Modern Korean is written in theKorean script (한글;Hangeul in South Korea,조선글;Chosŏn'gŭl in North Korea), a system developed during the 15th century for that purpose, although it did not become the primary script until the mid 20th century (Hanja andmixed script were the primary script until then).[6] The script uses 24 basic letters (jamo) and 27 complex letters formed from the basic ones.
Modern Korean descends fromMiddle Korean, which in turn descends fromOld Korean, which descends from theProto-Koreanic language, which is generally suggested to have itslinguistic homeland somewhere inManchuria.[7][8] Whitman (2012) suggests that the proto-Koreans, already present in northern Korea, expanded into the southern part of theKorean Peninsula at around 300 BC and coexisted with the descendants of the Japonic Mumun cultivators (or assimilated them). Both had influence on each other and a later founder effect diminished the internal variety of both language families.[9]
Since the establishment of two independent governments,North–South differences have developed in standard Korean, including variations in pronunciation and vocabulary chosen. While there tends to be strong political conflict between North and South Korea regarding these linguistic "differences," regional dialects within each country actually display greater linguistic variations than those found between North and South Korean standards. Nevertheless, these dialects remain largelymutually intelligible.
King Sejong's proclamation of the Hangul script, written inClassical Chinese
TheChinese language, written withChinese characters and read withSino-Xenic pronunciations, was first introduced to Korea in the 1st century BC, and remained the medium of formal writing and government until the late 19th century.[10] Korean scholars adapted Chinese characters (known in Korean asHanja) to write their own language, creating scripts known asidu,hyangchal,gugyeol, and gakpil.[11][12] These systems were cumbersome, due to the fundamental disparities between the Korean and Chinese languages, and accessible only to those educated in classical Chinese. Most of the population was illiterate.
The Korean alphabet was denounced by theyangban aristocracy, who looked down upon it for being too easy to learn.[16][17] However, it gained widespread use among the common class[18] and was widely used to print popular novels which were enjoyed by the common class.[19] Since few people could understand official documents written in classical Chinese, Korean kings sometimes released public notices entirely written in Hangul as early as the 16th century for all Korean classes, including uneducated peasants and slaves. By the 17th century, theyangban had exchanged Hangul letters with slaves, which suggests a high literacy rate of Hangul during the Joseon era.[20]
In the context of growing Korean nationalism in the 19th century, theGabo Reform of 1894 abolished the Confucian examinations and decreed that government documents would be issued in Hangul instead of literary Chinese.[21][22] Some newspapers were published in Hangul, but other publications usedKorean mixed script, with Hanja forSino-Korean vocabulary and Hangul for other elements.[23] North Korea abolished Hanja in writing in 1949, but continues to teach them in schools.[23] Their usage in South Korea is mainly reserved for specific circumstances such as newspapers, scholarly papers and disambiguation. Today Hanja is largely unused in everyday life but is still important for historical and linguistic studies.
The Korean names for the language are based on thenames for Korea used in both South Korea and North Korea. The English word "Korean" is derived fromGoryeo, which is thought to be the first Korean dynasty known to Western nations. Korean people in theformer USSR refer to themselves asKoryo-saram orKoryo-in (literally, 'Koryo/Goryeo people'), and call the languageKoryo-mar. Some older English sources also use the spelling "Corea" to refer to the nation, and its inflected form for the language, culture and people, "Korea" becoming more popular in the late 1800s.[24]
In South Korea the Korean language is referred to by many names includinghangugeo ('Korean language'),hangungmal ('Korean speech') andurimal ('our language'); "hanguk" is taken from the name of theKorean Empire (대한제국;大韓帝國;Daehan Jeguk). The "han" (韓) inHanguk andDaehan Jeguk is derived fromSamhan, in reference to theThree Kingdoms of Korea (not the ancient confederacies in the southern Korean Peninsula),[25][26] while "-eo" and "-mal" mean "language" and "speech", respectively. Korean is also simply referred to asgugeo, literally "national language". This name is based on the sameHan characters (國語 'nation' + 'language') that are also used inTaiwan and Japan to refer to their respective national languages.
