Do you have any suggestion for sources (books, website etc.) about DPKR? I would love to learn more about their political organisation and about social and everyday life.
Edit: thank you everyone for the suggestions!
According to Hakim, Patriots, Traitors, and Empires is about all you need, at least for a start.
That’s mostly about recent history of korea (since japanese occupation, up to now), still a great book.
Isn’t that what OP is asking for? They didn’t say Korean history in general, just the DPRK.
OP asked for everyday life in DPRK and their politics, which are not really covered in Gowans book.
I just wanted to clarify that it is an explicitly history book, i still encourage everyone to read it.
Fair, it probably wouldn’t cover daily life, but nonetheless gotta read it.
Socialist Constitution of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (2019) - DPRK’s constitution on Wikisource
DPRK Socio-Economic, Demographic and Health Survey 2014. - Survey co-authored by the United Nations Population Fund and the DPRK’s Central Bureau of Statistics (Related: UNFPA summary of DPRK census population data from 2008).
North Korea’s Surprisingly Robust Healthcare System - Article in Global Asia
ProleWiki page on DPRK - ProleWiki page giving info on DPRK
Books
Modern Korea: The Socialist North, Revolutionary Perspectives in the South, and Unification - Book by DPRK author about the revolution and socialist construction up to 1970
Modern History of Korea - A history book from DPRK
North Korean Journey: The Revolution Against Colonialism - Book by historian from the US who visited DPRK
Sanctions of Empire - A zine by Nodutdol about the sanctions placed on DPRK and other nations. (PDF)
Socialist Education in Korea: Selected Works of Kim Il-Sung (PDF) - “Socialist Education in Korea delves into the history and educational praxis of North Korea in a way that is rarely studied in the US, as this work counters many of the western media narratives against North Korea.”
Videos (in English or with English subs)
Hong Kong student delegation to DPRK - Students from Hong Kong hanging out with students from north Korea
North Koreans Talk! New Years Resolutions from North Koreans (2020) - “New Years Eve in North Korea I spent asking North Koreans what their New Year’s Resolutions for 2020 are.”
May day celebration 2017 - Watch some foreign tour guides hang out with Koreans at a May day celebration event. (More videos from them)
“My Experience at PUST(North Korea)” - A foreign English teacher at a school in DPRK made a documentary about their experience (it was an all male students school at the time but now has male and female students. Here is a student being interviewed)
“I met North Koreans on the Trans-Siberian Railway” - South Korean randomly meets some north Koreans on a trip abroad, turn on subtitles to see their conversation in English
Eid Al-Fitr in North Korea - Video of people in a mosque in DPRK
Pyongyang Centre for the Deaf and Blind - Visit to the center, and here is an article about it.
Night walk through the Ryomyong Street in Pyongyang - “One of the most recognizable newly build apartments in the capital of DPRK.”
Video of Pyongyang Public Transport (2019) - Just a video of public transport, as the title says.
Videos (in Korean)
Episode of a south Korean TV show where some people visit north Korea, “Walk Into Pyongyang” - Unfortunately there are not English subtitles, but you could try the auto-translate subs feature on YouTube. But you can see countryside and street scenes and see the tone of interactions between people even if you may not understand Korean. It shows their visit without trying to portray north Korea as scary.
[Docuseries] A north-south Korea joint production about north and south Korean cities, “두 도시 이야기” (Tale of Two Cities) - A post I made with links to episodes of this docuseries. I also summarized an episode here: [Video] “What does Childrens’ Day look like in north Korea?”
South Korean family on a road trip meets some North Koreans working in Russia - Just a friendly conversation between north and south Koreans randomly meeting in Russia (the north Koreans spotted the south Koreans pulled over at a gas station, and pulled over to greet them and had a chat, mentioned that they work in Russia but return to DPRK yearly)
Video channels, playlists, etc.
DPRK Explained - A YouTube channel which explains various things about DPRK.
DefendKorea - “Sharing information from the DPRK and countering the regime-change narrative in favor of peace, reconciliation, and reunification of Korea.”
푸옹 Phuong DPRK Daily - “Daily uploads of videos related to the DPRK, news, revolutionary politics, daily life, history, culture, etc. This channel is private and has no official ties to the DPRK.”
SAO Documentary - A group of people on various trips to DPRK filming as they go.
DPRK 360 - Various videos of DPRK. It also has a website with blog posts and panoramic photos of DPRK.
Our Daily Life in North Korea - Videos by Jaka Parker, who I believe is a diplomat who previously lived in DPRK with his family for a while. He has other playlists too such as North Korean Store.
