Why are there so many similarities between Japanese and Chinese writing (as I understand it at least), yet written Korean looks (to me at least) so different? I assume it has been occupied by both at various times throughout history, is the script used today recent? Or are they similar in a way I don’t see?
Japanese borrowed Chinese script and added a few modifications since the languages are completely different (not even remotely related).
Korean is written in an entirely different script. It was invented specifically for the Korean language, and is a syllabary-- one charager = one syllable. Not quite an alphabet, but almost.
That’s the quick answer. Go to Wikipedia (a great online resource) if you want more info.
“charager” should have been “character”. Don’t know how I screwed that one up…
So when was Korean script designed?
The “Few modifications” refer to the character set (kanji) and their pronunciation. However, The Japanese also added an additional set of simplified phonetic characters as a syllabary (kana) . Kana are functionally akin to the Korean Hangul; you can “spell out” words in your native or (approximately) foreign language. Chinese has to rely on transliterating foreign words into similar-sounding characters
Many Koreans still use the Chinese Characters to write their names, and most Koreans of “a certain age” can still read Chinese Characters.
My Japanese/English third grader has great trouble with Japanese characters - the only way to really learn them is to use them and write them over and over again. He copes but he doesn’t like it!
On the other hand, he is learning Korean from a local friend, and he is picking up the writing very quickly. His teacher gave us a sheet which looks like a multiplication table, with phonetic symbols across the top and down the sides. So if you line up “j” and “a” then you get the symbol for “ja” and so on. Great fun!
It’s the most logical writing system ever invented. I think I learned it in an afternoon on my first trip to Korea. A very elegant system.
Japanese/Chinese is tough. Even if you learn to read quite a few characters, writing them can be very problematic!
I have to dispute the contention that Korean is the most logical writing system ever invented. The Japanese kana sets represent the same sounds and are presented linearly rather than stacked in odd little clusters like Korean.
But of course, the Japanese have to go and ruin this perfect system by insisting on clinging to the daunting Chinese system.
Yes, the Korean writing system is quite easy. I learned it during the 10-hour flight the first time I came to Korea, with the help of a little self-study workbook. In my experience, much easier than the Japanese kana, which is of course a lot easier than Chinese characters.
Koreans are quite proud of the logical nature of Hangul (the name of their syllabary), and rightly so, I guess. It put literacy within the reach of the common person, who wasn’t able to spare the time needed for learning Chinese writing. But I occasionally read an article expounding the virtues of Hangul as the ideal writing system for every language, and this is patent nonsense. My given name, for example, is Glen, one syllable. In Korean, the “g” sound cannot appear next to the “l” sound (insofar as the language even has those sounds) without an intervening vowel, so my name is rendered in two syllables: Gu-len. My family name has two syllables, but expands to four in Hangul. It’s not bad, but it isn’t right, and many foreign words come out worse than this.
Of course, writing Korean words in the English alphabet is no better. “Seoul” actually has two syllables in Korean, but most non-Koreans pronounce it like “soul.” The common family name “Lee” does not ordinarily have an “l” sound in Korean, and actually sounds more like “Yee.” Many spell it “Yi” in English, which makes more sense to me. The surname “Kim” actually sounds more like “Gim,” and a few people spell it that way. And the current Korean president, Mr. Roh, actually has a family name that sounds almost just like the word “no,” but reportedly uses the “r” sound to avoid negative connotations.
In case anyone was wondering.
I disagree, although my understanding of Hangul is limited. If what I’ve read is correct, the character for ‘ka’ would have one mark representing a ‘k’ and one representing an ‘a’. ‘ka’ ‘sa’ ‘na’ and ‘ta’ would therefore all have a mark in common, as would ‘ka’ ‘ki’ ‘ke’ and ‘ko’. This seems easier to read and learn than hiragana or katakana, in which the characters don’t have any relationship to each other. I don’t know if I’d call hangul “the most logical,” but it seems pretty straightforward.
Actually, while the Japanese kana comprise two syllabaries, Korean writing actually is an alphabet. It’s just that the letters are arranged into syllables that fit into squares (making it look sorta vaguely like Chinese, compared to the style of the Roman or Arabic alphabets.)
Actually, most Linguists I’ve talked to call Hangul either an alphabet, or a “featural code”, not a syllabary. Each specific glyph does not equal a syllable.