In North Korea andChina, the language is most often calledJoseonmal, or more formally,Joseoneo. This is taken from the North Korean name for Korea (Joseon), a name retained from theJoseon period until the proclamation of theKorean Empire, which in turn was annexed by theEmpire of Japan.
Inmainland China, following the establishment of diplomatic relations with South Korea in 1992, the termCháoxiǎnyǔ or the short formCháoyǔ has normally been used to refer to the standard language of North Korea andYanbian, whereasHánguóyǔ or the short formHányǔ is used to refer to the standard language of South Korea.[citation needed]
Korean is a member of theKoreanic family along with theJeju language. Some linguists have included it in theAltaic family, but the core Altaic proposal itself has lost most of its prior support.[27] TheKhitan language has several vocabulary items similar to Korean that are not found in other Mongolian or Tungusic languages, suggesting a Korean influence on Khitan.[28]
Hudson & Robbeets (2020) suggested that there are traces of a pre-Nivkh substratum in Korean. According to the hypothesis, ancestral varieties of Nivkh (also known asAmuric) were once distributed on theKorean Peninsula before the arrival of Koreanic speakers.[35]
Spoken Korean (adult man): 구매자는 판매자에게 제품 대금으로 20달러를 지급하여야 한다. gumaejaneun panmaejaege jepum daegeumeuro isip dalleoreul ($20) jigeuphayeoya handa. "The buyer must pay the seller $20 for the product." lit. [the buyer] [to the seller] [the product] [in payment] [twenty dollars] [have to pay] [do]
Korean syllable structure is (C)(G)V(C), consisting of an optional onset consonant, glide/j,w,ɰ/ and final coda/p,t,k,m,n,ŋ,l/ surrounding a core vowel.
TheIPA symbol ⟨◌͈⟩ (U+0348◌͈COMBINING DOUBLE VERTICAL LINE BELOW) is used to denote thetensed consonants/p͈/,/t͈/,/k͈/,/t͡ɕ͈/,/s͈/. Its official use in theextensions to the IPA is for"strong" articulation, but is used in the literature forfaucalized voice. The Korean consonants also have elements ofstiff voice, but it is not yet known how typical this is of faucalized consonants. They are produced with a partially constrictedglottis and additional subglottal pressure in addition to tense vocal tract walls, laryngeal lowering, or other expansion of the larynx.
/s/ is aspirated[sʰ] and becomes analveolo-palatal[ɕʰ] before[j] or[i] for most speakers (but seeNorth–South differences in the Korean language). This occurs with the tense fricative and all the affricates as well. At the end of a syllable,/s/ changes to/t/ (example: beoseot (버섯) 'mushroom').
/h/ may become abilabial[ɸ] before[o] or[u], apalatal[ç] before[j] or[i], avelar[x] before[ɯ], a voiced[ɦ] between voiced sounds, and a[h] elsewhere.
/p,t,t͡ɕ,k/ become voiced[b,d,d͡ʑ,ɡ] between voiced sounds.
/m,n/ frequently denasalize at the beginnings of words.
/l/ becomes alveolar flap[ɾ] between vowels, and[l] or[ɭ] at the end of a syllable or next to another/l/. A written syllable-final 'ㄹ', when followed by a vowel or a glide (i.e., when the next character starts with 'ㅇ'), migrates to the next syllable and thus becomes[ɾ].
Traditionally,/l/ was disallowed at the beginning of a word. It disappeared before[j], and otherwise became/n/. However, the inflow of westernloanwords changed the trend, and now word-initial/l/ (mostly from English loanwords) are pronounced as a free variation of either[ɾ] or[l].
Allobstruents (plosives, affricates, fricatives) at the end of a word are pronounced withno audible release,[p̚,t̚,k̚].
Plosive sounds/p,t,k/ become nasals[m,n,ŋ] before nasal sounds.
Hangul spelling does not reflect these assimilatory pronunciation rules, but rather maintains the underlying, partly historicalmorphology. Given this, it is sometimes hard to tell which actual phonemes are present in a certain word.
