한 [Han/恨]
In extension of my paper on jeong (정), I look into another unique Korean concept, that of Han (한).The two are deeply connected and therefore require each other to fully understand both of them.
*Warning: I duly note that this essay may contain graphic contents.
Entering Note:
Han (한) is often called the “Korean rage.” As I wrote this essay, I began to question how much “Korean-ness” I embody, because so much of han was even new to me. Han is considered “an inherent part of being Korean. Some say it runs in their [Korean people’s] blood and is embedded in their DNA.” (Kim, 2020) Han is an indefinable emotion or almost a spiritual energy of resentment, sorrow, pain, regret, grief, anger, emptiness, or grudge that is repressed and embedded deeply inside a person, a psychological and pneumatic energy. In that sense, similar to jeong, han affects the relationship and connection of people as seen in another Korean word, Inn gahn (인간), which means human, a combination word of inn, meaning person and gahn, meaning between. In the literal sense, human in Korean means “in between persons” emphasizing the togetherness and relationships. There is definitely an etymological responsibility and concept that is given of how people should connect, embrace, share and love.
Han is introduced in two streams: jeong han and won han. I will define and discuss each of them using various case studies in an attempt to cover the wide-ranging definition of han. I will also look at arts, culture, and various entertainment in today’s world through the lens of han.
Jeong Han I. In the Lives of the Living: In Parent and Child Relationship
Jeong han is visible in relationships between people who share strong emotions of jeong such as family, or close friends. Jeong is an emotion of “feeling, love, sentiment, passion, human nature, sympathy, heart,” (Chung and Cho, Significance Of “Jeong” In Korean Culture And Psychotherapy.) that “permeate virtually all aspects of Korean life” (Samson, “Korea Has a Unique Kind of Love That is Extremely Difficult to Explain to Foreigners.”) Intense jeong han is especially likely to occur when the people with whom you shared it die. For example, the pain of losing your child, or the death of your parents, or even a friend that you share this intimate emotion with, is indescribable. In grief, one often develops mixed emotions of resentment, longing, sorrow, and emptiness.
But the jeong han relationship is not limited only to the deceased. Jong Park defines the relationship between Korean students and their parents as an example in his dissertation, “The Experience of Elderly Koreans’ Han and Its Implication for Spiritual Care: In The Canadian Context Spiritual”. Many Korean parents have control over their children, This is because in Korea parents consider their children’s success as their own success. Conversely, their children’s failure is also their own. This results in parents controlling their children’s lives very often without mutual consent. It is not surprising that Korean parents are addressed as the mother or father of a given child, rather than their own names. Parents try desperately to make their children stand out, filling their days with countless academic after school programs that create a burden difficult even for college students to handle. Most young Korean students go along with their parents’ wishes, desperately trying to meet their expectations.
These roles and responsibilities that are expected of both parents and the children alike often become problematic when the children are grown and preparing to go to college or find a career. The children have a hard time trying to understand what may possibly be the most essential profundity of one’s life — existing as an individual entity. The children start to question who they are and what they feel passionate about, what they want to do in life and what makes them happy — essential but rather complex questions.
The jeong han relationship is clearly visible in this case of Korean parents and students where the parents make certain choices in “excessive anxiety about their children’s wellbeing.” (Park, “The Experience of Elderly Koreans’ Han and Its Implication for Spiritual Care: In The Canadian Context Spiritual.”) Although parents’ intentions are genuine, they don’t give the children the opportunity to learn vital life skills — independence, social connection, individuality and so on.
Nowadays, the attitudes of younger parents are changing and yet the idea of a parent’s success and failure being entwined with that of their own children appears to be something that is deeply embedded in Korean culture. But the gradual change in parenting can also be seen as a result of jeong han relationship between the parents and children of the previous generation who understand that children are under a lot of pressure, because they themselves were pushed by their parents into tremendous responsibility.
