Talk:Jokbo

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So the second son and so forth don't have a jokbo? If this is correct, than only a small portion of Korean (nuclear) families have a jokbo, with most everyone looking to their fourth and fifth cousins to discover their ancestry. Please explain Isaac Crumm 01:14, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

The holder of the jokbo is the head of the household, and it is not a nuclear family document, but a clan document. It's typically held in the clan central office, as it were, although there are certainly copies. Clans are identified by the region of origin, what Koreans mean when they say "hometown" - 'kohyang'. The huge Kim (Korean name) surname has any number of clans, and the records for, say, the cadet royal line, the Andong Kims, will be kept in Andong. As an additional comment, perhaps we should fill out this a bit more, since these records replace the western vital records - Koreans do not have marriage licenses, birth certificates, etc but rather keep all such records in the jokbo, of which a copy is also kept at the local government office. The jokbo can even denote citizenship...I am married to a Korean woman, whose family very kindly entered me into the jokbo when we married. That act among other things confers Korean citizenship. I didn't realize at the time what a very gracious act it was. Especially given that the clan is the Min clan. --Dan (talk) 18:58, 29 February 2008 (UTC)