The traditional prohibition of word-initial/ɾ/ became a morphological rule called "initial law" (두음법칙) in the pronunciation standards of South Korea, which pertains to Sino-Korean vocabulary. Such words retain their word-initial/ɾ/ in the pronunciation standards of North Korea. For example,
^[B] ㅓ is generally pronounced as [ə] when it becomes a long vowel.
However, in Korea, with the exception of older generations in certain regions, most people neither pronounce nor distinguish clearly between the two monophthongs 'ㅐ' (ae) and 'ㅔ' (e). Similarly, 'ㅟ' and 'ㅚ' are sometimes pronounced as [wi] and [we] respectively.[36] The demographic that maintains monophthongal realizations of 'ㅟ' and 'ㅚ' is reportedly limited to elderly speakers in the Gyeonggi, Gangwon, and Chungcheong provinces. The official standard pronunciation guidelines acknowledge this variation by permitting both monophthongal and diphthongal pronunciations of these vowels.[37]
In South Korea, while the distinction between long and short vowels is not clearly pronounced in contemporary speech, this distinction is maintained in standard language norms for reasons of tradition and semantic differentiation.[36]
Grammaticalmorphemes may change shape depending on the preceding sounds. Examples include-eun/-neun (-은/-는) and-i/-ga (-이/-가).
Sometimes sounds may be inserted instead. Examples include-eul/-reul (-을/-를),-euro/-ro (-으로/-로),-eseo/-seo (-에서/-서),-ideunji/-deunji (-이든지/-든지) and-iya/-ya (-이야/-야).
However,-euro/-ro is somewhat irregular, since it will behave differently after aㄹ (rieul consonant).
Korean particles
After a consonant
After a ㄹ (rieul)
After a vowel
-ui (-의)
-eun (-은)
-neun (-는)
-i (-이)
-ga (-가)
-eul (-을)
-reul (-를)
-gwa (-과)
-wa (-와)
-euro (-으로)
-ro (-로)
Some verbs may also change shape morphophonemically.
Korean is anagglutinative language. The Korean language is traditionally considered to havenine parts of speech. Modifiers generally precede the modified words, and in the case of verb modifiers, can be serially appended. The sentence structure or basic form of a Korean sentence issubject–object–verb (SOV), but theverb is the only required and immovable element andword order is highly flexible, as in many other agglutinative languages.
The relationship between a speaker/writer and theirsubject and audience is paramount inKorean grammar. The relationship between the speaker/writer and subject referent is reflected inhonorifics, whereas that between speaker/writer and audience is reflected inspeech level.
When talking about someone superior in status, a speaker or writer usually uses special nouns or verb endings to indicate the subject's superiority. Generally, someone is superior in status if they are an older relative, a stranger of roughly equal or greater age, or an employer, teacher, customer, or the like. Someone is equal or inferior in status if they are a younger stranger, student, employee, or the like. Nowadays, there are special endings which can be used on declarative, interrogative, and imperative sentences, and both honorific or normal sentences.
Honorifics in traditional Korea were strictly hierarchical. The caste and estate systems possessed patterns and usages much more complex and stratified than those used today. The intricate structure of the Korean honorific system flourished in traditional culture and society. Honorifics in contemporary Korea are now used for people who are psychologically distant. Honorifics are also used for people who are superior in status, such as older people, teachers, and employers.[38]
There are seven verbparadigms orspeech levels in Korean, and each level has its own unique set of verb endings which are used to indicate the level of formality of a situation.[39] Unlikehonorifics—which are used to show respect towards the referent (the person spoken of)—speech levels are used to show respect towards a speaker's or writer's audience (the person spoken to). The names of the seven levels are derived from the non-honorificimperative form of the verb하다 (hada, "do") in each level, plus the suffix체 (che,Hanja:體), which means "style".
The three levels with high politeness (very formally polite, formally polite, casually polite) are generally grouped together asjondaesmal (존댓말), whereas the two levels with low politeness (formally impolite, casually impolite) arebanmal (반말) in Korean. The remaining two levels (neutral formality with neutral politeness, high formality with neutral politeness) are neither polite nor impolite.