Jeong Han II. Deceased Spirits: Eternal search for family, Nam Il Paik
Both my maternal and paternal grandparents come from regionally Northern part of Korea. They fled to the South and settled there after the Korean War broke out in 1950. When my maternal grandfather, Nam Il Paik passed away in 2008, we felt even more great responsibility to find his family whom he searched for all his life. For the rest of his life, he searched for ways to reunite with his long-lost brother and sister, who had remained in the North since the war. Because it was in the 80s when North and South Korea were especially hostile against each other, there were no official or governmental organization set up. Both of my grandmother and grandfather personally paid a lot of money to a broker in an effort to have them search for his family. During the negotiation process in effort to find them and see them there were a lot of robbing and swindling by the broker — taking the money and not giving false information about the family. It was truly a false hope for my grandfather. He was never able to find them until he died in 2008. And now that he has passed away, gone on to another realm, his longing to reunite with his family remains as his unresolved han.
To this day, I still wonder about his spirit and where it might be, if it is in search for his lost family in this world or another. Or perhaps, he roams as a lost soul waiting for the day when we, the rest of his family, will finally resolve his han by finding his family across the Military Demarcation Line.
Jeong Han III. The Deceased Spirits: Lost Soul, Korean Folklores
In Korean folklore it is said that a spirit of the deceased often wanders around in this world that we live in, failing to have ascended to the world beyond or world above. The failed ascension of these spirits is a result of the unfulfilled han that remains deep in their hearts.
One example that Jong Park mentions in his dissertation is Mong-dal-gui-shin (몽달귀신), a bachelor ghost. Mong-dal-gui-shin is a male ghost who died before having the experience of marriage or a sexual relationship. These bachelor ghosts roam the material world with a deeply-seeded han of never having had an intimate relationship, which in turn creates Won Han towards, for example, anyone who caused his death (depending on the situation). Mong-dal-gui-shin’s han is only resolved through posthumous marriage or ghost marriage, in which case the bachelor ghost marries Son-gak-ssi (손각시), a maiden ghost. Son-gak-ssi also has a deep han having died a virgin without getting married. These maiden ghosts are said to haunt living women who are coming of age of age and are preparing to get married.
The han of mong-dal-gui-shin and son-gas-ssi can be related to Sigmund Freud’s concept of libido because These spirits definitely have repressed desire for sexual intercourse. The way they haunt the living, seeking to resolve their han is through sexual intercourse with a living being. After all, one of han’s characteristics is that it is a “clustered entity, something is suppressed in one’s psyche as unfulfilled human desire.” (Park, “The Experience of Elderly Koreans’ Han and Its Implication For Spiritual Care: In The Canadian Context Spiritual.”)
Melanie Klein’s theory of depressive anxiety, a development stage an infant “experiences after the first three to four months due to its fear of the loss of a loved object such as the mother’s breast, becomes the source of” jeong han (Lee, The Exploration Of The Inner Wounds-Han). In this sense, jeong han also works in the similar psychoanalytic measures in that it shares the mixture of both jeong, a positive concept and han, a negative energy and that usually the person who is experiencing it goes through a sudden loss of someone or something he/she loved as the infants do during with mother’s breasts during this development stage.
Won Han I. Korea and Japan: The Sworn Enemies, “The Battle of Tokyo”
Won han is emotions of “grudge, hate, and vengefulness,”(Park, “The Experience of Elderly Koreans’ Han and Its Implication for Spiritual Care: In The Canadian Context Spiritual.”) that very often comes with a strong desire for revenge.
Certain Korean emotions that have developed over the course of history can be an example of won han, beginning in 1910 when the real horror of Japanese rule over the Peninsula began. Until 1945 when the Japanese surrendered at the end of World War II, Korea and the lives of the Koreans were completely taken over by Japan. Some 100,000 Japanese families settled in Korea on land that had been taken over and given to them by the Japanese authorities. Major changes took place in Koreans’ daily lives as well.
Usage of Korean newspapers, education, oral and written language, and religion were strictly forbidden. Koreans were subject to forced labors, experiments, and discrimination for medical treatment by the Japanese. They burnt over 200,000 Korean historical documents, “essentially wiping out the historical memory of Korea.” (Blakemore, “How Japan Took Control Of Korea.”) Koreans were also forced to serve the Japanese Emperor under the pretext that Christianity, which pervaded Korea during the time, was a religion of the past and needed modernization. About 450,000 Koreans were forced into labor during World War II. During this same time, about 200,000 girls were kidnapped and taken to work at brothels as “comfort women” serving Japanese soldiers (“E-Museum of The Victims of Japanese Military Sexual Slavery.”).
