Juche

Talks
to Senior Officials of the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea

September 8, Juche 91
(2002) and January 2, Juche 92 (2003)

 

We should sustain the
fine national traditions of our people in every possible way and develop them.

Inheriting and
developing the national traditions is of great significance in maintaining the
national character. The traditions of a nation are based on its character. If a
country is to defend its independence, it must maintain its national character.
If it fails to adhere to its national character and becomes heterogeneous, it
cannot defend its independence.

From olden times
Koreans have been known to be diligent, honest, with a strong sense of justice,
valiant, good-mannered and dutiful. Only when we sustain these excellent
national traditions can we implant in the hearts of our people the dignity and
pride in being members of the Korean nation, and get them to realize and
perform their responsibilities and obligations as such.

It is a consistent
policy of our Party to sustain the fine national traditions unique to our
people in every way. Our Party has always valued the national character and
embodied it in every sphere of social life, and made great efforts to inherit
and develop our beautiful and noble national traditions.

The spirit of national
independence and national self-confidence, and love for the country and the
nation emanate from cherishing the good qualities of the nation, and loving and
valuing national things in daily life. A man who neither values his national
character nor knows his ancestral customs and the feelings of his fellows
cannot become a genuine revolutionary or patriot.

If we fail to sustain
the national traditions in the situation in which the external environment of
our country is complex and the imperialists’ schemes for ideological and
cultural infiltration are intense, the people may be infected by the decadent
bourgeois culture and lifestyle, and the sound and revolutionary way of life in
our society may be diluted. If our people maintain their fine national
traditions and are strong in their national character, we can check the
imperialists’ ideological and cultural infiltration, and no kind of
heterogeneous trends will be able to infiltrate our country.

Maintaining the
national traditions, like good manners and customs, presents itself as a
particularly important problem at present, when the struggle for national
reunification is being waged on a new, higher stage. Koreans are a homogeneous
nation, who have lived for thousands of years on the same territory and with
the same language, blood and culture from olden times. There is no nation in
the world which has as pure a national character as the Korean nation does. If
we attach importance to the national character and sustain the national
traditions when the enthusiasm for driving out the foreign forces and realizing
national reunification by the Korean nation itself is running high among the
south Korean people, it will give them great strength and encouragement.

We should continuously
pay close attention to preserving the cultural traditions and good manners and
customs unique to the Korean nation, and sustaining them in line with the
demands and interests of the Korean people. The good customs, which have been
handed down traditionally by the Korean people, reflect the ennobling and
beautiful spiritual traits and emotions of the nation.     

We should celebrate
folk festivals like the New Year’s Day by the lunar calendar properly.

From olden times our
people had enjoyed the New Year’s Day by the lunar calendar as the festival for
celebrating the new year. The same was the case in many other countries in Asia. But since the solar calendar was introduced into
our country, the custom of celebrating the New Year’s Day by the lunar calendar
in a big way disappeared gradually. To celebrate the New Year’s Day by the
solar calendar as the main festival of the year is a Western custom. It is
advisable to make it a tradition to observe the New Year’s Day by the solar
calendar in a simple way, while celebrating the New Year’s Day by the lunar
calendar in a big way.

We should celebrate not
only the New Year’s Day by the lunar calendar but also such folk festivals as
the fifteenth day of the first month by the lunar calendar and Hangawi (the
fifteenth day of the eighth month by the lunar calendar or the Harvest Moon
day–Tr.) in a more significant way so as to sustain the cultural and life
traditions unique to our nation in every way.

We should also promote
folk games. Folk games are popular among our people because they consist of
many varieties and each of them has its own characteristics. Promoting folk
games is conducive to enhancing the people’s feeling of national dignity and pride,
and making a cultured and emotional way of life prevail throughout society.

Folk games should be
encouraged especially among children. In the past there were various folk games
enjoyed by children, but not many of them are played now, and books dealing
with such games are not being published in large numbers. Children should be
encouraged to enjoy such folk pastimes as kite-flying, top-spinning,
shuttlecock-kicking, sleighing, rope-skipping, hide-and-seek and hitting a
wooden pin.

