Korean Home > Languages > Korean
Korean | Difficulty: *** | Speaking Korean offers you social and
business opportunities in the region, but the increasing number of Koreans
who are studying English sometimes makes it hard to practice unless you go
to the suburbs or rural areas of South Korea. Compared to other Asian languages of the Northeast Asia region (Japanese,
Mandarin, Cantonese), this is the easiest to learn, due to the
comparatively simple and logical script, the absence of tones, and the
large number of borrowed English words. Thanks to Mark
Bailey from Japan for his kind contribution to this section! |
Introduction | Usefulness | Speaking Korean is of course
advantageous primarily only if traveling or living in Korea, but
ability to read it will sometimes allow you to get cheaper prices in
Korean shops in the country and in Korean-owned shops in the US. Speaking
it can also get you free extra or generous portions of food from
pleasantly surprised cooks in Korean restaurants, especially if the
restaurant is in another country, such as Japan, Canada, or in most
large cities in the U.S. | Beauty | If you are used to Romance
languages, Korean may not seem so beautiful, sometimes described as
choppy by westerners and can sometimes sound angry to Japanese or Thai
speakers, but there is an elegance to the sound of the spoken language
which is fun and challenging to get accustomed to. | Chic
factor | Since Asian languages are all
considered to be difficult by most non-speakers, saying you speak
Korean has some chic appeal, especially if you are not of Korean
descent. The fact that you attempted to tackle a language so
different from English or any western tongue will gain you respect in
most circles, especially in the U.S. | Speakers | 71 million | Countries | Total Countries: South Korea,
North Korea, and sizeable communities in Japan, Canada, and the U.S. | Regional
Variations | The dialects of North Korea (Joson)
and South Korea (Hanguk) are gradually gaining differences between
each other, mainly in spelling of vocabulary words, but are still
mutually intelligible. The writing system in North Korea has
completely eliminated older Chinese characters from writings, but in
South Korea, you may still occasionally find some in older literature.
This is not much of a problem though because South Koreans use these
characters less and less, especially the younger generations. If you
learn Korean, I highly recommend the standard Seoul dialect of South
Korea, which is the most prestigious dialect and is easily understood
among Korean speakers throughout the world. | Travel | Since North Korea is still
very restricted for foreigners to travel to, South Korea is presently
the only place you can use it to travel, but the people will open up
more to you if you speak their language, especially the further you
get from Seoul, the capital. | Culture | If you are a westerner,
learning Korean (as with many Asian languages) will both require and
allow you to expand your cultural horizons, including the way you
think about life, as well as how you interact socially with the native
speakers of your target language. Culture in the land of the morning
calm offers traditions, poems, parables, and historical writings
dating back at least a thousand years. The Korean language also offers
unique concepts such as the reluctance to leave old hopes and memories
behind, and some interesting Buddhist-based proverbs. Korean culture
also offers a lively nightlife of spicy food and fun bars and discos. | | m | Difficulty | Phonemes | No tones and not many stressed
syllables, but the consonants sometimes change sounds at the ends of
words, eliding into the next word. This takes getting used to,
but is made up for in the relatively easy syntax. The sounds are not
particularly difficult to pronounce but are different from western
values, especially the consonants. (see Orthography below). | Syntax | Verbs do not change according
to person or plural, but do have various degrees of politeness forms
according to the age and seniority of the person being addressed,
which are difficult to master, but fortunately the younger generations
do not regularly use these so much, and you as a foreigner will be
forgiven for politeness mistakes, especially if you err on the side of
the standard text-book ?eimnida?f forms. | Vocabulary | An easy aspect is that many
English words are easily recognizable: taxi, whiskey, ice cream,
hotel, etc. The more difficult aspect is that unless you know Chinese
or Japanese, the non-borrowed Korean words will seem long and
unrelated to other languages. Learning numbers requires that you
learn two sets of Korean numbers and know when to use them, although
one set is derived from Chinese and will be easily recognizable to a
Chinese, Japanese, or Thai speaker. | Ortograph | The more difficult aspect for
the beginner is the difference in sound values of b and p sounds, j
and ch, and t and d. This is compounded by the widely diverging
romanization systems used for Korean: Lukoff, Yale, Horne, and McCune-Reischauer.