Nowadays, younger-generation speakers no longer feel obligated to lower their usual regard toward the referent. It is common to see younger people talk to their older relatives withbanmal. This is not out of disrespect, but instead it shows the intimacy and the closeness of the relationship between the two speakers. Transformations in social structures and attitudes in today's rapidly changing society have brought about change in the way people speak.[38][page needed]
In general, Korean lacksgrammatical gender. As one of the few exceptions, thethird-person singular pronoun has two different forms: 그geu (male) and 그녀geunyeo (female). Before 그녀 was invented in need of translating 'she' into Korean, 그 was the only third-person singular pronoun and had no grammatical gender. Its origin causes 그녀 never to be used in spoken Korean but appearing only in writing.
To have a more complete understanding of the intricacies of gender in Korean, three models of language and gender that have been proposed: the deficit model, the dominance model, and the cultural difference model. In the deficit model, male speech is seen as the default, and any form of speech that diverges from that norm (female speech) is seen as lesser than. The dominance model sees women as lacking in power due to living within a patriarchal society. The cultural difference model proposes that the difference in upbringing between men and women can explain the differences in their speech patterns. It is important to look at the models to better understand the misogynistic conditions that shaped the ways that men and women use the language. Korean's lack of grammatical gender makes it different from most European languages. Rather, gendered differences in Korean can be observed through formality, intonation, word choice, etc.[40]
However, one can still find stronger contrasts between genders within Korean speech. Some examples of this can be seen in: (1) the softer tone used by women in speech; (2) a married woman introducing herself as someone's mother or wife, not with her own name; (3) the presence of gender differences in titles and occupational terms (for example, asajang is a company president, andyŏsajang is a female company president); (4) females sometimes using moretag questions and rising tones in statements, also seen in speech from children.[41]
Between two people of asymmetric status in Korean society, people tend to emphasize differences in status for the sake of solidarity. Koreans prefer to use kinship terms, rather than any other terms of reference.[42] In traditional Korean society, women have long been in disadvantaged positions. Korean social structure traditionally was a patriarchically dominated family system that emphasized the maintenance of family lines. That structure has tended to separate the roles of women from those of men.[43]
Cho and Whitman (2019) explore how categories such as male and female and social context influence Korean's features. For example, they point out that usage ofjagi (자기 you) is dependent on context. Among middle-aged women,jagi is used to address someone who is close to them, while young Koreans usejagi to address their lovers or spouses regardless of gender.
Korean society's prevalent attitude towards men being in public (outside the home) and women living in private still exists today. For instance, the word forhusband isbakkannyangban (바깥양반 'outside nobleman'), but a husband introduces his wife asansaram (안사람 an 'inside' 'person'). Also in kinship terminology,oe (외 'outside' or 'wrong') is added for maternal grandparents, creatingoeharabeoji andoehalmeoni (외할아버지, 외할머니 'grandfather and grandmother'), with different lexicons for males and females and patriarchal society revealed. Further, in interrogatives to an addressee of equal or lower status, Korean men tend to usehaennya (했냐? 'did it?')' in aggressive masculinity, but women usehaenni (했니? 'did it?')' as a soft expression.[44] However, there are exceptions. Korean society used the question endings-ni (니) and-nya (냐), the former prevailing among women and men until a few decades ago. In fact,-nya (냐) was characteristic of theJeolla andChungcheong dialects. However, since the 1950s, large numbers of people have moved to Seoul from Chungcheong and Jeolla, and they began to influence the way men speak. Recently, women also have used the-nya (냐). As for-ni (니), it is usually used toward people to be polite even to someone not close or younger. As for-nya (냐), it is used mainly to close friends regardless of gender.
