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Tae Kwon Do 태권도 Tay Kwahn Doh

Hand-and-Foot Combat

Korea, like other Asian countries, has a long history of martial arts, particularly those that were developed for use in self-defense and hand-to-hand combat without weapons. The reason for this traditional emphasis on weaponless self-defense was simply that ordinary Koreans of old, like other Asians, were generally not allowed to own or carry weapons and needed an effective way of protecting themselves because they were regularly subject to attack by brigands and other lawless individuals.

Another reason for developing skill in fighting without weapons was that warriors and others who were allowed to carry arms were often attacked when they were unarmed or were caught off guard and had no time to use their weapons. In addition, weaponless martial arts were used for physical exercise and in competition for positions in the royal court.

Korea’s most popular martial art is tae kwon do (tay kwahn doh), usually written in roman letters as one word, taekwondo, which literally means “the way of the hands and feet”—the “weapons” that are used the most in the art. “Some weapons, notably short sticks, long poles, knives, and swords, were traditionally used by taekwondo practitioners, but the focus was on weaponless defense,” notes American taekwondo master Ernest G. Beck.

Taekwondo is somewhat similar to China’s kung fu, which was created and made famous by priests of the Shaolin Temple, and Okinawa’s karate do (kah-rah-tay doh), or “the way of the empty hand,” but the Korean art developed independently of these well-known fighting methods. Taekwondo has been practiced in Korea for around two thousand years and is therefore much older than karate.

Like kung fu, taekwondo was based more on the use of mental energy than raw physical power and on knowing exactly where to strike opponents to stun or kill them with a single blow. The “secret” to the power of taekwondo is said to be ki (kee), which, according to Asian philosophy, is the cosmic energy that animates all life. Practitioners of the art of taekwondo mentally concentrate this energy in their hands or feet so that each blow is more like an explosion. Adds taekwondo master Ernest Beck: “Considerable effort is put into training the hands and feet to move with incredible speed, which dramatically multiplies the energy that is released when they strike an object.” This burst of energy penetrates deep into the target area in a shock wave that can cause considerable damage.

Of course the primary goal of present-day taekwondo masters is not to teach their students how to kill or maim opponents. It is to teach them physical and mental coordination, discipline, self-respect, and respect for others.

The world certifying body for taekwondo is the Korea Taekwondo Association (KTA), which was founded in 1961 and is headquartered in Seoul, Korea. In 1973 the KTA established the World Taekwondo Federation to train and certify foreign students in traditional taekwondo. However, over the years the World Taekwondo Federation moved strongly toward teaching the martial art as a sport and succeeded in getting the art admitted to the Olympic Games as a demonstration sport in 1988 and 1992. In 1996 the art was officially accepted by the Olympic Committee as a medaled sport beginning with the 2000 games.

In the meantime, the Korea Taekwondo Association, the parent entity, has remained a traditional martial arts organization. To maintain the teaching of taekwondo as a traditional martial art, the Korea Taekwondo Association has designated a number of American Taekwondo Master Instructors as representatives who are authorized to certify black belts in traditional taekwondo. This program has met with considerable success in the United States, resulting in other traditional Korean martial arts schools instituting similar certification programs.

Such recognized Korean organizations as the Korean Hapkido Federation and the Republic of Korea Yudo Association work closely with American masters to maintain the teaching of the traditional ways. Considerable support for these programs has also come from the Korean Martial Arts Instructors Association in Korea, which provides coordination and training in the United States by Senior Master Instructors from the respective school systems in Korea.

Foreign taekwondo practitioners may become members of such Korean organizations as the Korea Tang Soo Do Moo Duk Kwan Society and the Korea Ancient Martial Arts Society.

A Hanmadang (Hahn-mah-dahng), or “Martial Arts Festival,” has been staged each year in Korea since 1962 and in the United States since 1995. Practitioners from all of the martial arts are invited to participate in the annual festivals, competing in their respective forms—poomse, hung, kata, sets, etc.—for trophies. There is no “free-fighting” (sport fighting) in the Hanmadang. The primary aim of the festivals is to promote the study and practice of the traditional martial ways.

