Shawn Ford
LING 344
Term Project
Fall 2000
A Sketch of the Korean Language
Introduction
In the following paper, I will present a short sketch of the Korean language.
As Korean is an ancient and well-developed language, a complete description
of all of its features would take up more space than this paper allows. Therefore,
I will limit the discussion in certain sections and focus more attention on
areas that I found most interesting: Korean's genetic relationship, its orthography,
and some aspects of its morphology and syntax.
Genetic Relationship and General Background
The Korean language is a language spoken by approximately 72 million people
worldwide. The vast majority of these speakers reside on the Korean Peninsula
in either North or South Korea; however, an estimated 7% of the Korean population
lives outside of Korea in different countries throughout the world. In a ranking
of the world's languages according to number of speakers, Korean is eleventh.
The genetic affiliation of the Korean language is a subject that has created
much controversy in the field of linguistics and has yet to be determined. Various
hypotheses have been developed over the course of attempting to determine the
relationship of Korean to other languages. Among these hypotheses are the Altaic
hypothesis, the Austronesian hypothesis, the Altaic/ Austronesian hypothesis,
the Dravidian hypothesis, and the Nostratic hypothesis.
The Altaic connection is the hypothesis that has received the most attention
by serious linguists. This hypothesis relates Korean to the Altaic language
family which includes Turkic, Mongolian, and Tungusic languages. According to
this hypothesis, at some point in Korea's prehistory, dominant Altaic peoples
migrated southward into Korea from the north, imposing their language and culture
upon the native peoples who inhabited the Korean Peninsula at that time. The
result was a blending of proto-Altaic and the language spoken in Korea at the
time of the Altaic migrations.
Although disputed by some scholars, the genetic classification of Korean into
the Altaic language family appears to have a somewhat convincing linguistic
base. Following the accepted method in the field, linguists have established
a list of recurring sound correspondences while attempting to show the relation
of Korean to Altaic.
Researchers have also shown that Korean shares many other linguistic similarities
with Altaic languages. These similarities include phonological correspondences
in both vowels and consonants, and lexical and morphological items that appear
closely related.
In addition, quite a number of typological similarities between Korean and Altaic
languages have been cited to show their connection. Korean and Altaic languages
share SOV word order as well as a large number of other syntactic features.
As is common with many SOV languages, modifiers and clauses generally precede
the things they modify. These languages also have postpositions instead of prepositions.
Furthermore, in these languages, sentences can be formed that contain only a
verb, with the subject and the object understood in the given context. Lastly,
Korean and Altaic languages exhibit vowel harmony as phonological features.
According to the Austronesian hypothesis, Korean is related to the family that
includes the Indonesian, Melanesian, Polynesian, and Micronesian language groups.
At some point in Korea's past, an Austronesian group was to have entered the
Korean Peninsula from the south and influenced the native language after gaining
control of the peninsula. However, the relationship between Korean and Austronesian
languages is not based on a convincing sample of recurring sound correspondences.
The genetic affiliation is based primarily on typological similarities and anthropological
and archeological findings. Therefore, this hypothesis seems to be rather weak
as compared to the Altaic hypothesis.
With regards to the remaining three hypotheses, they also are based primarily
on similar typological features rather than recurring sound correspondences.
These hypotheses are widely unaccepted by the linguistic profession. However,
they have not been completely discredited, and scholars continue to work with
these hypotheses searching for evidence of the genetic relative of the Korean
language.
After analyzing the different conjectures, the blended Altaic/ Austronesian
hypothesis is the most intriguing from an anthropological, archeological, and
historical viewpoint. This hypothesis argues that an Altaic group entered Korea
from the north while and Austronesian group entered Korea from the south, resulting
in a language clash on the peninsula between the two language families that
produced the Korean language. A great deal of anthropological and archeological
evidence supports this historical scenario. Even so, without accepted linguistic
data, this hypothesis is probably best reserved for historians.
Perhaps the biggest obstacle cited to ever determining the genetic affiliation
of the Korean language is the lack of authentic historical data. The earliest
language samples are not yet 1000 years old, and many of these were written
using Chinese characters. In addition to the lack of data, the Korean language
has been overwhelmingly influenced by a plethora of Chinese loan words, making
analysis of original vocabulary items even more difficult. Unfortunately, it
is quite possible that the Korean language will never find its genetic relatives.
Orthography
The earliest writing system used in Korea dates to the second century B.C. when
a primitive Korean state introduced Chinese script to the peninsula. For centuries,
only Chinese characters were used to record events and write books. This posed
a great problem for the average Korean citizen due to the dissimilarities between
the Korean and Chinese languages and the difficulty of understanding the Chinese
characters.
