Jon Dunbar is a copy editor at The Korea Times, as well as editor of the Foreign Community page and curator of the Korea Times Archive. If you have suggestions for possible articles, or wish to contribute articles yourself, contact jdunbar@koreatimes.co.kr.
RAS Korea lecture takes aim at early 20th-century vernacular Korean humor
A poster for G.S. Hand's upcoming lecture / Courtesy of Royal Asiatic Society Korea
By Jon Dunbar
There's a lot of information out there about Korean history, whether through academic study, historical sites or even period K-dramas. We know, or at least think we know, how society functioned, how people dressed, where they lived and so on. But was Korea ever funny?
The history of humor in Korea has been largely overlooked by historians. When a visiting professor at Korea University introduced a 1916-published joke book to his class, it got the attention of G.S. Hand, then a grad student, now a professional literature translator.
"I decided to start translating these jokes the moment I saw them because they're hilarious — at least sometimes — and I don't think many people know about them," he said.
"Scholars of Korean modern literature usually study things from later than that, classical literature scholars usually study things from earlier, and neither group is all that interested in humor."
"Kkalkkal Useum" contains 72 short humorous texts that were considered funny in 1916, although many are likely much older, with clear indications they date back to the 1392-1910 Joseon Dynasty.
"A lot of the humor is about skewering authority figures, and some of that is very funny. In addition to the anti-authoritarian streak, there's also a lot of poop and fart humor, and a lot of wordplay on Chinese characters, which for me is more interesting than laugh-out-loud funny," said Hand, who won the Fiction Grand Prize from The Korea Times' Modern Korean Literature Translation Awards in 2022 for his translation of Kim Ae-ran's short story, “The Beginning of Winter.”
He added that many of the jokes in "Kkalkkal Useum" are odd and unexpected, citing one titled “Hearing That Made His Nostrils Flare,” in which a Christian illustrates that Confucian rituals are absurd by trying to feed his dead donkey grass.
"It begins with an image of the Christian dragging the donkey's body out into the mountains to discard it, which is a heck of an entrance," Hand said.
Many of the jokes have become outdated and some are no longer funny, to the point that some of them come across as anti-humor. But they reveal what people of the time considered to be normal, acceptable or unacceptable in casual daily life. Hand also emphasizes how they puncture stereotypes.
"TV and movies show a version of Joseon Korean in which everything is grand and serious all the time, and the royalty are the only people who matter. Figures in humor are less impressive but more relatable," he said.
Some of the jokes are still funny, and their influence and humor techniques can be found in comedy created closer to the modern day.
"I've seen jokes from 'Kkalkkal Useum' reworked in humor columns in Korean newspapers from the 1950s through the 1970s. These jokes were popular in their era and seemingly had some staying power," he said.
Hand has finished translating all the jokes of "Kkalkkal Useum," almost half of which have been published in The Korea Times.
Hand studied translation at the Literature Translation Institute of Korea and modern Korean literature at Korea University.
He will give a lecture for Royal Asiatic Society (RAS) Korea, during which he will introduce the materials he's translated, look at how they portray different family and social relationships and offer a few ideas from humor theory as alternative explanations for how the humor functions.
The lecture will be held Sept. 8 at 7:20 p.m. at the fifth-floor conference room of Fast Five Tower near Seoul City Hall. Entry costs 10,000 won, or 5,000 won for students of all ages with valid student ID, and is free for RAS Korea members.
Visit raskb.com for more information.