Like the case of "actor" and "actress", it also is possible to add a gender prefix for emphasis:biseo (비서 'secretary') is sometimes combined withyeo (여 'female') to formyeobiseo (여비서 'female secretary');namja (남자 'man') often is added toganhosa (간호사 'nurse') to formnamja ganhosa (남자 간호사 'male nurse').[45]
Another crucial difference between men and women is the tone and pitch of their voices and how they affect the perception of politeness. Men learn to use an authoritative falling tone; in Korean culture, a deeper voice is associated with being more polite. In addition to the deferential speech endings being used, men are seen as more polite as well as impartial, and professional. While women who use a rising tone in conjunction with-yo (요) are not perceived to be as polite as men. The-yo (요) also indicates uncertainty since the ending has many prefixes that indicate uncertainty and questioning while the deferential ending has no prefixes to indicate uncertainty. The-hamnida (합니다) ending is the most polite and formal form of Korea, and the-yo (요) ending is less polite and formal, which reinforces the perception of women as less professional.[44][46]
Hedges and euphemisms to soften assertions are common in women's speech. Women traditionally add nasal soundsneyng,neym,ney-e in the last syllable more frequently than men. Often,l is added in women's for female stereotypes and soigeolo (이거로 'this thing') becomesigeollo (이걸로 'this thing') to communicate a lack of confidence and passivity.[38][page needed]
Women use more linguistic markers such as exclamationeomeo (어머 'oh') andeojjeom (어쩜 'what a surprise') than men do in cooperative communication.[44]
The core of the Korean vocabulary is made up ofnative Korean words. However, a significant proportion of the vocabulary, especially words that denote abstract ideas, areSino-Korean words.[47] To a much lesser extent, some words have also been borrowed fromMongolian and other languages.[48] More recent loanwords are dominated by English.
In South Korea, it is widely believed that North Korea wanted to emphasize the use of unique Korean expressions in its language and eliminate the influence of foreign languages. However, according to researchers such as Jeon Soo-tae, who has seen first-hand data from North Korea, the country has reduced the number of difficult foreign words in a similar way to South Korea.[49]
In 2021, Moon Sung-guk ofKim Il Sung University in North Korea wrote in his thesis thatKim Jong Il had said that vernacularized Sino-Korean vocabulary should be used as it is, not modified. "A language is in constant interaction with other languages, and in the process it is constantly being developed and enriched," he said. According to the paper, Kim Jong Il argued that academic terms used in the natural sciences and engineering, such as콤퓨터 (k'omp'yut'ŏ; 'computer') and하드디스크 (hadŭdisŭk'ŭ; 'hard disk') should remain in the names of their inventors, and that the word쵸콜레트 (ch'ok'ollet'ŭ; 'chocolate') should not be replaced because it had been used for so long.[50]
South Korea defines its vocabulary standards through the표준국어대사전 (Standard Korean Language Dictionary), and North Korea defines its vocabulary standards through the조선말대사전 (Korean Language Dictionary).
compounds coined in Korea or Japan and read using the Sino-Korean reading ofChinese characters.
Therefore, just like other words, Korean hastwo sets of numeral systems. English is similar, having native English words andLatinate equivalents such aswater-aqua,fire-flame,sea-marine,two-dual,sun-solar,star-stellar. However, unlike English and Latin which belong to the sameIndo-European languages family and bear a certain resemblance, Korean and Chinese aregenetically unrelated and the two sets of Korean words differ completely from each other. All Sino-Koreanmorphemes aremonosyllabic as in Chinese, whereas native Korean morphemes can be polysyllabic. The Sino-Korean words were deliberately imported alongside corresponding Chinese characters for a written language and everything was supposed to be written in Hanja, so the coexistence of Sino-Korean would be more thorough and systematic than that of Latinate words in English.