There were many independence activists who were arrested by the Japanese while fighting for Korean independence and eventually tortured to death. On March 1st, 1919, 1,500 demonstrations happened all over Korea (later known as the March 1st Movement), where many activists were arrested, tortured, and brutally killed. Water tortures in which the Japanese tied them up side down and poured boiling water on them, forcing them to eat coal powder, stuffing them in a small box filled with nails and rolling it around, and sticking bamboo sticks in the fingernails were only few of the many unimaginable, inhumane acts of brutality they endured.. And this was all because they were fighting for their mother country, a place they should have been free to call home.
Korea was finally liberated in 1945 after the United States attacked two cities in Japan, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, with atomic bombs, and Japan surrendered during the final phase of World War II.
Understanding the historical context, it is not so strange that Korea and Japan remain sworn enemies to this day. Korea always has this won han towards Japan. Although it is more vivid in the psychology of the elderly, who actually experienced this period of time, even today Korea seeks their retribution — most visibly in sports.
When Korea plays Japan in a sports match, the atmosphere intensifies around the whole country. Korean sports anchors always emphasize the fact that the game is a rivalry game, and Korea must win. Just before the World Cup of 1998, Korean and Japanese relations hit an especially low point. The Japanese prime minister, Tomiichi Murayama stated publicly that the 1910 Japanese invasion was enacted under legal legitimacy. The situation with Japan was so bad that Young-sam Kim, the Korean president at the time even said, we have to “teach Japan a lesson.” This intensity was brought directly to the soccer field in Tokyo, Japan, where the two countries met against each other to be eligible to participate in the World Cup. Korea was losing to Japan by a score of 1–0 until during the latter half of the game, when Korea reversed the score by 2–1. It was a golden decision of the Director Beom Geun Cha, to replace another player with
Jung Won Seo three minutes after losing a goal to Japan. The director’s strategy to attack from the sides worked perfectly when a miraculous heading by Seo made it into the goal, followed by a reversal shot by Lee Min-sung, 42 minutes into the final half. Although the psychic wounds left behind by the wartime atrocities will never fade, and the pain of losing the final World Cup tournament cannot compare to the pain the Japanese inflicted upon Koreans, this truly was the historical moment where the repressed won han towards Japan was released in form of a sport — vengeance ritual. A remark made by the sports anchor became the most famous quote from the tournament: “Fuji Mountain is collapsing.”
[Today’s World] Han in Pop Culture I: K-Drama, Master’s Sun
Korean pop culture also frequently references han. There are many of Korean television series that deal with ghost spirits and their unfulfilled han. Master’s Sun for instance, showcases a female protagonist, Gong Sil Tae, who sees dead spirits that are yet to be ascended because of the han that they still possess. Tae, even though she herself is scared, always risks the danger of losing her body (because whenever she sleeps or in an unconscious state, the spirit takes over her body) in order to help the deceased spirit resolve their han. The drama shows different kinds of spirits who have all different stories therefore have all different hans. But the main han is that of the male protagonist, Joong Won Joo who was abducted when he was a high school student after losinghis girlfriend to a car explosion. And Tae, who frequently sees his childhood girlfriend, helps unveil the mystery of the killer (abductor) and solve the hidden conspiracy hidden behind Joo’s accident.
Then in the end, now that her han is resolved, the spirit of the girlfriend who never left Joo’s side since her death finally finds peace and leaves this world into the sky.
[Today’s World] Han in Pop Culture I: Hotel del Luna
One other example that deals with han is a TV drama called, Hotel del Luna. This drama is about a special hotel that only dead spirits can find and stay. It is a place for the deceased souls to stay until their han in this world is resolved and they are prepared to ascend. It is the duty of the host of the hotel, the female protagonist, Man Wol Jang, to see them out their way to the other world. Jang is a person of a different era whose time has stopped and therefore stays as someone who is neither dead nor alive. Throughout the drama, she has great han or remorse for this. She is in this state of limbo because she did evil deeds in her time, and she is paying her debt by providing peace to the spirits’ who are resolving their hans.