In 1443 A.D., the fourth king of Korea's Cosen dynasty, King Seycong, commissioned
scholars to help him develop a writing system specifically for the Korean language.
After intense study of Chinese linguistics and Korean phonology, the phonetic
alphabet Hankul was developed to accurately express the Korean language in printed
form. Hankul is considered by some to be the most scientific writing system
ever created, and the Korean people are very proud of this achievement.
The three main vowel symbols of the alphabet represent heaven (a round dot:
ð, later changed to a short horizontal or vertical
stroke on a longer line), earth (a long horizontal line: æ),
and man (a long vertical line: |). Combinations of these three symbols create
all vowel sounds in the Korean inventory. Five main consonant shapes represent
the shapes of the speech organs when forming the sounds. Velar consonants are
represented by ( ÿ ), alveolar consonants by
( - ), dental consonants by (
), bilabial consonants by ( ) and glottal consonants by (
O ). Variations of these shapes reproduce all of consonants in the Korean
language.
By combining consonants and vowels in a left-to-right and top-to-bottom fashion,
syllable blocks are formed. Each separate block represents a separate syllable
and, in some cases, a separate morpheme. Combining these syllable blocks appropriately
forms morphemes and lexical items.
An interesting aspect of Hankul is that its writing system utilizes the principle
of morphophonemics. In some cases, syllable blocks are not written as syllables,
but rather as morphemes. Each morpheme is spelled in one standardized form regardless
of its contextual sound variation. By following a series of phonological rules,
the correct pronunciation of a combination of syllable block syllables and/or
morphemes can be made.
Phonetics, and Phonology
An observation of the data appears to show that over the course of the recorded
history of the Korean language, the sound inventory of the language has decreased
somewhat. Several consonant phonemes have fallen out of use since the Hankul
alphabet was created. In addition, an observable phenomenon is currently taking
place within the sound system of the Korean language. Younger generation speakers
no longer distinguish long vowels from short vowels. Thus, within the course
of one generation, the Korean language may lose its phonemic distinction between
long and short vowels.
Without regards to dialectal differences, the Korean sound system consists of
nineteen consonants, ten vowels, and two semivowels. Table 1 shows the nineteen
consonants arranged by manner and place of articulation. As can be noted in
Table 1, Korean stop consonants contrast phonemically between lax, aspirate,
and tense. I found this to be an interesting feature of the language.
Table 1: Korean consonants
Table 2 shows the ten Korean vowels arranged by place of articulation, shape,
and height. All vowels are voiced monotone and very consistent regardless of
their environments. Each of the basic ten vowels has a long counterpart; however,
as stated earlier, the younger generation of speakers no longer makes this distinction.
Korean also contains many double vowels that are never shortened in any situation.
In addition, combining the ten basic vowels makes numerous diphthongs.
Table 2: Korean vowels
In addition to the nineteen consonants and the ten vowels, the Korean language
also has the two semivowel glides /w/ and /j/. These semivowels are always on-glides,
as the always occur before and never after a vowel. They are also always in
the syllable-initial position. Another sound that deserves mention is similar
to the sh sound in English. This voiceless palatal fricative is formed when
/s/ or /s'/ occur before an /i/, /y/, or /j/.
Korean syllables are arranged in the structure (C) (G) V (C). Syllables may
contain one optional consonant (C) and one optional glide (G) as onsets, and
it may contain an optional (C) as the coda. The only required element of a Korean
syllable is a vowel (V) as the nucleus.
A very interesting characteristic of the Korean language regards its use of
onomatopoeic words. Many of these words show a distinction between lax, aspirate,
and tense consonants. Each class of consonant seems to take on certain characteristics
that help reflect the sound that is being imitated. The same is true for vowels.
The result is an onomatopoeic word that more accurately reflects a specific
sound:
'turn round and round'
lax: pingping
(airplane)
aspirate: phingphing (a motor belt)
tense: p'ingp'ing (a top)
Morphology
The Korean language is considered to be a highly agglutinative language. It
consists of upwards of 100 particles and over 600 affixes, which serve either
derivational or inflectional purposes. Long chains of these particles or affixes
may be attached to nominal or predicate stems. Each of the particles and affixes
maintain a constant form and meaning in its attachment.
Example of Korean morphology:
ka- si- ess-
keyss- sup- ni-
ta
go+subj.honor.+past+presumpt.+addressee honor.+indicative+declarative
'(a respectable person) may have gone'
An interesting aspect of Korean morphology is its careful use of sentence enders.
