Suffering and Smiling: Daily Life in North Korea
By (Author) Byung-Ho Chung
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
1st October 2024
United States
General
Non Fiction
Asian history
951.93
Hardback
244
Width 157mm, Height 236mm, Spine 23mm
463g
Suffering and Smiling: Daily Life in North Korea, is a field report of North Korean culture based on two decades of the authors personal observation and contact with people. The dichotomy of suffering and smiling becomes a lens through which the author observes the transformation and resilience of North Korean life. The book delves into historical struggles, such as the Arduous March against Imperial Japan and the 1990s famine, juxtaposed with the persistent theme of smiling propagated by the regime.
The author also weaves in the experiences of North Koreans, highlighting their ability to find humor and maintain humanity despite oppressive conditions. Anecdotes, such as spontaneous comments from refugees, showcase the resilience and subversive humor ingrained in North Korean culture. Despite its isolation and nuclear ambitions, the country is undergoing rapid social changes with informal connections to the global capitalist system.
The book provides readers with empathetic glasses to view North Korea while considering its historical trauma and the enduring impact of Korean War. It promises a rich exploration of North Korean life, offering readers a compelling narrative that combines personal experiences, political insights, and cultural analysis. It sets the stage for a comprehensive understanding of a nation often shrouded in mystery and misunderstood by the outside world.
This remarkable, insightful and intimate account of North Korea breaks through the stereotypes to reveal the complexity and contradictions of North Korean life. Byung-Ho Chung's sensitive analysis of North Korea's cultural politics is a poignant reminder of the continuing tragedy of the division of Korea along Cold War lines, and is essential reading for anyone who seeks to make sense of that tragedy. -- Tessa Morris-Suzuki, Australian National University
Anthropologist, educator, humanitarian and activist, Byung-Ho Chung has written a book distilling decades of close observation of, and deep empathy for, the evident suffering and the enigmatic smiles of the North Korean people. Suffering and Smiling: Daily Life in North Korea examines the lives of North Korean refugees in China, those who have resettled in South Korea, and those inside the still isolated country, bearing witness to their protracted march through hardship and famine and their powerful will to survive and draw pleasure where they can find it. In a divided world and across the divided Koreas, Byung-Ho Chungs book seeks to build a bridge of understanding. -- W. Courtland Robinson, Johns Hopkins
Byung-Ho Chung is professor emeritus at Hanyang University, South Korea. He was president of the Korean Society for Cultural Anthropology. He has visited North Korea as well as Chinas borders with North Korea on numerous occasions for humanitarian purposes. As a public intellectual and action anthropologist, he is the founder or co-founder of seven organizations for equality and multiculturalism, and was a special advisor to the president of Korean Red Cross. He is the co-author of North Korea: Beyond Charismatic Politics, R&L, 2012.