From ancient times our
country has been called a country of good manners in the East. Observing good
manners is a trait and tradition unique to our people. We should ensure that
our people observe decorum and morality properly as befit the people of a
country of good manners in the East.

Loving children,
respecting the elderly, valuing friendship and living in harmony with
neighbours helping one another are beautiful moral traits of our nation, which
have been handed down from time immemorial. We should develop these traits in
conformity with the present reality.

Respect for one’s
former teacher can also be called an element of the national traditions. The
climate of every one loving one’s alma mater and respecting one’s former
teacher should be established throughout society. Officials should possess the
trait of remembering their alma maters and former teachers. If they themselves
visit their old schools, write to their former teachers or send congratulatory
letters and bouquets of flowers to them on their birthdays it will imbue the
whole of society with more ennobling and richer emotions.

We should ensure that
every one respects his or her parents and observes good manners in family life.
Sons and daughters should listen to their parents’ principled and correct
instructions and follow them, but this is not the case now. For example, some
young people marry in disregard of their parents’ opinions. In the past
children got married only after receiving the approval of their parents;
moreover, they did not get divorced at their pleasure. From olden times there
is a good custom in our country of a couple living together their whole life
once they got married. If a son or daughter of a family got divorced, it was
regarded as a disgrace to the family, and the family members felt ashamed. But
now it is different. Some women do not support their parents-in-law well.
Educational work should be intensified among the people so that they do not
violate good manners in family life.

We should ensure that
people do not shake hands when greeting each other but bow in the Korean way.
To bow is a way of greeting peculiar to our country, and it is better than to
shake hands. Some people say that those who do not shake hands are haughty.
They are misguided. Shaking hands is a way of greeting introduced from Western
countries, and it is not good in terms of hygiene. The habit of shaking hands
should be done away with among our people, and the Korean style of greeting
should be actively encouraged.

Language is one of the
basic criteria of a nation, and plays a very important role in developing the
national culture and preserving the national character. The use of our own
language, the standard dialect in particular, should be encouraged. The
standard dialect in our country is the Pyongyang
dialect. To use the Pyongyang
dialect is a principle of cultured life advanced long ago. We should make sure
that foreign words and dialects which are not standard do not make inroads into
our language. We should thoroughly preserve the Juche character and national character
in everyday language as well.

It is important to
promote and develop the national costume and cuisine. The national character
finds expression not only in everyday language and manners but also in clothes
and food.

National costumes
should be promoted. Our national costumes are appealing to the eye and
convenient to wear. Chima (skirt–Tr.) and jogori (jacket–Tr.) are women’s
garments which we can boast of to the world. From time immemorial, Korean women
wore chima and jogori of bright and elegant natural colours. But contemporary
women are not willing to wear chima and jogori, and their attire is being
changed in a bizarre fashion. It is not a matter that can be overlooked that
they dislike wearing the national costume and instead like wearing parti-colored
clothes. Not willing to wear national costume is an expression of lack of
national character.

We should encourage
women to wear elegant and good-looking chima and jogori. Women in chima and
jogori look smart. Girl students and women who engage in foreign affairs should
wear decent Korean clothes. The working people’s organizations should
strengthen educational work, and parents should encourage their children to
wear national clothes, so that everyone can lead a proud and dignified life
wearing national costumes.

 At present, our people are not preserving such
a national custom as cooking traditional dishes. If we neglect traditional
dishes the national dietary customs may disappear. There are many traditional
dishes in our country. Pyongyang
cold noodles are one of them, famous from olden times. Pyongyang’s Okryu Restaurant is famous for
serving cold noodles. Pounding boiled glutinous rice to make cakes, making
noodles by means of noodle-presses and eating red-bean congee at the winter
solstice are some of the customs unique to our country. Kimchi is a traditional
dish our people like to eat at every meal. We should promote such traditional
foods as kimchi, rice-cakes and noodles, which our people like, and take
measures so that they can make them easily and tasty.

In order to develop
traditional dishes, we should create new ones, while preserving those which
have been handed down traditionally. If we develop new dishes and popularize
them, they will become national dishes in the next generation and be handed
down to posterity. We should develop national dishes by creating and
popularizing various types of food by making use of soybean paste, which all
our people like, and organizing cooking competitions.