The sentence ender is very important for passing on required information about
the sentence so that it can be understood. Each sentence ender must include
from one to three suffixes in a fixed order: addressee honorific, mood, and
sentence-type. The sentence ender tells the receiver who is being spoken to,
the mood of the sentence, and the type of sentence that is given. The following
diagram shows the possible combinations of sentence enders in Korean.
Sentence ender example:
mek- up- si-
ta
eat+addressee honor.+requestive+propositive
'Let's eat'
Syntax
The Korean language is an SOV language; its basic word order is subject-object-predicate.
Although the predicate always must appear at the end of a sentence, the subject
and other constituents can be scrambled within the sentence for subtle changes
in meaning. Quite often, the subject and object are omitted altogether when
they are understood in the given context:
eti ka- sey- yo?
where go+subj.honor.+polite
'Where are (you) going?'
All Korean particles are postpositions in that they always appear after the
words they are used with:
o-pun-e il
five part of one
'one-fifth'
In contrast, all modifiers precede the elements that they modify:
nay ka tani- nu- n
hak.kyo
I noun marker attend+indicative+relativizer school
'the school that I attend'
Another syntactic note of interest is the fact that the Korean language expresses
things in order of greater-to-lesser, more important to less important, the
whole to the part. Thus, Koreans refer to themselves by their family name first,
followed by their given name, and then a title, if any. In addition, time is
given with the year first and the seconds last.Sample Text
The following short text is a poem from Songs of Flying Dragons, a eulogy written
in celebration of the Cosen Dynasty. This eulogy was composed by royal scholars
to test the newly developed Hankul script; hence, it is the first sample of
the Korean language written in Hankul.
Poem
pulhwi kiphun namkaun
paulaumay ani muylssauy
koc tyokho
yelum hanauni
sauymi kiphun mulun
kaumaulay ani kuchulssauy
nayhi ile
palaulay kanauni
Morpheme Breakdown
(1) pul·hwi ki·phun namkaun
(2) paulau·may a·ni :muyl·ssauy
(3) koc :tyokho
(4) yelum ·hanau·ni
(5) :sauy·mi ki·phun ·mu·lun
(6) ·kaumau·lay a·ni ku·chul·ssauy
(7) :nay·hi i·le
(8) pa·lau·lay ·kanau·ni
Literal Morpheme-by-Morpheme Translation
(1) root/ deep+ relativizer suffix/ tree+ topic-contrast particle/
(2) wind+ to/ not/ move+ as/
(3) flower/ good+ and/
(4) fruit/ abundant+ declarative suffix
(5) stream+ nominative case particle/ deep+ relativizer suffix/ water+ topic-contrast
particle/
(6) drought+ at/ not/ stop+ as/
(7) river/ form+ and then/
(8) sea+ to/ go+ declarative suffix/
Idiomatic Translation
The tree that strikes deep root
Is firm amidst the winds.
Its flowers are good,
Its fruits abundant.
The stream whose source is deep
Gushes fourth even in drought.
It forms a river
And gains the sea.
References
Kim, Chin-u.(1983). The Making of the Korean language. In the Korean National
Commission for UNESCO, ed., TheKorean language, 13-42. Seoul: Si-sa-yong-o-sa
Publishers, Inc.
Kim, Jin-p'yong. (1983). The Letterforms of Han'gul. In the Korean National
Commission for UNESCO, ed., The Korean language, 13-42. Seoul: Si-sa-yong-o-sa
Publishers, Inc.
Lee, Sang-Oak, Hi-Won Yoon, Jae-Young Han, Mee-Sun Han, and Eun Gyu Choi. (undated
textbook). Korean III textbook. Seoul: Language Research Institute of Seoul
National University.
Lyovin, Anatole V. (1997). An Introduction to the languages of the world. New
York: Oxford University Press.
Sohn, Ho-Min. (1999). The Korean language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Yi, Chong-no. (1983). Some characteristics of word order in Korean. In the Korean
National Commission for UNESCO, ed., The Korean language, 13-42. Seoul: Si-sa-yong-o-sa
Publishers, Inc.
Yi, Sang-ok. (1983). The Theory of Altaic languages and Korean. In the Korean
National Commission for UNESCO, ed., The Korean language, 43-54. Seoul: Si-sa-yong-o-sa
Publishers, Inc.
contents (c) 2001 Shawn Ford/ Webb-Ed
Press
sford@hawaii.edu