Taekwondo, also an official event in the Asian Games, is taught as a sport in more than one hundred countries around the world. Although there is body contact in the sports version of the art, it is limited to prevent injury. Master Beck says that another long-term goal among American devotees of taekwondo is to get the teaching of the traditional art established in primary schools and high schools as a standard curriculum. He adds: “More and more people are recognizing that the discipline students learn in traditional taekwondo programs carries over into their school work—their grades go up!—and into their homes—they are more respectful toward their parents and others!”

Visitors in Seoul can see exhibitions of taekwondo at the World Tae Kwon Do Federation headquarters.

The second most popular martial art in Korea is yudo (judo in Japanese), which means “the way of gentleness,” in reference to its emphasis on giving way, being passive, and letting opponents defeat themselves by taking advantage of their moves and turning their strength against them. Yudo was developed in China in ancient times and introduced into Korea in the twelfth century, where it enjoyed a minor boom and then faded away.

However, Koreans did take the art to Japan, where it became a major part of the training of Japan’s famous samurai warrior class which ruled Japan from the latter part of the twelfth century until 1868. When Japan occupied Korea in 1905 and finally annexed the country in 1910, the Japanese occupation forces reintroduced yudo to Koreans by making it a part of the physical and mental education of Korean youths (as part of their overall campaign to Japanize all Koreans).

Yudo is still taught in Korean schools as a sport and is a part of the training of all Korean military and police. A number of Korean judoists have won gold medals in the Olympic Games.

Taedo 태도 Tay-doh

Manners as Morality

Koreans have always associated morality with taedo (tay-doh), or “manners.” Speaking in broad terms, the traditional morality of Koreans was based on absolute conformity to a precise set of rules governing relationships between parents and children and between inferiors and superiors. This Confucian-based etiquette system was not founded on abstract principles that guided Koreans in the decisions they made or in their day-to-day behavior. They had no decisions to ponder, no choices to make.

Virtually everything Koreans were expected and allowed to do was carefully ritualized down to the last small detail. This included all of the mundane actions of life, from sitting, eating, dressing, talking, and working to walking. Any deviation from the established way was glaringly conspicuous and taboo. This social system, which was made the law of the land during the early decades of the Joseon dynasty (1392–1910), was superimposed over a tradition of refined manners that had made Koreans famous for well over two thousand years.

Korea’s original taedo apparently grew out of animistic rituals that were an integral part of daily life—rituals that were designed to please the spirits and keep everyone and everything in harmony with the cosmos. As time passed and the population grew, the elite ruling class added new rules to these ancient rituals in an effort to ensure an obedient citizenry and a harmonious society. Etiquette gradually became equated with ethics, making morality a physical thing that was visible for all to see.

Koreans are no longer bound by the all-encompassing etiquette of the feudal era. But among family members, friends, and acquaintances, their behavior is still distinguished by a level of taedo that is rare outside the Confucian sphere of Asia and adds a special quality and ambience to life in the country. In fact, Korean taedo has a noticeably positive influence on most Westerners who spend more than a few weeks in the country, subtly resulting in their becoming more sensitive about their own behavior and adopting Korean manners to varying degrees. Foreigners who spend several years in Korea, especially if they learn the language and are able to get inside the culture, usually find themselves bowing and behaving very much like Koreans in their more casual personal relationships.

This tendency for foreigners in Korea to take on some of the coloration of the culture has both good and bad aspects. On the positive side, it helps reduce the cultural stress that affects both foreigners and Koreans when they associate with each other. This is often more of a benefit to the Korean side than to the foreign side because associating with foreigners puts un-Westernized Koreans under an exceptionally severe strain, particularly if the burden of communicating in English or some other foreign language is put on them.

