Korean: An Essential Grammar

Young-Key Kim-Renaud

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9780415385138
• eBook ISBN: 9781134173143
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Languages
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

Korean: An Essential Grammar is a concise and convenient guide to the basic grammatical structure of standard Korean. Presenting a fresh and accessible description of the language, this engaging Grammar uses clear, jargon-free explanations and sets out the complexities of Korean in short, readable sections.

Key features include:

• clear explanations of grammatical terms
• frequent use of authentic examples
• the Korean alphabet used alongside McCune-Reischauer romanization system
• a full glossary of explanations.

Chapter 1

Introduction: the Korean language and its speakers

 

 

A native language for some 72 million people on the Korean peninsula and a first or second language for 5 million more ethnic Koreans living in China, Japan, North America, and the former Soviet Union, Korean ranks eleventh in number of speakers among more than 3,000 languages of the world.

Korean does not have a proven close linguistic relative. Many accept that it is related to Japanese and that both belong to the Tungusic branch of the Altaic family of languages, spoken mainly in Siberia and Mongolia. Typologically, Korean and Japanese are remarkably close in syntactic, semantic, and discourse-pragmatic features. Even more strikingly, Japanese and Korean show such sociolinguistic features as grammatically encoded honorifics [►6.8, 10.1] in a way not shared with any other languages. The two languages also are extremely rich in sound-symbolic expressions called mimetics that are not sporadic, arbitrary words as in most languages, but are an integral part of their respective grammars.

Korean does not belong to the same language family as Chinese and also greatly differs from Chinese in structure. However, as an important member of the Sinitic civilization and a direct neighbor to China, Korea has had a close relationship with the Middle Kingdom. A huge portion of the Korean lexicon, therefore, is based on Sino-Korean roots borrowed from classical written Chinese. Today, loanwords from Western languages, especially English, are increasingly used as a result of globalization and contact with foreign trade goods, ideas, cultures, and customs. Contemporary Korean is a descendant of the language of the Silla kingdom (57 BCE–935 CE), one of the three kingdoms that ruled over the Korean peninsula and a large part of Manchuria, which unified the peninsula in 668.

The basic Korean word order is Subject-Object-Verb. Korean is an agglutinative language, in which words are formed by concatenating various meaning-bearing units. Typically noun phrases or verb stems are followed by suffix-like elements. There are no prepositions, but rather postpositions. For example, noun phrases consist of nouns followed by particles indicating their relationship to other elements in a sentence such as subject, object, dative, etc. Verb stems cannot stand alone but must be followed by suffixes such as those indicating tense, aspect, mood, and the expressed attitude of the speaker vis-à-vis the interlocutor and the referent. Therefore, different word orders are possible, as grammatical markers make the basic meaning of the sentence clear. However, all modifiers must precede the words they modify.

When different roots come together, their forms often influence each other. Many sound alternations are due to universal principles governed by physical and other human characteristics. However, many other seemingly complicated pronunciation changes in Korean are explainable by three important but simple metaforces in Korean: (1) the tendency for consonants between vowels to soften; (2) the tendency for Koreans to unrelease the syllable-final consonant, i.e., retain its contact position in the mouth [►3.4.6]; and (3) the strong nature of the utterance-initial position.

Two salient features of the Korean language are intricate systems of honorification and sound symbolism. In Korean, rather narrowly defined interpersonal relationships are grammatically coded, and a speaker cannot open his or her mouth without considering linguistic protocol. Sound symbolism is the direct or iconic representation of meaning in sounds, which categorizes the world in a Korean-specific way through sound and meaning but still follows certain natural linguistic tendencies such as certain kinds of vowels or consonants occurring with similar sounds. Vowel harmony, which used to be much more systematic in Korean, is now most productive in sound-symbolic words, also called mimetics or ideophones.

Korean is written in han’gǔl, a unique alphabet invented in the mid-1400s, that shows a remarkable linguistic fit between its letter forms and various phonological units of the language. Chinese script was used in writing the Korean language for two millennia, and it is still mixed with Korean script in some academic or legal documents, although writing in han’gǔl only recently has become the norm even in those cases.

Chapter 2

Han’gǔl, the Korean alphabet

Korean is written in an alphabetic system, commonly known today as han’gǔl (“Han [Korean, great, unique] script”) in South Korea and elsewhere, but called chosǒn’gǔl in North Korea. This simple, yet systematic and efficient, alphabet invented in the mid-1400s is a source of great pride for Koreans. In the Republic of Korea, October 9 is celebrated as han’gǔl Day, a rare national day of celebration honoring a linguistic achievement. Various foreign linguists, especially specialists in writing, have noted han’gǔl’s many unusual qualities, calling it, for example, “one of the great intellectual achievements of humankind” (Sampson 1985: 144), “perhaps the most remarkable [script] in the world” (Ledyard 1966: 370), and “probably the most remarkable writing system ever invented” (Coulmas 1989: 118).

Han’gǔl did not evolve over a long period like most alphabets but was invented, and we know its inventor — a sage king and brilliant linguist, Sejong the Great (r. 1418–50). Furthermore, the scientific, humanistic, and philosophical principles underlying its invention are clearly recorded. The original name of the alphabet was Hunmin chǒng’ǔm (“correct sounds for the instruction of the people”) when it was proclaimed in 1446. The proclamation, also entitled Hunmin chǒng’ǔm (hereinafter HC), was a kind of handbook for learning the alphabet; it contained explanatory treatises and examples called Hunmin chǒng’ǔm haerye (“explanations and examples of the correct sounds for the instruction of the people,” or HCH). This historic publication miraculously resurfaced in 1940 after having been lost for centuries. In 1997 UNESCO voted to include it in its Memory of the World register — the first and probably the only linguistic treatise honored in this manner.

Sejong wanted to devise a writing system that would be easy for all Koreans to learn and to use, as clearly stated in his famous Preface to HC:

The sounds of our country’s language are different from those of the Middle Kingdom (China) and are not smoothly communicable with literary (Chinese) characters. Therefore, among my dear people, there are many who, though they have something they wish to tell, are never able to express their feelings [in writing]. Commiserating with this, I have newly designed 28 letters. I desire only that everyone acquire them easily, to make them convenient and comfortable for daily use.

(trans. Kim-Renaud)

Sejong was also eager and confident that the new system would become universal. As Chǒng In-ji put it in his Postface to HCH:

Though only twenty-eight letters are used, their shifts and changes in function are endless; they are simple and fine, reduced to the minimum yet universally applicable. Therefore, a wise man can acquaint himself with them before the morning is over; a stupid man can learn them in the space of ten days … There is no usage not provided for, no direction in which they do not extend. Even the sound of the winds, t...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Routledge Essential Grammars
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• List of abbreviations and notations
• List of tables and figures
• Chapter 1 Introduction: the Korean language and its speakers
• Chapter 2 Han'gŭl, the Korean alphabet
• Chapter 3 Sound pattern
• Chapter 4 The sentence
• Chapter 5 Words
• Chapter 6 Verbs
• Chapter 7 Negation
• Chapter 8 Nouns
• Chapter 9 Modifiers
• Chapter 10 Linguistic protocol
• Appendix 1 Romanization of Han'gŭl letters
• Appendix 2 A quick guide to using the Korean dictionary
• Appendix 3 Sample irregular verb conjugation
• Appendix 4 Glossary
• Appendix 5 Bibliography for further reading
• Index