What appear to be syllable glyphs are actually groups of glyphs, each having a single phoneme. So “Han”, written in Hangul looks like one syllable, but is composed of three glyphs: H - A - N. I’ve actually seen attempts to write Korean out linearly rather than in syllable blocks. King Sejong (the inventor) was probably inspired by Chinese and is probably the reason for the syllable blocks. I’ve also read he may have been inspired by 'Phags-pa .
So, what’s a featural code you ask? Well, the short answer is that in a featural code, glyphs representing similar sounds are written with glyphs that all have a similar shape. King Sejong actually is said to have created the consonant glyphs based upon the shape of the mouth as they are pronounced. So the glyph for n looks like a tongue with the tip flexed upwards.
Hangul would be inefficient for writing languages other than Korean because it doesn’t show a distinction between voiced and voiceless consonants (like g/k, b/p, d/t, etc). But, the way Korean’s phonetic rules work, it makes a lot of sense and fits perfectly.
The South Koreans use a mixed system, which like Japanese includes Chinese characters. North Korea has done away entirely with Chinese characters in writing and writes purely in Hangul (which they actually call “cosenkul” not “hangul”)
While the script is very different between Chinese and Korean, the pronunciation is often similiar. I would be studying a Chinese character, how’s it’s pronounced and written for a good 15 minutes, and my korean girlfriend can pick up a large chunk of the characters based on the pinyin. I can’t think of the pronunciation right now, but the word for “stepfather” in Chinese is similiar in Korean.
I can really say that Korean system is way better than that of Japense, since Korean way is more efficient to spell out or read. Actually, I would explain bad of the Japanese system. I am actually learning Japanese and feel that it is sometimes horrible, because I need to memorize whole single characters like “ka” “ki” individualy. But in Korean system, you will learn a character sounding “K” and use other characters like “a” or “i” put together and make sound like “ka” “ki”. And in Japanese system, there is no relationship among letters, though there are in same row. “ka” “ki” “ku” “ke” and “ko” in same row are all different.
The reason why the Korean seems having more characters is that Korean language can sound more than that of Japanese. For example, Japanese cannot pronounce more than simple syllables like “ka” “ga”. They cannot pronounce like “kal” “kack” “kam” “kab”. You know Japanese way to say McDonald is “ma ku do na ru do”
I would not say that Korean is the most logical, but “pretty” logical compared with others.
In addition, Japanese and Korean letters are not related. Korean letters “Hangul” is solely invented by a Korean king names Seojongdaewang in 1443. Japanese’s katakana and hiragana are pretty much a simplified version of Chinese characters.
I have to disagree here. Memorizing hangul probably takes less time than memorizing the kana (not that doing either takes much time), but once memorized, neither system strikes me as inherently more efficient to read.
Recently, more and more foreign loanwords are being introduced into Japanese, and the katakana syllabary has been twisted to try to make it more accurately reflect sounds it wasn’t intended for (I’m referring to things such as the shift from ビ to ヴィ for ‘vi’, and other compounds such as ディ for ‘di’… no doubt some kind of differentiation between l and r will eventually be introduced). Has anything similar happened with hangul?
This is the most confusing thing about Korean to me. The more I hear about it, the more confusing it gets. What I need is someone who actually understands linguistics who can explain it systematically.
What is up with the initial “L” sound in Korean that they keep substituting other sounds to pronounce it with, and other letters to transliterate it with? In the standardized McCue-Reischauer transliteration, the consonant glyph with three parallel horizontal lines is transliterated “L” when syllable-initial and word-final, but “R” when intervocalic (between vowels). For some reason, though, popular Korean uses anything but L initially. This is what I’ve never figured out.
Li > Rhee (pronounced Yee)
Lo > Roh (pronounced Noh)
HELP!!!
Nope. The Japanese kana are more or less aribitrary, while Hangul is designed to make like sounds have like characters.
OK, but you never actually write an “h” glyph by itself, do you? It may exist in the abstract, but AFAIK, is never actually used. Correct me if I’m wrong on that.
The Korean Hangeul writing system is most definitely an alphabet. The confusion comes about because it is not written in a simple left-to-right lines.
Letters are grouped into blocks. The order within a block is left-to-right then up-to-down. A block always starts with a consonant (although it may be silent) is always followed by one or two vowels. An additional one or two consonants may follow the vowel(s). Blocks never cross word boundaries.
It is very easy to learn the Korean alphabet. There’re only 24 letters to learn. The blocks are only a stylistic convention.
Cites: Korean Government, Omniglot.