Discussion Post #9

I have not yet learned how to write in Korean, but I suspect that I would prefer to write free hand. This is because typing would add the extra step of trying to find each individual character on the keyboard, whereas I could write quicker free hand. Although, if there are software-augmented shortcuts for Korean, I may prefer typing over writing free hand.

I do know that Korean words are often short. This is because each Korean word is comprised of only a few characters. This makes Korean much simpler than English, which can have ridiculously long words, such as “antidisestablishmentarianism.” I researched what the longest word in Korean is, and there are words with 41-46 Korean letters, but they describe incredibly specific things, such as a ceramic bowl from the Goryeo dynasty. Other than a few outliers, most Korean words have no more than five characters. This makes Korean much easier to learn after learning the alphabet.

Korean sentences are structured as either “subject + verb” or “subject + object + verb.” For example, the sentence “Eden plays” is structured the same in Korean and English, but “Eden plays violin” would be “Eden violin plays” in Korean. Therefore, directly translating a sentence from English to Korean would make no sense! As for writing complex sentences, the best way I have found is to break them up into simple phrases.

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Comments

  • I think it's great that you included the structure of how Korean sentences are structured. I completely agree with you that Korean words are significantly shorter than certain English words. Today, Koreans are taking a step further by incorporating acronyms into their speech, so words and speech are getting even shorter now.

  • It's very interesting that Korean probably also has software augmentation for typing. Would you have to learn a sort of Korean pinyin in order to type? It also very cool that specific things about a bowl are just part of a word and not additional words.

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