Can you beat them?
The Two Koreas Quiz
Ten questions on the two Koreas, from King Sejong's alphabet and the Korean War to K-pop, Kim Jong-un and the South's shrinking population.
- 10 questions
- About 3 minutes
- Medium
- Includes a map and a photo
About this quiz
Korea was one country for more than a thousand years before 1945. The quiz covers how it was split, the war of 1950 to 1953, and the two very different states that grew up on either side of the border: a rich democracy in the South and a nuclear-armed family dictatorship in the North.
It suits anyone who knows the headlines about Seoul and Pyongyang and wants the history behind them. The last questions deal with the two Koreas today, from how North Korea pays for its weapons to why South Korea's population is shrinking.
Topics in this quiz
Read up first
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Encyclopedia
Douglas MacArthur
The American general who rebuilt Japan as a democracy, saved South Korea with one brilliant landing, and was fired for refusing to accept that a president outranks a general.
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Encyclopedia
Korean Wave (Hallyu)
South Korea's state-nurtured export of pop culture, from BTS to Squid Game, turning a mid-sized country into a soft-power heavyweight.
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Blog
How South Korea went from poorer than Ghana to the world's 14th-largest economy
In 1960 South Korea's income per person was lower than Ghana's. One military dictator, Park Chung-hee, forced the country into steel, ships, and semiconductors in less than two decades.
