A decade or so ago in South Korea, the most common household was comprised of four people. Now that number is one. There are more single-person households than households with couples or families or any other group of people. The marriage rate and the birth rate have hit all-time lows.
Big demographic changes are hardly specific to South Korea. A United Nations report from 2019 showed that in many nations around the world, marriage is on the decline and living single is on the rise. In South Korea, though, it is particularly noteworthy for young single people to live on their own when the expectation is that they will live with their parents until they marry. Also remarkable are the ways in which major segments of South Korean society are accommodating, rather than shaming, single people living alone.
Honjok: Solo Singles of South Korea, Rebuffing Expectations and Traditions
A 2017 article in Vogue about young single people in South Korea began like this:
“It is just after midnight in Seoul, and the streets in Itaewon have flooded with local kids hopping between clubs. Shots of flavored vodka and soju are passed around…and everyone dances together until sunrise…”
That’s a popular image of the culture of young single people, and not just in South Korea. It does play out in many places around the world. But that’s not the new culture of young singles in South Korea, the one that is much more interesting.
The singles who are bucking tradition are called honjok. Ann Babe, a Korean-American journalist based in Seoul, describes them as “individualistic loners” in a nation that is not individualistic. Pressures to achieve in school and at work, and to marry and have children, are intense. The honjok are tired of it; they’re opting out. “At its core,” Ann Babe explains, “honjok culture is about resisting South Korea’s establishment society and putting individual needs and desires above loyalty to hierarchy and authority.”
Honjok like being alone, but just how alone? The answer is different for different honjok:
“Honjok might partake in leisure activities alone, maintain a single-person household, avoid a workplace or office setting, limit social circles, abstain from sex or romantic relationships, or reject marriage or children.”
(Take a look at the honjok taxonomy at the end of this article.)
Babe interviewed honjok who rarely saw friends in person and whose interpersonal connections were mostly online. Monica Kim, who wrote the Vogue article, agrees about the importance of solitude to honjok, who can be found taking “a solo trip to the movies, skipping the office happy hour for a night at home.” But she also found that many “have joined up, creating common kitchens and cooking collectives to thrive together, yet apart.”
Empowered or Alienated?
Portrayals of honjok vary. Kim notes that honjok include:
“20-somethings, sitting alone in a café with a glass of wine and finding freedom in ordinary solitude.”
Babe’s depiction is starker. She describes honjok as:
“a group of people who prefer, out of pleasure or practicality – and, often, utter exhaustion and sheer desperation – to live outside of conventional social structures and simply be alone.”
Are honjok empowered single people, living lives of their own choosing, or are they mostly just alienated?
The alienation argument suggests that honjok are not trying to change society, they’ve just given up on it. Large numbers of young adults in South Korea – many more than in comparable countries – don’t have work and are not looking for work. That was true, Babe notes, even before the pandemic.
Although businesses have welcomed honjok and their disposable income with open arms, the rest of society is less inclined to celebrate. Honjok who announce their disinterest in marriage and children are at risk of being stereotyped, stigmatized, and cyberbullied. That can exacerbate feelings of alienation.
And yet, more and more honjok are making their preferences known. They are finding each other, often online, where they enjoy the validation of knowing that other people feel just the way they do.
Among the networks Ann Babe described are:
- Honjok Dot Com: a website and Facebook group that “recommends establishments, from barbeque restaurants to tennis courts, that cater to solo patrons, as well as various on-demand services for managing a single household.”
- King of Honjok: a community app and website where “solitaries post photos of their daily lives, shop the marketplace for honjok wares, and peruse articles like “The trend these days is ‘I live alone’” and other content created specifically for them.”
- EMIF: “Elite without Marriage I am going Forward,” a network letting honjok women know that “it’s okay for them to choose themselves, including their own careers and goals, over husbands and children.”
With these resources, honjok are changing the ways they are regarded by others. The man who started Honjok Dot Com told Babe, “Before, this word generally implied a socially awkward person,” but now it has a new meaning – people “who confidently choose to remain alone and stay happy.”
Guinevere de la Mare, co-founder of the international network of literary meetups, Silent Book Club, believes that for women especially, honjok is about empowerment. Honjok include both women and men, but more women than men live alone in South Korea, and they may be “the economic drivers of its success.”
It is significant, de la Mare believes, that South Korea’s “record on gender equality is abysmal.” Honjok women are not just quietly retreating. They are pushing back against the constrained and conforming lives they have been pressured to live for far too long.
“Honjok, a subculture that allows greater mobility, agency, and privacy for women in a repressive society, is a radical feminist movement. Reading alone in a public space is an act of resistance against societal assumptions that a single woman is in want of a (male) companion. A woman putting her own needs first defies cultural expectations that women should devote themselves fully to their careers (lean in!) and their families (attachment parenting!) and their mates (#instabeauty). Honjok offers women an alternative path, one that allows her to make her own lifestyle choices, that allows her to live her life to the fullest.”
How Businesses are Welcoming Single People Who Live Alone
In South Korea, the marketplace, the media, and the entertainment industry are catering to single people living alone. Here, in Ann Babe’s words (which I’ve reformatted as bullet points), are some examples:
- “Banks offer single-household credit cards.
- E-commerce platforms list honjok as a stand-alone shopping category, marketing items like tiny washing machines, multipurpose furniture, and one-person settings of dishware.
- Convenience stores, popular among honjok because of their ubiquitous locations and smaller quantities, put on special promotions and advertise single-serving meals and pouches of alcohol.
- Food delivery services promote takeout for one.
- Bars and restaurants promise solo patrons judgment-free service, and honjok-specific establishments set partitioned tables just for them.
- Specialized karaoke joints feature individual coin-operated booths.
- Cinemas install single-seat aisles.
- TV shows like “I Live Alone” and “Drinking Solo” portray honjok life, and
- News sites like 1conomy News exclusively cover single living.”
Another example is the Today House app, for finding places to live; it includes a section just for honjok. Writing for Quartz in 2017, Isabella Steger and Soo Kyung Jung reported that there is a magazine called Singles, which “helps single people to be happy and proud in their choice.”
My guess – or maybe it is just my hope – is that the alienated honjok are the minority. With a welcoming business community and thriving networks of their own, the honjok who see their solo lives as an affirming life choice now have resources to support them in that choice.
Honjok Taxonomy
- Bihon: people who reject marriage and often child-rearing
- 4Bs: people who reject marriage, child-rearing, romantic relationships, and sex
- Honyeo: solitary women
- Honbap: eating alone
- Honsul: drinking alone
- Honnol: playing alone
- Honhaeng: going to movies alone
- Honsho: shopping alone
- Honconomy: single-person household economy
[Notes: (1) The opinions expressed here do not represent the official positions of Unmarried Equality. (2) I’ll post all these blog posts at the UE Facebook page; please join our discussions there. (3) For links to previous columns, click here.]
About Bella DePaulo
