I am a sociocultural anthropologist, writer, and Postdoctoral Scholar at the GW Institute for Korean Studies. I am also a Visiting Scholar at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.
Broadly, my research explores how national imaginaries shape the ways people are racialized, valued, and governed in conflict-affected contexts. My current book project is an ethnography that examines how North Korean diasporic youth in South Korea navigate the politics and semiotics of Korean unification. It is based on my dissertation, which won the 2026 CAE Frederick Erickson Outstanding Dissertation Award.
I have written about schooling and neoliberalism in South Korea, and gendered migration between North Korea and China both in policy-facing and fictional form. More of my recent published work can be found here.
My research has been supported by the National Science Foundation, the National Academy of Education/Spencer Foundation, and the American Anthropological Association, among others.
upcoming ENGAGEMENTS
Nov. 13-15, 2026. Presenting at the CIES Northeast Regional Conference in New York City, NY.
Nov. 20, 2026. Co-organizing and presenting on panel, “State Temporalities: Preparation, Governance, and Conflicts of Time,” at the AAA Annual Meeting, St. Louis, MO.
March 19-21, 2027. Discussant on panel, “Being Korean from the Outside: Drawing and Contesting the Boundaries of Koreanness,” at the AAS Annual Meeting, Boston, MA.
April 17-19, 2027. Presenting on panel at the Global Asias 8 Conference, State College, PA.
academic PAPERS
Um-Lo, Noël. 2026. “From North Korean Migrant to ‘Unification Talent:’ Schools, Human Capital, and Neoliberal Future-Making.” Current Issues in Comparative Education, 29(2): 24-42.
Um-Lo, Noël. 2026. “Brutal Fantasies: Imagining North Korea in the Long Cold War.” Book Review. Journal of Asian Studies, 85(3): 743-745.
Um-Lo, Noël. 2020. “Biopower, mediascapes, and the politics of fear in the age of Covid-19.” City & Society, 32(2): 247-253.
Public / Creative WRITING
Noël Um-Lo takes the page 99 test, CaMP Anthropology Blog, June 2026.
Um-Lo, Noël. 2026. “Your father bought me for 8,000 yuan.” Anthropology and Humanism, 51(1): e70077.
Um-Lo, Noël & Eunsook Jang. 2025. “Slipping through the Cracks in South Korea: The Uncertain Futures for the Children of North Korean Defectors.” Migration Information Source, Migration Policy Institute.