The exact proportion of Sino-Korean vocabulary is a matter of debate. Sohn (2001) stated 50–60%.[47] In 2006 the same author gives an even higher estimate of 65%.[51] Jeong Jae-do, one of the compilers of the dictionaryUrimal Keun Sajeon, asserts that the proportion is not so high. He points out that Korean dictionaries compiled during thecolonial period include many unused Sino-Korean words. In his estimation, the proportion of Sino-Korean vocabulary in the Korean language might be as low as 30%.[52]
The vast majority ofloanwords other than Sino-Korean come from modern times, approximately 90% of which are fromEnglish.[47] Many words have also been borrowed fromWestern languages such asGerman viaJapanese (e.g.아르바이트 (areubaiteu) 'part-time job',알레르기 (allereugi) 'allergy',기브스 (gibseu orgibuseu) 'plaster cast used for broken bones'). Some Western words were borrowed indirectly via Japanese during theJapanese occupation of Korea, taking a Japanese sound pattern, for example "dozen" >ダースdāsu >다스daseu. However, most indirect Western borrowings are now written according to current "Hangulization" rules for the respective Western language, as if borrowed directly. In South Korean official use, a number of other Sino-Korean country names have been replaced with phonetically oriented "Hangeulizations" of the countries' endonyms or English names.[53]
Because of such a prevalence of English in modern South Korean culture and society,lexical borrowing is inevitable. English-derived Korean, or "Konglish" (콩글리시), is increasingly used. The vocabulary of the South Korean dialect of the Korean language is roughly 5% loanwords (excluding Sino-Korean vocabulary).[54] However, due to North Korea's isolation, such influence is lacking in North Korean speech.
Modern Korean is written with an alphabet script, known asHangul in South Korea andChosŏn'gŭl in North Korea. TheKorean mixed script, combining Hanja and Hangul, is still used to a certain extent in South Korea, but that method is slowly declining in use even though students learn Hanja in school.[55]
The letters of the Korean alphabet are not written linearly like most alphabets, but instead arranged into blocks that representsyllables. So, while the wordbibimbap (Korean rice dish) is written as eight characters in a row in the Latin alphabet, in Korean it is written비빔밥, as three "syllabic blocks" in a row.Mukbang (먹방 'eating show') is seven characters afterromanization but only two "syllabic blocks" before.
Modern Korean is written with spaces between words, a feature not found in Chinese or Japanese (except when Japanese is written exclusively inhiragana, as in children's books). Themarks used forKorean punctuation are almost identical to Western ones. Traditionally, Korean was written in columns, from top to bottom, right to left, like traditional Chinese. However, the syllabic blocks are now usually written in rows, from left to right, top to bottom, like English.
Korean has numerous small localdialects (calledmal (말;lit. 'speech'),saturi (사투리), orbangeon (방언;方言)). South Korean authors claim that thestandard language (pyojuneo orpyojunmal) of both South Korea and North Korea is based on the dialect of the area around Seoul (which, as Hanyang, was the capital ofJoseon-era Korea for 500 years), but since 1966, North Korea officially states that its standard is based on the Pyongyang speech.[56][57] All dialects of Korean are similar to one another and largely aremutually intelligible (with the exception of dialect-specific phrases or nonstandard vocabulary unique to dialects) though thedialect of Jeju Island is divergent enough to be generally considered a separate language.[58][59] TheYukjin dialect in the far northeast is also quite distinctive.[60]
One of the more salient differences between dialects is the use of tone: speakers of theSeoul dialect make use of vowel length, but speakers of theGyeongsang dialect maintain thepitch accent of Middle Korean. Some dialects are conservative, maintaining Middle Korean sounds (such asz, β, ə), which have been lost from the standard language, and others are highly innovative.
There is substantial evidence for a history of extensivedialect levelling or evenconvergent evolution or intermixture of two or more originally-distinct linguistic stocks, within the Korean language and its dialects. Many Korean dialects have a basic vocabulary that is etymologically distinct from vocabulary of identical meaning in Standard Korean or other dialects. For example, "garlic chives" translated into Gyeongsang dialect is/t͡ɕʌŋ.ɡu.d͡ʑi/ (정구지;jeongguji), but in Standard Korean, it is/puːt͡ɕʰu/ (부추;buchu). This suggests that the Korean Peninsula may have at one time been much more linguistically diverse than it is today.[65] See also theJapanese–Koguryoic languages hypothesis.
In North Korea,palatalization of/si/ is optional, and/t͡ɕ/ can be pronounced[z] between vowels.
Words that are written the same way may be pronounced differently (such as the examples below). The pronunciations below are given inRevised Romanization,McCune–Reischauer and modifiedHangul (what the Korean characters would be if one were to write the word as pronounced).