This confusion can be easily avoided however if you learn the Korean
script, Hangul, as soon as possible, and skip the middle step of
romanization completely. This is strongly advised, because it
will save valuable time, lessen your confusion, and greatly enhance
the speed with which you learn Korean. It will also help
you to avoid spelling mistakes (there are two T's,
two P's, etc.
in the script) when you start to write Korean Hangul script. | Overall
difficulty | I rate this language as DDD,
rather difficult to learn for most westerners, but still one of the
easiest of northern Asian languages. Korean is not related to any
other language or family, except for Japanese, which it resembles
slightly in structure, politeness rules, and borrowed vocabulary. This
fact makes it seem more difficult than it is. Knowing Chinese or
Japanese will make it easier to learn Korean, and like those
languages, it is easier to speak it than to read or write it. | Time
needed | I would allow a year to learn
to speak, but to learn to read newspapers and use the politeness forms
properly you would need at least three years of study, though you can
learn to read simple Korean in about four months. The right-angle
shapes and logic of the writing system make it easy to learn and can
be learned in two days. It is fun to show off that you can read
and write it but the tricky part comes in learning to read books and
newspapers quickly, which takes a lot of practice. | | m | Learning
material | Books
and tapes | For an introduction to only
speaking Korean, I recommend the following: Making Out in Korean, by Peter Constantine, 1995 Yenbooks (slightly
racy terms included, but very fun, trendy and colloquial). Korean in Plain English, by Boye De Mente, Passport Books, 1988. Korean in a Hurry, by Samuel E.Martin, Charles E. Tuttle Company A formal and more comprehensive guide to learn to speak, write and
read, I recommend: Mastering Korean, by B.Nam Park, with cassettes, Barron's, 1988, this
is the Foreign Service Institute guide developed by the U.S.Government,
and it is effective though dull (no pictures or illustrations). Also highly recommended are: Colloquial Korean; A Complete Language Course, with cassettes, by A.I. Kim,
1997. Korean: Instant Vocabulary, Vocabulearn, Levels I and II, 1986. Pimsleur Language Program by Sung-Hyun Kirk Kim, 1998. Only 10
lessons are available so far, but eventually the full 30-lesson
package would be most beneficial. If you can read Japanese, there is an excellent book with cassettes to
teach vocabulary and writing for beginners: Kankokugo Kihontango
purasu 2000, by Kim Dong Hahn, Goken Publishers. In buying a dictionary, you have to decide if you want to get one that
uses one of the romanization systems listed above, which are confusing
and incompatible with each other. I strongly recommend instead
that you learn the script and get a good Hangul (script) dictionary,
which may have pronunciation guides, but does not rely on a
romanization system. | Schools | am aware of a school in Ohio,
U.S. which teaches speaking, reading, and writing Korean: Korean
American Community School of Central Ohio: http://www.kals.net/ The following program will set you up with a South Korean homestay
family and enroll you in Korean classes, but shop around in Seoul if
you can, you may find a better bargain: Languages Abroad, 502-99
Avenue Rd, Toronto, ON, Canada, M5R 2G5 Also these two programs will arrange for you to home-stay with Korean
families, but do not provide language classes: ANDYOU Korean homestays http://homestay1.andyou.com/cgi-bin/w3-msql/homestay.html
E-mail: homestay@andyou.com Ace Homestay http://www.ace-homestay.com/
Many large U.S.cities feature some Korean programming on cable TV or
radio, and the internet and shortwave radio also provides Korean
broadcasts. | Links
| Many large U.S.cities feature
some Korean programming on cable TV or radio, and the internet and
shortwave radio also provides Korean broadcasts. Go to www.yahoo.co.kr
for a wide variety of Korean links, including news and current events
in South Korea. The Human Languages Page offers some other good
Korean language sites: http://www.june29.com/HLP/ To read the links for Korean on the internet, you will need a browser
capable of reading Hangul script, and will need Korean language
support software if you want to type in Korean. |
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