Interesting Features That You Should Know When You Learn Korean

[Joo.K]

Interesting Features That You Should Know When You Learn Korean

Learning Korean can be difficult at first. However, if you have a basic knowledge of Korean letters and memorize words, you will realize that it is very easy to make Korean sentences. You don't need to have formal knowledge of Korean language because you can freely speak Korean without knowing difficult grammar.

When you learn and speak Korean, you really don’t need to care about Korean grammar too much. For example, a sentence in English; ‘I love you’. We need to write down ‘(subject) I’ and ‘(object) you’ to clarify the meaning of the sentence. However, you can omit ‘(subject) I’ and ‘(object) you’ in a Korean sentence because we already know who the narrator is and who the narrator loves. In this case, all you need to say is “love”.

That's why I insist that you don't need to be tied down to Korean grammar. Even though you make a grammatical mistake, Korean people can understand what you say and what you write. The only thing that you should keep in mind is distinguishing between 'present verbs' and 'past verbs'. As long as you write down right verbs, Korean people can understand what you are talking about.

However, here is the thing that you really should be careful. That is ‘Spacing out words’, which is the most difficult thing when foreign people study Korean grammar.

For example, there is a sentence, ‘아빠가방에있다’. This sentence can have different meanings, depending on ‘spacing’. ‘아빠가 방에 있다’, it means ‘father is in a room’. On the other hand,  ‘아빠 가방에 있다’, it means ‘that’s in my father’s bag’. The meanings of two sentences are totally different because of spacing. Isn't it interesting? That’s because of the words ‘가’ and ‘방’. In the first sentence, ‘가’ is ‘affix’, and ‘방’ is ‘a room’. However, in the second sentence, ‘가’ and ‘방’ are together, so it becomes a word ‘a bag’. When you study Korean, try to practice making spacing between words.

Don't be afraid of learning Korean. Korean will be the easiest language when you have some knowledge of Korean grammar.

Writer: Joo K

Location: Seoul, South Korea