Monday, June 18, 2007

Dating and Marrying in North Korea

Here you can read about dating in North Korea and marriage.
When we learned about different class in North Korea, I got the curiosity about the marriage in North Korea. North Korean defectors say that "dating in Pyongyang is liberal" such as going out for movie or zoo. It is a kind of surprising that North Korean couples hold their hands or kiss each other in public. I never imagined about it. For some reason I am only able to imagine North Korean in a army uniform walking in a group with exactly same postures. I guess I was brainwashed about North Korea since I was pretty young but I still think that level of liberty is different not only for marriage but also for dating. I assume that meeting different sex accross the social class is very limited because people get different treatment according to the class.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

I think it is interesting how assumptions can reach into every part of our thoughts about a people, a country, or a lifestyle. The fact that this article was even written goes to show that the authors had the same wonderings- what is dating like in North Korea? Arranged marriages, or some at least, used to have a financial incentive as well. One question to ask would be does the decrease in percentage of arranged marriages equal better economic conditions, or simply a liberalization of choice. I think it could be some of both.

julienne said...

As I was reading my assigned book for the presentations, I came across a section about sex. While this is not specifically dateing, it is a part of it. The book (North Korea: Another Country, Cumings) says "Sex is not a main point of Korean marriage, so you get lots of male philandering and lots of horny housewives". It also says that chastitiy is highly valued. These statements do make sense with the image of North Korea that i had in mind. Hopefully this brings a different perspective as well.