Word Order
Korean Hangul is a subject-object-verb (SOV) language unlike English that is a subject-verb-object (SVO) language. Consider this instance,
English: Charles [S] studies [V] Korean [O].
Korean: Charles [S] Korean [O] studies [V]
찰스가 한국어를 공부해요.
Hence, verbs as well as descriptive verbs (i.e., English adjectives) appear at the end of the sentence. All other elements such as nouns (i.e., subject and/or object), pronouns, adverbs and numbers (e.g., with Korean counters) appear before verbs and/or adjectives. Modifiers such as adverbs, demonstratives and relative clauses also appear before modified words.
To further understand, consider this another instance,
English: James eats breakfast at home.
Korean: 젬서가 집에서 아침 식사를 먹어요. (James home-at breakfast eats)
In English, “James” is the subject of the sentence since it appears before the verb “eats” and “breakfast” is the object as it appears after the verb. In addition, the extra element “at home” comes after the object. Notice that English prepositions (e.g., at, in the) always appear before the nouns like “at home”.
However in Korean, the word order is distinctively different. Aside being SOV language, Korean uses particles that attached in their word elements (e.g., verbs, nouns). For instance, 젬서 is the subject since it is marked by the subject particle 가. 집 is the location since it is marked by the locative particle 에서 and 아침 식사 is the object since it is marked by object particle 를.
Moreover, particles are also the reason that Korean sentences don’t always follow the SOV pattern. Consequently, Korean nouns (as subjects or objects) can be rearranged freely in a sentence. For instance, the following six sentences mean “James eats breakfast at home.”
[1] 젬서가 집에서 아침 식사를 먹어요. “James home-at breakfast eats”
[2] 젬서가 아침 식사를 집에서 먹어요. “James breakfast home-at eats”
[3] 집에서 젬서가 아침 식사를 먹어요. “Home-at James lunch eats”
[4] 집에서 아침 식사를 젬서가 먹어요. “Home-at lunch James eats”
[5] 아침 식사를 젬서가 집에서 먹어요. “Breakfast James home-at eats”
[6] 아침 식사를 집에서 젬서가 먹어요. “Breakfast home-at James eats”
Notice that even the word order changes, the verb is always appears at the end of the sentence. In addition, word order only affects the Korean language if certain particles are missing in given sentences. But, it often happens during colloquial usages or conversations. Meanwhile, changing the word order (i.e., as discussed later on context-oriented language) or using the special particles (e.g., topic particle은/는) delimits the meanings of Korean nouns.
Context-Oriented Language
We already know that changing of word order is possible in Korean language. However, the order of the word varies significantly. The reason is that the most important elements tend to cluster to the end of the sentence. The nearer the word is to the end of the sentence, the more essential that word element is. In other words, nouns (e.g., subject and/or object) as always appear at the beginning of the sentence are less important and most likely to be dropped. Hence, verb is the most important element in the sentence as it is always appears at the end of the sentence following the SOV pattern. Consequently, Korean sentences that just have verb or adjectives are grammatically correct and natural in conversation. Here are some of the instances,
괜찮습니까? “ Are you okay?”
lit., are okay
뭐 하세요? “What do you do?”
lit., what do
사과합니다 “I apologize.”
lit., apologize do
Notice that there are no subject or object in the above sentences. Therefore, what determines the omission is the context. Korean Hangul is a context-oriented language which means that any contextually understood elements may be omitted unless they are essential.
General-to-Specific Language
Korean Hangul is a “general-to-specific language” or “big-to-small language”. Indeed, Koreans used to write or say general or bigger units before the specific or smaller units. Here are the appropriate examples,
[1] 이종욱 “Lee Jong-wook”
Korean people write or say their last name before the given name.
[2] 대한민국, 경기도, 파주시, 서초구, 양재동 2, 이종욱 “Republic of Korea, Gyeonggi
Province, Paju City, Seocho District, Yangjae 2, Lee Jong-wook"
When writing an address, Koreans write the name of the country first, followed by the
province, city, district, street, house number and the name of the receiver.
[3] 2017 년 7 월 18 일 “2017 year 7 month 18 day” (July 18, 2017)
When writing a date, the year comes first then the month followed by the day.
Honorific Language
Korean Hangul is an honorific language since it has grammatical elements used to indicate social meanings involved in contexts such as speakers’ attitude (e.g., formality, respect, humility, intimacy) toward whom they are talking to or whom they are talking about.
Indeed, Korean people use hierarchical address-reference terms of titles (e.g., -씨, -님, -야) as well as different speech levels to indicate formality, politeness and intimacy level of speech during a conversation. Koreans do also use humble person pronoun forms like 저 “first person singular” and 저회 “first person plural” to indicate humility. Moreover, they also use an honorific suffix (으) 시 and euphemistic words to indicate their respect toward a subject of seniority or higher social status. Consider these instances,
[a] 오늘 밤 우리 대학 동창회에 와 주어서 고마워.
“(I) appreciated that you came to our college reunion tonight.”
[b] 오늘 밤 저희 대학 돈창회에 와 주셔서 구맙습니다.
“(I) appreciated that you came to our college reunion tonight.”
The referential meanings of the two above sentences are the same. However, their social meanings are different. As for [b], it uses humble person pronoun 저희, honorific suffix 시and deferential speech level to indicate humility, respect and formality to the receiver. To further understand, 저희 [b] is used instead of우리from [a] to indicate humility; the use of honorific suffix 시 to the verb in [a] 주어서 “giving (me)” to [b] 주셔서 (contracted form of 주시어서) to indicate respect; and lastly, the use of the deferential speech level sentence-ending -습니다 [b] instead of the intimate speech level sentence ending –어 in [a]. Therefore, instance [a] is most likely addressing to a person either of equal or lower status (=rank or –rank) and/or whom the speaker knows well (+intimacy). For instance, it could be close friend, classmates and schoolmates. As for instance [b], the use of honorific elements signifies that the addressee is somewhat a person on higher-status (+rank) (e.g., professor).
Thus, Korean Hangul as language depicts on how an utterance is said is more important than what is said.
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