Podcasts
Podcast of KEEP delegation discussing former DPRK visits - Several people in the Korean diaspora who travelled to DPRK on multiple trips a few years ago talk about their experiences going there and about the misconceptions they had about DPRK and discussions they had with DPRK people. Currently they are now involved in activism to undo the US travel ban against north Korea so they can continue their delegation trips.
The modern history of Korea with Ju-Hyun Park, Part 1 - Talks about Korea’s modern history before the division. Discusses the Japanese colonial period and independence struggle, and the beginning of US occupation. Part 2 - Discusses Korea post-division, talks about the Korean war and the history of DPRK and south Korea since then.
The Friendship is Strong: Talking About North Korea - Xiangyu (anti-imperialist rapper) discusses going to DPRK and also talks about working for Young Pioneer Tours.
Blowback Podcast season 3 covers Korean war history, it’s very worth learning about Korean history as a whole to really understand DPRK.
Articles, blogs, photos
Young Pioneer Tours - This website has several articles about DPRK, usually with photos too, but they’re not really listed anywhere that I know of on the site. But if you use a search engine and include the site name you can probably find articles by them on various topics. Examples of some articles: Sariwon Folklore Village, Golden Triangle Bank, Guide to Wonsan, Domestic North Korean Flights, North Korean Traffic Girls, Vegan Food in North Korea, Tae’an Friendship Glass Factory, North Korean Cuisine, Kwangbok Department Store and Supermarket
Explore DPRK - A website with various info. “As an International Friendship Initiative, we strive to promote mutual understanding and cultural exchange between the people of DPRK and the rest of the world. Our website serves as a platform to share knowledge, experiences, and insights about DPRK with the global community.”
DPRK 360 - “Since 2013, Aram Pan has been visiting the DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) and capturing many aspects of their culture and everyday life.”
Avax News, photos tagged “DPRK” - Various pages of photos, when you click “details” you can see multiple photos per post. You can of course try other search terms too.
Korean-language articles (sorry that I don’t know an English version of these, but machine translation can help give the main points if you are okay with that):
“Understanding North Korea” - Article series by Tongil Times, especially their 북현대사 (“North Modern History”) series is informative.
“North Korea through the constitution” - Series by Sovereignty Research Institute.
Not sure about day to day life stuff. All I’ve read about is the history of Korea post-1945 leading up to the partition and little bit after that. I can help with those if you are interested.
The closest thing I have seen related to what you are asking are some YouTube channels but I cannot recall their names.
Books: A capitalist in North Korea is good one about everyday life in the DPRK, although it mostly covers life during the late Kim Jong-il and early Kim Jong-un period. Felix Abt’s support for the DPRK flucuates a lot throughout the book and he makes some false additions based on later research instead of his own experiences (such as mentioning the Songbun myth). Markets in the DPRK were quite prevalent back then due to official government encouragement of markets in the mid 2000s, but he does cover the start of the demarketization process with Kim Jong-un’s entry. Today, state markets are able to provide most consumer goods and the “free markets” are most limited to farmers’ markets and those too are slowly dying out.
North Korea: Another Country is also a good read. It’s overall biased against the DPRK but it has some pretty good points in it.
Documentaries: Boy Boy’s The Haircut is probably the best starter documentary to the DPRK and its myths. Loyal Citizens of Pyongyang in Seoul is also good, as is my Brothers and Sisters in the North. The most comprehensive series is the SAO Documentary series, which I believe has more than 100 hours of lightly edited footage inside the DPRK. It’s mostly tourist stuff but they ask a lot of questions to the tour guide about daily life and I found it very useful. The documentaries are in Chinese but there are english subtitles in the video. The translations get worse as the series goes on however and sometimes the translations can give very incorrect information. For example one of the video’s subtitles says that rice rations in the DPRK are 2kg a month when in reality it’s 2kg a week.
This link has good resources too: https://linktr.ee/dprkmyths
Start here: https://dprkorea.carrd.co/
Main portal: http://naenara.com.kp/main/index/en/first
News: http://www.pyongyangtimes.com.kp/
Books: http://www.korean-books.com.kp/en/
There are others but those are the main ones I use
Since I didn’t see it mentioned yet PAEKTU SOLIDARITY ALLIANCE
I’m not sure anyone mentioned this yet, but, if I remember correctly, Hakim suggested this video: Daily life in North Korea - “My Brothers and Sisters in the North” (Full awarded documentary)
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
