Learning Journal #6

[Devin Chen]

Study has been going well. Our class has finished learning the alphabet, and I feel somewhat confident remembering the basic vowels and consonants. Also, we learned several basic words for greeting people and making short conversations. Nothing has changed yet but I want to learn more about Korean cultures. I would say that culture and language are very much related, in Chinese, there are even new slang phrases as popular culture evolves. I think similar situation happens in Korea. To improve my communicative competence, I need to learn both the Korean language and the nuances that happen because of contemporary popular culture. Other kind of competence I want to attain is sociolinguistic competence. As I understand, Koreans care a lot about etiquette and addressing their elders properly in the correct suffixes, and that is important in knowing the language.