In the show, spirits use special equipment like the “Phantasm Call,” where a spirit may place a phone call in which they will appear in the living person’s dream as a phantasm, as a way to resolve han. This provides them a chance to say and fulfill their duty on earth before they ascend. Ultimately, Jang is the last guest to stay at the hotel that the male protagonist, the hotel manager, Chan Sung Koo, a human, has to see out. Jang’s limbo state is a punishment by a deity who made her pay for all her sins she committed in her lifetime — murdering and killing many people. She has to learn to appreciate the existence of people and their preciousness. If not, she will turn into a form of nothingness — a total annihilation of the self, without having the chance to ascend. To ascend, in this drama means to cross the Sam do cheon bridge which is apparently so immeasurably long that as you cross it, you forget all the memories that you have in this world.
The drama is intended for light entertainment but it nonetheless makes you contemplate the possible place of pneuma in another realm in which spirits with unforgettable or unfulfilled han seem to continue to live. It also raises the importance of considering and contemplating the way in which one lives. It posits questions about whether this life that we are all living right now may merely be a phase of a long unknown journey of one’s pneuma — symbolically reflected through the endless Sam do cheon bridge.
[Today’s World] Han in Pop Culture II: Arirang, BTS’s K-Concert in Paris
Besides Korean dramas, of course, there are plenty of songs from traditional folk to more modern and contemporary that utilize han as a source of creation. But the most symbolic is Arirang.
Arirang is a national folk song that was sung by Koreans during the rough times of poverty, war, and division. It is a cultural form which embodies the true spirit of Koreans.
Different versions of Arirang are sung based on the different regions of Korea (one can be found here: https://youtu.be/5xGSngr275c). The Korean Traditional Performing Arts Foundation defines it as “culture of sharing, revealing that we are one.”
Oneness relates tightly with concept of jeong which is a deep seated “attachment, bond, affection, or even bondage.” (Chung and Cho, Significance of “Jeong’’ In Korean Culture and Psychotherapy.). Arirang is a song that people sang to stick together in the times of hardships, happiness, and any emotions that they share nationally as one. The lyrics of Arirang reveal the han of the Koreans who had to suffer a long history of pain and suffering caused by numerous foreign invasions dating back to the era of the Three Kingdom (37 BC~562 AD).* The lyrics can be translated as follows (This is one of many versions of Arirangs):
(*During the early days, Korea was divided into three kingdoms and Gaya in forms of federation.)
<Refrain>
Arirang, Arirang, Arariyo,
Arirang Pass is the long road you go.
If you leave and forsake me, my own,
Ere three miles you go, lame you’ll have grown.
<Refrain>
Wondrous time, happy time — let us delay;
Till night is over, go not away.
Arirang Mount is my Tear-Falling Hill,
So seeking my love, I cannot stay still.
The brightest of stars stud the sky so blue;
Deep in my bosom burns bitterest rue.
Man’s heart is like water streaming downhill;
Woman’s heart is well water — so deep and still.
Young men’s love is like pinecones seeming sound,
But when the wind blows, they fall to the ground.
Birds in the morning sing simply to eat;
Birds in the evening sing for love sweet.
When man has attained to the age of a score,
The mind of a woman should be his love.
The trees and the flowers will bloom for aye,
But the glories of youth will soon fade away.
*Translation by “Folk Songs — Arirang — Lyrics — English — K-Pop Rocks”. K-Pop Rocks. Accessed 27 March 2020. https://k-pop.rocks/song/6715/.
The sorrow of being separated, having to part with your loved one is mournfully reflected in the lyrics.
Today, Arirang is heard in various popular forms and mediums. Korean pop music has become more visible and widespread, thanks in part to a Korean boy and girl group of singers. One of the boy groups, BTS, has successfully entered the global world with their music, heard by 700million viewers all around the world. During their 2016 concert in Paris, BTS performed Arirang (Link here: https://youtu.be/vwc5zTayVJw). They reinterpreted the song into a much more contemporary and hip version, combining it with hip hop style dance moves in their performance. The concert ended with all the other Korean groups who had performed at the concert, singing Arirang together onstage, reflecting the spirit of the song joining together as one to create harmony.
