About

‘Untact,’ a term that elides the prefix un- with the word contact, denotes a way of doing things without coming into direct contact with others. Coined in 2017 by a team of consumer science researchers at Seoul National University, this expression entered the Korean vernacular in 2020 as a buzzword describing COVID-era social distancing practices such as touchless payment systems, online shopping and videoconferencing. It is a notion that emphasizes connection rather than distance, underscoring the communal sense of solidarity at the core of contemporary Korean consciousness. This ethos was …