When aㄴㄴ combination is pronounced asll, the original Hangul spelling is kept in the North, whereas the Hangul is changed in the South.
규률
규율
rules
gyuyul (kyuyul)
In words where the original Hanja is spelt "렬" or "률" and follows a vowel, the initialㄹ is not pronounced in the North, making the pronunciation identical with that in the South where theㄹ is dropped in the spelling.
Basically, the standard languages of North and South Korea, including pronunciation and vocabulary, are both linguistically based on the Seoul dialect, but in North Korea, words have been modified to reflect the theories of scholars likeKim Tu-bong, who sought a refined language, as well as political needs. Some differences are difficult to explain in terms of political ideas, such as North Korea's use of the wordrajio (라지오).:
Word
Meaning
Remarks
North spelling
North pronun.
South spelling
South pronun.
력량
ryeongryang (ryŏngryang)
역량
yeongnyang (yŏngnyang)
strength
Initialr's are dropped if followed byi ory in the South Korean version of Korean.
로동
rodong (rodong)
노동
nodong (nodong)
work
Initialr's are demoted to ann if not followed byi ory in the South Korean version of Korean.
원쑤
wonssu (wŏnssu)
원수
wonsu (wŏnsu)
mortal enemy
"Mortal enemy" and "field marshal" are homophones in the South. Possibly to avoid referring toKim Il Sung,Kim Jong Il orKim Jong Un as the enemy, the second syllable of "enemy" is written and pronounced쑤 in the North.[67]
라지오
rajio (rajio)
라디오
radio (radio)
radio
In South Korea, the expressionrajio is considered a Japanese expression that was introduced during the Japanese colonial rule and does not properly represent the pronunciation of Korean.[68]
When transcribing foreign words from languages that do not have contrasts between aspirated and unaspirated stops, North Koreans generally use tensed stops for the unaspirated ones while South Koreans use aspirated stops in both cases.
페
pe (p'e)
폐
pye (p'ye), pe (p'e)
lungs
In the case whereye comes after a consonant, such as inhye andpye, it is pronounced without the palatal approximate. North Korean orthography reflects this pronunciation nuance.
In general, when transcribing place names, North Korea tends to use the pronunciation in the original language more than South Korea, which often uses the pronunciation in English. For example:
All similar grammar forms of verbs or adjectives that end inㅣ in the stem (i.e.ㅣ,ㅐ,ㅔ,ㅚ,ㅟ andㅢ) in the North use여 instead of the South's어.
고마와요
gomawayo (komawayo)
고마워요
gomawoyo (komawŏyo)
thanks
ㅂ-irregular verbs in the North use와 (wa) for all those with a positive ending vowel; this only happens in the South if the verb stem has only one syllable.
할가요
halgayo (halkayo)
할까요
halkkayo (halkkayo)
Shall we do?
Although the Hangul differ, the pronunciations are the same (i.e. with the tensedㄲ sound).
In the North,guillemets (《 and》) are the symbols used forquotes; in the South, quotation marks equivalent to the English ones (" and") are standard (although『 』 and「 」 are also used).
Some vocabulary is different between the North and the South:
Word
Meaning
Remarks
North word
North pronun.
South word
South pronun.
문화주택
munhwajutaek (munhwajut'aek)
아파트
apateu (ap'at'ŭ)
Apartment
아빠트 (appateu/appat'ŭ) is also used in the North.
조선어
joseoneo (chosŏnŏ)
한국어
hangugeo (han'gugŏ)
Korean language
The Japanese pronunciation of 조선말 was used throughout Korea and Manchuria during Japanese imperial rule, but after liberation, the government in the South chose the name 대한민국 (daehanminguk) which was derived from the name immediately prior to Japanese imperial rule, and claimed by government-in-exile from 1919. The syllable 한 (han) was drawn from the same source as that name (in reference to the Han people).Read more.
조선어 (joseoneo/chosŏnŏ) is officially used in the North.
