Blogs

In Korean the structure of sentence differ to English sentences, for example the phrase "Chal Chinaessooyo" literally means "Well have you been getting on?" which is the opposite from English. In general the structure of the Korean sentences is broken down as "subject - object - verb". 

Although the grammar is not that difficult, a reference grammar can definitely be helpful especially for us beginners. I am going to learn some basic grammars by reading grammar books online and ask my Korean friends for help. I will document every new grammar I learn in my notebook so that I can review them easily.

Since the Korean grammar structure is quite different from English, I am going to do a comparison for each new grammar to help me memorize and understand. For example, in Korean unlike English, the subject of the sentences is optional like "I", then the "in order section" is next, which is then followed by "the place you are going".

Also there are a few words that you may add to the end of verb stems at the end of sentences, these include "yo" which makes sentences polite, and "ro" which means "in order to". 

For someone new to the Korean writing system, it may look to be an ideographic system like Chinese. However, the Korean writing system is in fact a phonetic system (just like English) with simple letters to represent each of its various phonemes or sounds. What makes Korean seem ideographic is its convention of grouping its letters into square, syllabic blocks. These syllabic blocks are then combined to form words.

The Koreans borrowed a huge number of Chinese words, gave Korean readings and/or meanings to some of the Chinese characters and also invented about 150 new characters, most of which are rare or used mainly for personal or place names.

Below are some additional features of the Korean writing system:

• The Korean alphabet is made up of 24 letters or jamo. These 24 letters consist of 14 consonants and 10 vowels.
  
• The symbols used to write the consonants g/k, n, s, m and ng are meant to be abstract pictures of the speech organs used to produce their sounds.
  
• "Korean can be written in vertical columns running from top to bottom and right to left, or in horizontal lines running from left to right". 
  

Journal%20%234.docx

SDLC%20Journal%20%233.docx

http://www.voki.com/pickup.php?scid=12403011&height=267&width=200

In my opinion most of the presentations that my classmates held were successful. All of them covered a specific aspect of a culture. We definitely learned a lot about the Korean culture. I have never really studied Asian cultures and I found it very interesting to learn some of the customs and traditions or daily life routines: from very fundamental behavioral rules, such as filial piety, over holiday celebration, to cosmetics. The students managed to bring the Korean culture closer to me and give me a better understanding of the values of that society. It was interesting to see that Koreans still have a lot of respect to the elders and that there is still a hierarchy. Fun fact was really that staying young is a big deal for them. Even men use a lot of cosmetics. Furthermore, Korean dramas seem to be very popular. I used to watch Spanish and Turkish drama, which might be similar to them based on the scenes they include. That presentation has definitely awaken my interest to watch Korean dramas too. I also enjoyed the Ataturk presentation. I already knew some of the things that were mentioned, but I did not know that every office in Turkey had to have Ataturk’s portrait. That really tells a lot about the culture. It is also important as a foreigner visiting the country to be aware of the importance this man has for the entire society. Moreover, I did not know that the McDonald’s in Israel processes their food in a special way and that Israelis cannot eat diary and meat together.  In general, all students gave their best to present an aspect of a culture. 

Prior to 1446, Korea did not have a writing language of their own. Those who were from the elite class, wrote in hanja, classical Chinese characters in order to record the meaning of the Korean words that were spoken. King Sejong, Sejong the Great, said that using Chinese characters for Korean was “like trying to fit a square handle into a round hole”. King Sejong, who was upset that his citizens could not express their concerns to him, developed 28 new letters, so that his people can learn how to use the letters easily and for daily use. It was initially known as Hunmin Jeongeum (“proper sounds for instructing the people”).

The way in which Korean is written is different from most writing systems, despite it being an alphabet, the letters are not written linearly. They are grouped into syllable blocks. Example is for the word hangul: h-a-n-g-u-l regularly would look like this ㅎㅏㄴㄱㅡㄹ  but instead it is this 한글 [han-gul]. There are 3 different “sets” of consonants:

1. ㄱ, ㄷ, ㅂ, ㅈ (romanised as k, t, p, ch)

2. ㅋ, ㅌ, ㅍ, ㅊ (romanised as k’, t’, p’, ch’)

3. ㄲ, ㄸ, ㅃ, ㅆ, ㅉ (romanised as kk, tt, pp, ss, tch)

The presentations that my classmates presented in class on Tuesday were interesting because I learned about many aspects of different cultures and languages. I think the most interesting one was about Mustafa Kemal Atatürk that Shayna Webb presented to the class. Atatürk was the first presented of Turkey and he implemented many reforms such as a new written language for Turkish as well as unveiling the mMuslimwomen there. This meant that Muslim women could no longer wear veils to cover up their hair. Atatürk was so revered for what he did during that time and even to this day, people still honor him and he’s still considered the Father of Turkey. This made me think of how Mao Zedong is still in a way revered in China, since he was the founder of the People’s Republic of China. Another presentation that I enjoyed was about filial piety in Korea, presented by Becky Chen. Filial piety has been something that I could relate since I discovered what it was a few years ago because it reminded of the specific duties that children have to do for their parents and their family. This is based on Confucian ideas, which are still practiced all over Asia.  

I think that my first artifact conversation went well. I used my voki character to record my introduction. There were some technical difficulties at first with the mic in my room, so I decided to call the number and record my introduction that way. In my introduction, I said “My name is Sequioa. Nice to meet you. I’m American. I like Korean. I am 21 years old. Thank you.” I think the quality of audio could be improved, but the experience was fun. I have been working on my pronunciation of Hangul thus far. I still need to improve on the reading and writing, but I think that right now it is most important that I have speaking and reading down for when I want to travel.

