Traditional Image of Women in the Ukrainian and Korean Cultures: Ethnographical Aspect

Abstract

The article analyzes the image of women in the Ukrainian and Korean cultures by investigating Franko’s viewpoint on Ukrainian folklore as well as Korean folk songs about women’s fate, in order to compare main social role and function of women in the family, and also to identify some ethno-cultural stereotypes of Ukrainian and Korean people. The author pays much attention to Franko’s term “women’s servitude” and to the Korean “han”, and to the main factors that influenced their formation. Also the author reveals the meaning of these terms, analyzing folk songs, which show the most difficult aspects of women’s life after marriage (relationship with the parents-in-law, the difficult life in a new family, life with her husbands, especially as women were not loved, widowhood and divorce). The comparatively high position of Ukrainian women in the family did not them to avoid the “servitude” that has been connected mainly with socio-economic problems of the society and forever “attracts a woman to a man, though unloved” (I. Franko). However, “han” for Korean women did not only mean the subjugation to that life situation, but also her search for balance and harmony in life.