Rural Life and Customs according to the testimony of Pak Myǒngsǒ

This bachelor's thesis focuses on life and traditions in the Korean countryside during the first half of the 20th century, as portrayed in the memoirs of Pak Myǒngsǒ. The thesis is divided into three topic areas: family relations, women's section of the household and related activities, and traditional holidays and customs. These areas are analyzed with the aim of clarifying how the author, through her memoirs, depicts the everyday lives of women, their social status, and their relationship to traditional values in the Confucian-oriented region of Andong. The aim of the thesis is to reveal through the analysis of selected topics, how Pak Myǒngsǒ's memoirs reflects the position of women in traditional Korean society and how they capture the relationship between daily life, family duties and cultural traditions. Methodologically, the thesis is based on a qualitative analysis of the memoir text, supported by secondary literature, primarily ethnographic studies, focusing on Korean society and the status of women. This approach gives us the possibility to situate the author's individual testimony within a broader cultural and social context and to determine the extent to which her experiences correspond to generally known facts and how much they represent a unique perpective based on a specific regional...