동무 was originally a non-ideological word for "friend" used all over the Korean peninsula, but North Koreans later adopted it as the equivalent of the Communist term of address "comrade". As a result, to South Koreans today the word has a heavy political tinge, and so they have shifted to using other words for friend likechingu (친구) orbeot (벗). Today,beot (벗) is closer to a term used in literature, andchingu (친구) is the widest-used word for friend.
Such changes were made after the Korean War and the ideological battle between the anti-Communist government in the South and North Korea's communism.[69][70]
In North Korea, the regulatory body is the Language Institute of the Academy of Social Sciences (사회과학원 어학연구소;社會科學院語學硏究所;Sahoegwahagwŏn ŏhagyŏn'guso). In South Korea, the regulatory body for Korean is theSeoul-basedNational Institute of Korean Language, which was created by presidential decree on 23 January 1991.
Established pursuant to Article 9, Section 2, of the Framework Act on the National Language, theKing Sejong Institute[72] is a public institution set up to coordinate the government's project of propagating Korean language and culture; it also supports the King Sejong Institute, which is the institution's overseas branch. The King Sejong Institute was established in response to:
An increase in the demand for Korean language education;
a rapid increase in Korean language education thanks to the spread of the culture (hallyu), an increase in international marriage, the expansion of Korean enterprises into overseas markets, and enforcement of employment licensing system;
the need for a government-sanctioned Korean language educational institution;
the need for general support for overseas Korean language education based on a successful domestic language education program.
King Sejong Institute has 59 in Europe, 15 in Africa, 146 in Asia, 34 in the Americas, and 4 in Oceania.[73]
TheTOPIK Korea Institute is a lifelong educational center affiliated with a variety of Korean universities in Seoul, South Korea, whose aim is to promote Korean language and culture, support local Korean teaching internationally, and facilitate cultural exchanges.
The institute is sometimes compared to language and culture promotion organizations such as the King Sejong Institute. Unlike that organization, however, the TOPIK Korea Institute operates within established universities and colleges around the world, providing educational materials. In countries around the world, Korean embassies and cultural centers (한국문화원) administer TOPIK examinations.[74]
For native English-speakers, Korean is generally considered to be one of the most difficultforeign languages to master despite the relative ease of learning Hangul. For instance, theUnited States'Defense Language Institute places Korean in Category IV withJapanese,Chinese (Mandarin andCantonese), andArabic, requiring 64 weeks of instruction (as compared to just 26 weeks for Category I languages likeItalian,French, andSpanish) to bring an English-speaking student to a limited working level of proficiency in which they have "sufficient capability to meet routine social demands and limited job requirements" and "can deal with concrete topics in past, present, and future tense."[75][76] Similarly, theForeign Service Institute's School of Language Studies places Korean in Category IV, the highest level of difficulty.[77]
The study of the Korean language in the United States is dominated byKorean Americanheritage language students; in 2007, these students were estimated to form over 80% of all students of the language at non-military universities.[78] However,Sejong Institutes in the United States have noted a sharp rise in the number of people of other ethnic backgrounds studying Korean between 2009 and 2011, which they attribute torising popularity ofSouth Korean music andtelevision shows.[79] In 2018, it was reported that the rise in K-Pop was responsible for the increase in people learning the language in US universities.[80]
There are two widely used tests of Korean as a foreign language: theKorean Language Ability Test (KLAT) and theTest of Proficiency in Korean (TOPIK). The Korean Language Proficiency Test, an examination aimed at assessing non-native speakers' competence in Korean, was instituted in 1997; 17,000 people applied for the 2005 sitting of the examination.[81] The TOPIK was first administered in 1997 and was taken by 2,274 people. Since then the total number of people who have taken the TOPIK has surpassed 1 million, with more than 150,000 candidates taking the test in 2012.[82] TOPIK is administered in 45 regions within South Korea and 72 nations outside of South Korea, with a significant portion being administered in Japan and North America, which would suggest the targeted audience for TOPIK is still primarily foreigners of Korean heritage.[83] This is also evident in TOPIK's website, where the examination is introduced as intended for Korean heritage students.
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.[85]
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