News that haenyeo culture has become a world heritage always arrives alongside news that the haenyeo are disappearing. In the numbers, the second story weighs far more. Working from the statistics kept by the Haenyeo Museum and the Jeju provincial government, this article looks at how many of Jeju's free-diving sea women remain and why the count keeps falling.
Jeju's working haenyeo have fallen from more than 23,000 at the mid-1960s peak to the low two thousands, a drop of close to 90 percent in about sixty years (year-by-year figures follow the provincial haenyeo statistics in the references). More than 60 percent of working divers are seventy or older. The causes stack together: other jobs appeared, the work is dangerous and the income uneven, mothers chose not to pass it to their daughters, and the village cooperatives open their gate to newcomers only slowly.
By the statistics compiled at the Haenyeo Museum, the number of working Jeju haenyeo peaked in 1965 at more than 23,000. It has fallen through every decade since, into the low two thousands. The most recent count is kept in the provincial haenyeo statistics linked in the references, and the exact figure is deliberately not restated here, because it changes every year.
Heavier than the count is the age curve. More than 60 percent of working divers are seventy or older, and adding those in their sixties accounts for most of the rest. New divers enter at a rate of a few dozen a year, so on the current trend the working population will shrink sharply again within a decade.
| What the statistics show | |
|---|---|
| The peak | Mid-1960s, more than 23,000 divers |
| Now | Low two thousands (latest count in the references) |
| The drop | Close to 90 percent in about sixty years |
| Age | More than 60 percent are seventy or older; divers under fifty are a small handful |
| New entrants | Roughly three in ten haenyeo school graduates go on to join a cooperative |
First, other work appeared. As tourism and services grew, young women found jobs that were steadier and less dangerous than muljil, work that depends on the weather and wears the body down.
Second, mothers did not pass it on. Through the museum's oral histories runs one repeated vow: no daughter of mine will dive. Haenyeo mothers used their diving income to send children to school on the mainland, and those children did not become divers.
Third, the income structure. An experienced top-rank diver can earn well in the deep grounds, but a new haenyeo starts in shallow water, where diving alone rarely covers a living. The resource itself is thinner than it once was.
Fourth, the gate is narrow. Becoming a haenyeo means joining a village eochongye, and a cooperative that shares a finite fishing ground does not admit new members lightly. Even among haenyeo school graduates, only about three in ten make it into a cooperative and actually work as divers.
Admission is only the start. A newcomer works months as a probationary member before the eochongye examines and accepts her, then spends years in shallow water before moving deep. Because one diver takes so long to make, the small class entering now will need well over a decade to become the next generation of top-rank divers.
Jeju's city governments subsidize cooperative admission fees and early settlement costs for new haenyeo. The programs change year to year, so the current city notices are the place to check.
The haenyeo grow fewer, and their rules travel by word of mouth rather than by document. Sumbi took its name from this culture, so cheering for the work of recording it comes first, and a stretch of time with the phone face down is a fine place for that cheering to start. Sumbi supports the documentation and preservation of Jeju haenyeo culture.
See the ocean Sumbi made →Which rock shelters abalone, which current turns dangerous on which tide: none of it is on a map. It passes from senior divers to juniors in the water. When the divers go, the knowledge goes with them.
Halmang-badang, the custom of reserving the calm shallows for elderly divers, the geumchaegi closed seasons, the etiquette of the bulteok: these rules work only while a haenyeo association exists to keep them. When a village is down to a few working divers, the community that holds the rules dissolves before the rules do.
The whistling breath a diver releases at the surface, the rowing songs, and the Jeju-dialect words of muljil live only as long as the divers who use them. It is why the Haenyeo Museum records voices and sounds. A recording cannot replace a person, but it is the one thing that remains after the person is gone.
One line the sea taught us. Haenyeo mothers refused to hand their daughters the work, yet still tried to hand down the rules of the sea. A phone habit passes to children the same way, shown first, never forced.
This article is a cultural introduction based on published sources; figures reflect the survey dates listed in the references.
Sumbi