[Today’s World] Han in Pop Culture III: Filmmaker, Ki-duk Kim’s Acceptance Speech in Venice
In 2012, Korean film director Ki-duk Kim had the honor of receiving the Golden Lion award at the Venice Film Festival for his movie Pieta. It was Korea’s first time winning an award at one of the three major film festivals of Cannes, Venice, and Berlin. His acceptance speech for this prize went viral. Instead of saying the traditional thank yous, and expressing his emotions for receiving this award, he sang Arirang. It was unusual for an acceptance speech but as a Korean, it successfully delivered a message of his emotional state at the time. Kim, himself later explained that Arirang is a song that “Koreans sing when we are sad, when we feel alone, when we feel desperate, but also when we’re happy.” (King, “Kim Ki-Duk’s ‘Pieta’ Wins Golden Lion at Venice Film Festival.”)
At the moment, it was clear that he felt all the hopes, desires and hans of various types that he must have had as a film director was being compensated with this award. His singing Arirang can be seen as an expression of his han, the desire to make successful films, hard decisions he had to make, days and nights of effort put to the film, being resolved through this very award.
Korean children don’t learn Arirang by written text or recordings. As it is a song delivered through having sung by nearly all grandparents and parents from generation to generation, it is heard and learned subliminally from a very young age. Now with the development of technology and mass media, Arirang is much more accessible to a public beyond Korea. It became even more ubiquitous through entertainments and cultures that people consume — music festivals, busking performances on the streets of Seoul City, a song sung by the elderly while working in the field of rural farms. Through these various formats, Koreans release their hans through the traditional Korean song. Arirang does not cease to reveal itself as a form of identity, emotion, psychology and spirit of all of the young and old and male and female Koreans.
Closing Note:
Han is psychological and spiritual exhaustion of repressed emotions of desire, sorrow, resentment and regret. However, it is a complex term that cannot be simply defined. It is a pneumatic experience that affects the whole life, death and even the self.
Han is closely related to jeong, a “feeling, love, sentiment, passion, human nature, sympathy, heart,” that includes more basic emotions such as “attachment, bond, affection, or even bondage,” (Chung and Cho, Significance of “Jeong” In Korean Culture and Psychotherapy.) because the primary reason for the sharing of jeong is what also causes han for people. This concludes that throughout time and in history there are shared psychological phenomena that create emotional attachments and connections between people. In that sense, Koreans, more so than others, believe that all people are intertwined — one.
And in the 21st century today, this spirit is still very vibrantly alive in forms of popular culture, mass media, and information. And it holds people together and helps us grow as part of a global society.
Reference
Text
- Kim, E., 2020. There’s A Uniquely Korean Word For Rage And Regret. So Why Had I Never Heard Of It? | CBC Radio. [online] CBC. Available at: <https://www.cbc.ca/radio/docproject/there-s-a-uniquely-korean-word-for-rage-and-regret-so-why-had-i-never-heard-of-it-1.5118989> [Accessed 21 March 2020].
- Park, J., 2013. The Experience Of Elderly Koreans’ Han And Its Implication for Spiritual Care: In The Canadian Context Spiritual. Wilfrid Laurier University.
- Kim, Jongdae. “Encyclopedia Of Korean Folk Culture”. National Folk Museum Of Korea. Accessed 23 March 2020. http://folkency.nfm.go.kr/kr/topic/detail/2095.
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- Chung, Christopher, and Samson Cho. Significance Of “Jeong” In Korean Culture And Psychotherapy. Ebook. Los Angeles: Harbor-UCLA Medical Center. Accessed 27 March 2020. https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/b492/d8398d95aadefe1cf99f3782621cf6a55cb6.pdf.
- Korean Traditional Performing Arts Foundation. The Story Of Arirang. Video, 2014. https://youtu.be/CxxpFegNLik.
Images
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- 마즈. 일제 강점기때 선조분들이 받은 끔찍한 고문들. Image, 2018. https://youtu.be/mqB3pDls8KQ.
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