The once-dominant Confucian culture—with its emphasis on respect for ancestors, age, and seniority—continues to influence Korean family, work, and social life, albeit to a lesser degree than in the past. In addition to other factors, such as economic status and position in a business hierarchy, age and marital status are among the determinants of relative seniority, and there is some expectation that even between social acquaintances these factors—especially age—will influence relations.

Traditional family life is much involved with rituals marking life-cycle milestones and the observation of holidays and ancestral rites. The most important passages in a person’s life are the completion of a baby’s first 100 days, one’s marriage, and one’s 61st birthday. According to traditional Korean belief, the spirits of the departed do not leave the earth for several generations; thus, deceased parents and grandparents are still considered part of the family. Ancestral rites (cherye) are performed to honor them on death anniversaries and on major holidays. Two of the most important holidays are Seollal (Lunar New Year) and Chuseok (harvest moon festival, often referred to as the Korean Thanksgiving), both observed according to the lunar calendar. These are marked by the gathering of families in the ancestral hometown or at the home of the head of the family. Traditional elements of holiday celebrations include the formal, respectful greeting of elders, the preparation and eating of special foods such as specific types of rice cakes (dduk), and the wearing of traditional dress (hanbok).

Hanbok was the everyday dress of Koreans for thousands of years before the opening of the country to the West. Western dress has supplanted the hanbok almost everywhere, but even urban dwellers commonly still wear it on special occasions such as important family meetings, holidays, weddings, and funerals. Women’s and girls’ formal hanbok consists of several layers of undergarments under a colorful, long billowing skirt and short jacket held closed with a long tie. The men’s and boys’ version consists of full-legged pants and a long, wide-sleeved jacket. There are different hanbok for special occasions, such as weddings, babies’ birthdays, and 61st-birthday celebrations.

Food is an important part of Korean cultural identity. In the diets of even the most Westernized urban dwellers, traditional Korean cuisine, which emphasizes grains—especially rice—and fresh vegetables, continues to occupy a dominant role even amid the popularity of pizza, hamburgers, sushi, Chinese food, and other foreign dishes. A Korean meal generally consists of rice, soup or stew, and a number of side dishes, almost invariably among them kimchi, or pickled vegetables. Such is the importance of kimchi in the national diet that an estimated 160 or more varieties have been identified, and there is a museum in Seoul dedicated to the dish. The most common type is the spicy baechu (Chinese cabbage) kimchi. Although many families today buy most of their kimchi in supermarkets, many others still make their own. The traditional practice of kimjang, in which villages and families devoted several days in the autumn to preparing the winter supply of kimchi, is celebrated in such annual kimjang festivals as that held in the southwestern city of Gwangju. Other popular Korean dishes are bibimbap (rice mixed with vegetables, egg, a spicy sauce, and sometimes meat), jjajangmyeon (noodles in a black-bean sauce), bulgogi (marinated meat grilled over charcoal), and samgyetang (a soup of stewed whole chicken stuffed with rice and ginseng), which is eaten as a restorative, particularly during hot weather.

The arts

Traveling troupes that performed shadow or puppet plays, did acrobatics and juggling, danced and sang, and performed versions of court or popular entertainments were long a feature of Korean village and provincial town life. Among the oldest forms of Korean dance and theater performance is the masked dance. In addition to professional groups, villagers in different areas of the country formed folk groups to perform their own local versions of the sandae masked play and dances. Today the sandae is performed by villagers in Gyeonggi and South Gyeongsang provinces as well as in parts of North Korea. Performers are males. Masks cover either the whole head or the face and are made from paper or gourds or, occasionally, are carved from wood. They are boldly painted to represent the stock characters of the play: monks, shaman, noblemen, young dancing girl, and others.

Pansori, a sung narrative accompanied by virtuoso drumming, was created by professional performers during the Joseon period. Either a man or a woman could be the solo singer-dancer, and the performer was often a shaman. The current repertoire of six long stories was codified in the 19th century by the performer Shin Jae-hyo.

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Traditional folk dances, some of them ancient, survive, and several—the mask dance (cheoyongmu) of the Silla kingdom, the crane dance (hakchum) of the Goryeo, and the dance of the spring nightingale (chunaengjeon)—are supported and promoted by the government as designated “intangible cultural properties.” Folk music, accompanied by traditional musical instruments such as the gayageum (a 12-stringed zither) and the changgo (an hourglass-shaped drum), has undergone a revival and is performed at ceremonies and festive occasions.

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Korean popular music, or “K-pop,” emerged as an international phenomenon in the 21st century and became one of South Korea’s most visible cultural exports. Hip-hop star Rain was at the forefront of this movement; by 2005 he had expanded on his significant success in the Korean market to dominate the popular music charts across East and Southeast Asia. Rapper PSY was the next breakout star to emerge on the international stage. His satirical hit “Gangnam Style” was a global smash thanks to its catchy beats and an absurd music video that amassed billions of views on YouTube. Perhaps the most visible K-pop artists, though, were boy bands such as BTS, which combined elements of electronic dance music and hip-hop with impeccable choreography and coordinated outfits. BTS won a massive following around the world, and in May 2018 they became the first K-pop artists to reach number one on the U.S. Billboard 200 album chart.

One of the earliest examples of Korean painting is found in the mural paintings in the royal tombs of Goguryeo. The best-known mural paintings are those in the Ssangyong Tomb at Yonggang, located in North Korea. Ceramic arts became highly developed, flourishing during the Goryeo period—when Korea produced some of its most notable examples of fine celadon ware—and diffusing to Japan. Every province continues to produce its distinctive ceramic ware.

Korean architecture shows Chinese influence, but it is adapted to local conditions, utilizing wood and granite, the most abundant building materials. Beautiful examples are found in old palaces, Buddhist temples, dolmens, and Buddhist pagodas. Western-style architecture became common from the 1970s, fundamentally changing the urban landscape, but some old-style wooden houses (hanok) still exist even in Seoul, and the traditional Korean floor-heating system (ondol) continues to be used in new construction.