Korean Language

While those ambitious enough can learn the writing system in about a day, learning the language itself is quite a chore. It most definitely requires some degree if diligence, motivation and skill. According to the first volume of the Integrated Korean textbook series, English speakers require three times as much time to learn these "difficult" languages than to learn "easy" languages, such as French or Spanish, to attain a comparable level of proficiency. (p. 15) The National Virtual Translation Center (NTVC) claims that students pursuing languages that are exceptionally difficult for for native English speakers, such as Korean, Japanese, or Arabic require up to four times as many class hours as languages similar to English for comparable levels of proficiency. Despite the difficulty, hopefully these resources will help you learn Korean.

In South Korea, Korean is referred to as hangukeo, hangukmal, or gugeo (national language). It is also sometimes colloquially referred to as urimal (our language). People of Korean ancestry in the former Soviet union often refer to themselves as koryeo saram or koryeo in after the old Korean kingdom of Koryeo, and therefore call the language koryeomal.

There is some debate regarding the classification of modern Korean and there are two generally accepted theories. Many linguists support the theory that Korean is a member of the Altaic language family, along with Turkic, Mongolic, and Tungusic (Manchu-Tungus). Some scholars also include Japanese and Ainu.

The Korean language is spoken by some 80 million people worldwide and is the official language of North and South Korea. It is also one of the two official languages just over the border in Yanbian, China. Countries with substantial Korean speakers include Australia, Brazil, China, Japan, the Philippines, former Soviet block countires, and the United States.

Click here to access our Korean langauge forum.