The negative aspects of foreigners “going native” range from being very subtle to blatant, but all result from the same thing—the propensity for Koreans to treat foreigners more as they treat other Koreans when the foreigners in question act like Koreans. Some experienced Westerners say this reaction by Koreans can be so detrimental that they deliberately continue “acting like foreigners” no matter how long they have been in Korea, how well they speak the language, or how familiar they are with all of the nuances of Korean behavior. Their rationale is simply that Koreans generally treat foreigners as guests, going out of their way to accommodate them, and are far more tolerant of any transgressions they may commit—something that translates into a major advantage for foreign visitors and residents alike if they do not abuse it.

Another facet of this syndrome is that most Koreans personally do not appreciate the idea of foreigners acting too much like Koreans. To them it is both irrational and impractical because they are acutely aware that traditional Korean etiquette, with all of its obligations, is often so restrictive and burdensome that it no longer makes any sense.

Old-timers say the most practical solution to this challenge is to follow the niceties of Korean taedo in casual personal relationships but to follow Western patterns of behavior in all matters of substance, thereby keeping both the respect and cooperation of Koreans.

Tong Il 통일 Tohng Eel

The Great Reunification Dream

The Korean peninsula first appears in history as the home of several small clan tribes that eventually fused into a number of kingdoms—notably Koguryo, Paekche, Shilla, and Kaya. In the late 600s the Shilla kingdom, located on the southern portion of the peninsula, succeeding in unifying the kingdoms under a single national banner. The peninsula was to remain unified until 1948, when it was divided into North and South Korea as part of the post-World War II conflict between the Soviet Union and the United States.

In 1950 Communist-dominated North Korea invaded South Korea in an attempt to reunite the two halves of the peninsula by force. The United States and other members of the United Nations joined the war on behalf of South Korea. The Soviet Union and China backed North Korea with troops and equipment. The fighting lasted for three years, ending in July 1953.

Both North and South Korea were devastated by the war. More than a million people were killed, and other millions were left homeless and separated from their families. The truce left the two halves of the peninsula in a wary standoff, with each side rearmed by its patrons and the degree of acrimony so virulent, particularly on the part of the North Korean leadership, that it verged on insanity. For the next several decades the passionate desire of most ordinary Koreans for tong il (tohng eel), or “reunification,” remained a frustrating holy grail.

The term tong il took on a life of its own, generating an ongoing debate and endless meetings between North and South Korean representatives, along with their American advisers, that had the aura of a macabre drama constantly on the verge of total violence. These meetings, in the village of Panmunjom less than an hour north of Seoul, with their staged theatrics, became a tourist attraction.

It was not until the early 1990s, when the Soviet Union broke up and East and West Germany were reunited, that North Korean leaders began to show signs of flexibility in their stance on tong il. But by that time it was suspected that North Korea had, or was on the verge of producing, nuclear weapons. This became a new bone of contention that kept the two sides in a bitter stalemate. In the following years there were other calculated signs of progress in the pursuit of tong il, but in each case they turned out to be delaying tactics designed by the Communist leaders of North Korea.

By 1995 the economy of North Korea appeared on the verge of collapse. With aid from Russia, China, and other Eastern Bloc nations greatly reduced, and in some cases stopped altogether, combined with a number of natural disasters, shortages of food and fuel forced the Communist authorities in Pyongang to appeal to the international community for help. This resulted in renewed hope that the leaders of North Korea would be more amenable to tong il. But once again these hopes were in vain.

By 1997 the consensus outside of North Korea appeared to be that barring a revolution by the people of North Korea—a revolution that all or most of the North Korean army would have to support for it to be successful—any tong il would have to take place very gradually over a period of decades. Given the historical acrimony between the northern and southern portions of Korea, even this prediction may be overly optimistic.

In the meantime, tong il remains one of the most politically, economically, and socially sensitive and provocative terms in the Korean language, stirring longings, fears, and anger over this new suffering imposed on Korea by outsiders.