Throughout my Korean learning journey, it had always been difficult to learn the spellings of the words I would hear and learn from my parents. Because Korean uses distinctive alphabets, it had been a struggle to transcribe the words through sounds. Some sounds that do not exist in American English or are hard to pronounce by Americans include the alphabets, ㄹ, ㅃ, ㅉ, ㄸ, ㄲ, ㅆ, and ㅇ. The first alphabet presented, ㄹ, would translate over to English as an ‘r’ or a ‘l’. Because it can work as both, depending on the situation, it is hard to distinguish the difference. For example, the word 신발 (shoes) would be spelled as ‘shinbal’ but when I pronounce it, it could sound like ‘shinbar’. We put our tongue on the alveolar ridge, but because it is a soft sound, Americans would hear it as the letter ‘R.’ The alphabets ㅃ, ㅉ, ㄸ, ㄲ, ㅆ are known as the ‘쌍’ means that they are doubled versions of the alphabet. These are usually voiced compared to the singular ones and put more pressure on the lips when pronounced. Finally, the alphabet ㅇ is a hard one to say as we use our glottis. I have asked a couple of friends to say the word “응” which is a word often used for “yes.” They were not able to say it as it requires working the airstream through a place they are not used to using. I will try to focus more on the different places of articulation for a more correct sound for the words.
Another point I want to work on is when we have to combine different alphabets when it has more than one sound. For example, the word 닭 (chicken) combines the alphabets ㄹ and ㄱ on the bottom to express the sounds ‘L’ and ‘K.’ These words are hard to spell when we normally do not say the alphabet ㄹ. I will try to focus on cutting up the syllables to really hear all parts of the word to improve my spelling. I also want to focus on where to stress for each letter and differentiate the pitch of the intonations.
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