aging society, which reminded me a lot of my project. So I was able to teach other students in the class about the research that I did back here, and that kind of gave us the basis for our project.” Weatherford also took advantage of additional resources at OU Libraries while she was abroad to help with the group project. Her experience is a great example of how an international studies education from OU lays a strong foundation for a more in-depth study of a particular region or global issue.

While in Seoul, Weatherford took four English-language courses — the aforementioned government course as well as courses on Korean cinema, East Asian economies and postwar Japan and East Asia — and lived in dorms with other international students. She also had the opportunity to take excursions to places like Gyeongbokgung Palace and Gamcheon Cultural Village in Busan. From the food to the friends to the skills she acquired, Weatherford has nothing but rave reviews of her experience. “I really just enjoyed meeting people from everywhere — I think I met people from 15-16 countries,” she says. “And I also gained Korean language skills — learned through survival, which is great! Everyday language was one of the biggest things I enjoyed about the experience.” W

eatherford is currently working with OU Libraries to help preserve her story map and keep it accessible. She’s spending her senior year in Norman, though she’d love to return to Seoul one day, perhaps to complete an internship after graduation or to further her research. “I would love to travel to Seoul again sometime and expand on the research I’ve done, but as of now I’m not sure,” she says. “I think it’s a great starting point for something I would like to do in the future.”

Julia Weatherford is a senior international studies/economics major at OU. You can read her award-winning research project at https://bit.ly/3Ursrac