Journal #5

[Wonjun Kim]

I am extremely interested in Korean's interpersonal relationships in colleges and universities. Because I moved to America at such a young age, I can't really understand any of the school culture that my friends in Korea talk about. I've always had fantasies of what it would be like to go to a Korean high school or college. In between the Korean students, there are slangs that go around, and it is really interesting. Also, the relationships between friends and classmates is completely different than that of American schools. Korean students speak formally to strangers or people that are even one year older than you. Age plays a huge role in Korea as to how you talk to someone, what words you use, and how you deliver your message. To learn about this school culture, I have to know formal vocabulary and what words I can use or not. For example, there are three different ways to say the command "eat" in Korean. 밥먹어 is informal and used commonly to friends or people younger than you. 식사하세요 is formal and used commonly to strangers or people older than you. 진지드세요 is super formal and used commonly to your grandparents or someone that is significantly older than you. I've incorporated advanced vocabulary and preparing for Yeonsei in my learning plan to engage these topics.

[Emmaline Poth-Nebel]

Hi Wonjun, I think there are a lot of differences between American culture and cultures throughout the rest of the world, especially when it comes to respecting your elders and such. In Turkish, there are also formal greetings, suffixes and names, and I've heard that Japanese also has a similar structure. This difference makes learning these languages a little more difficult - at least for me - because I've always used the same suffixes and addressed people of all ages the same way (minus honorifics and such). 

Now I also would like to know about how relationships in Turkish schools differ from those of American schools. I  hadn't even considered the dynamic change before, but now that you mention how it affects Korean school relationships, it makes me think it might impact Turkish social life as well.