When inheriting and
developing national traditions, we should correct the customs that obstruct
social progress and run counter to the aspirations of the people, however long
standing they may be. Some customs contain elements which are outdated and
backward, like feudalistic and superstitious ones. We should not restore all
the things of the past on the plea of sustaining the national traditions. We
should discard those which are old and run counter to the desires of the
people, and develop those which are progressive and people-oriented in
accordance with today’s reality. Only then can we create a new national culture
and lifestyle which accord with the national emotions and life sentiments of
the people.

It is important to
sustain the national character in the field of art and literature.

I once saw artistes of
the National Folk Art Troupe dancing a traditional dance in kkorichima (long
skirt hemmed on both sides–Tr.) with charming movements which had been
unearthed. Charming movements are the main thing in Korean dance. Korean dance
should never become something like a hotchpotch; it should sustain the
movements unique to the nation. The national characteristics should also be
sustained in the costumes of folk dancers.

Folk songs should be
encouraged. Folk songs are rich in national flavour and content. As they
reflect the national emotions and life feelings of our people, the more one
hears them, the more one feels attracted to them. Folk songs should be sung
both solo and by small choirs. They should be discovered in large numbers and
rearranged for characteristic rendering.

Traditional musical
instruments should be put into active use. They conform to the life feelings
and emotions unique to the Korean nation, and have long developed enjoying the
love of the Korean people. But now they are not being used on a large scale. At
one time, the folk song Sinau was re-presented as an ensemble of the national
instrumental music and chorus, but it is difficult to hear such a song now.

The art sector should
make active use of traditional musical instruments, the kayagum (a
nineteen-stringed Korean zither–Tr.) in particular. Tremolo is the main thing
in playing the kayagum. Playing the kayagum becomes attractive when it sustains
tremolo but recently the kayagum players play the instrument as if it were a
harp, thinking only about producing chord tones. The tanso (short bamboo
flute–Tr.) solo Spring at the Post sustained the national flavour as the
kayagum ensemble accompanying the solo produced tremolo. As the kayagum is a
musical instrument peculiar to the Korean nation, tremolo should be produced
properly for the preservation of the national timbre. 

We should study well
the art and literature of the period of enlightenment of our country, and
discover the excellent national emotions in them in order to develop them in
accordance with modern aesthetic feelings. Among the artistic and literary
works produced in the enlightenment period are those filled with sadness and
grief over the brutal colonial rule of Japanese imperialism, and those that
reflect the cultural emotions peculiar to our nation. The songs produced in
those days, because of the limitations of the era, lack revolutionary ideas
that prevail in the songs produced in the present days, but they reflect the
anger of the nation that was deprived of its country, resistance to the
aggressors, love of the native land and emotions peculiar to the nation. Once
some people, who were ignorant of the songs of the enlightenment period,
forbade the singing of these songs, saying that they were bad songs. Songs like
Falling Blossoms and Flowing Streams and The Tuman River Filled with Tears were
regarded as songs that should not be sung. As the songs of the enlightenment
period were once popular among our people, singing them should be taken up
again. To begin with, the wrong understanding of these songs should be
rectified.

We should give wide
publicity to our fine national traditions in various forms and by various
methods. We should introduce the traditions peculiar to our nation to our
people so as to promote them. We should give wide publicity to the unique life
customs of our nation through publications and TV broadcasting. It is advisable
to convey to them general knowledge about the costumes and dietary customs of
our nation, folk festivals, traditional dishes and the methods of playing folk
games. We should ensure that people visit the folklore museums and history
museums on folk festivals and days-off. Then they will have a deeper knowledge
of the time-honoured history, traditions and life customs of our nation, and
cherish national pride and patriotism more deeply. Academic circles should make
a close study of our nation’s folk customs and practices and write many works
of general knowledge related to them.

All the officials,
working people and younger generation should be fully aware of the fine customs
and traditions of their nation and sustain them, so as to add lustre to the
dignity and excellence of the nation cherishing the Korean-nation-first
principle.