What I have been working on:

So far, I have been working on religious vocabulary and the seasons. I want to focus on using complete sentences in the near future.

Statement:

I want to be able to recognize more words when I attend the ASL church.

Strategies:

The best way for me to memorize new words in ASL is repetition. Muscle memory plays a large part in learning new words.

Effectiveness:

I think the above method is very effective, as long as I remember to practice the words every day. If I forget a day, I sometimes forget a sign or two.

Building on what I have learned (language):

The more words I learn the closer I will be to putting together full sentences. One of my problems now is I can put together a sentence, but there is normally always one or two words that I don’t know the sign for and I have to either ask or just finger spell it.

Building on what I have learned (strategies):

I need to work more on practicing my ASL every day. No one around me understands ASL, but I think it would be beneficial for me to sign the signs I do know as I’m having normal conversations. This will also help me recognize which words I should learn the signs for. 

Greetings%20and%20Farewells.mp3

Introductions.mp3

Korean sentences are written in the following order:

Subject – Object – Verb (for example: I hamburger eat)
                                Or
Subject – Adjective (for example: I beautiful)

The subject refers to person/thing/noun/whatever that is acting. The subject does the action of the verb.

The object refers to whatever the verb is acting on. 

Sometimes there is no object because it has simply been omitted from the sentence. For example, “I ate” or “I ate rice” are both correct sentences.

Subjects are also present in sentences with adjectives. However, there is no object in a sentence with an adjective. 

 Every Korean sentence has to end in either a verb (like eat, sleep or walk) or an adjective (like beautiful, pretty, and delicious).

I reference grammar is definitely useful because it is designed to teach someone about the language and to give readers a reference tool for looking up specific details of the language. It is written for individuals who have some understanding of language as a universal phenomenon and who wish to learn how the particular language described fits into universal understandings of human language

Reflecting on the presentations, I really enjoyed learning about different aspects of different cultures particularly from the non-Korean presentations. But I think there are some overlaps among the the different cultures and the Korean culture. As it was pointed out in the Pakistani myths presentations, they value eternal love through the mythical stories, Koreans value eternal love as well as portrayed in Korean dramas. Both Korean dramas and the Pakistani myths have sort of a fantasy component. The stories are not very realistic, but some aspects are, such as the girl having to obey her father's orders and marry who she is supposed to. Korean tradition values parents, and children should respect and obey them, perhaps not for marriage, but in general. 

I thought the German presentation was also interesting, particularly in regards to how they are giving the Syrian refugees some cultural education to help them adjust to life in Germany and deal with people during a festive time. I do not think that Koreans have much very many refugees from other countries coming in. But it makes me think of how South Koreans would handle the North Koreans who escape and try to live in South Korea. I do not know much about North and South Korean cultural differences, but I would assume there are some. I would think the North Koreans, coming from a very isolated society, they would not be as open as the South Koreans and may not be used to the whole Kpop, K-drama culture. Perhaps they would not even be able to understand aegyo. The North Koreans who see South Korean girls do aegyo might find it offensive and that girls should not show off and be so dramatic and that they should still be feminine but more conservative particularly when interacting with men. 

Applying Korean culture to the Kosher McDonalds presentation, I think that there are probably Korean McDonalds and I would think their menu offers different options than the American ones. I think the Korean McDonald's might offer burgers and fries with varying flavors and levels of spiciness. They would probably advertise McDonald's using Korean celebrities from different K-pop groups and dramas to encourage people to eat there. 

I thought the experiences of culture shock presented in the video were very similar to mine when I spent a year abroad. Culture shock is inevitable in that it will happen to anyone, no matter how extensive the preparation for cultural assimilation one may have received. My experience started from the very first minute I landed in Israel. The airport security and the taxi service were both a wake-up. The security itself differed from what I am accustomed to say at LGA or Kennedy in that upon exiting the plane I was questioned by an official. The taxi stand too was queued in every which way, not to mention the price jump the drivers levy on those they deem foreigners. I could go on and on about the micro-scenarios in which the culture shock got the best of me, but the macro-culture proved to be unwavering. I remember feeling isolated and perhaps a little frustrated about a month into my stay. I told myself that I would never be able to adopt their practices and therefore adapt into the society's pace. However, I heard an olim (those who made Aliyah) speak about the Israeli culture, and how bananas it could seem. He continued to say that the only way to enjoy Israel is to quit trying to proselytize your way of life and to assimilate to the Israeli way; to stop trying to compare every facet of their society to your own because you will always find some difference. His words had a great influence. I replaced my predisposition for that of Israel's and tried to live the way the Israelis do. This made a world of a difference, as I greatly enjoyed my time spent there.

Korean is a complex language that has many influences. The structure of Korean language is easier than what most people believe. The Korean language consists of 40 letters: 10 pure vowels, 11 compound vowels, 14 basic consonants and 5 double consonants. Linguistically, Korean is similar to Japanese and has is distantly relative to Mongolian, Finish, and Hungarian. As a native Korean learner, I found it easy to incorporate terminology. However, sometimes my slang Korean can confuse non-native speakers.  In addition, different regions in Korea use different dialects. My family is originally from Busan, so I speak more like that region. Any language is complex and provides cultural obstacles. Korean is no different, in that different regions and areas have different dialects.

I hope to continue to immerse myself by speaking to other native Korean speakers from different areas of Korea. Personally, I believe a reference grammar would greatly help me learn more about the structure of the Korean language. 

I would actually just like to become more involved in ASL culture this semester. I learned quite a lot about it last semester, but because my grasp of the language was not that great, I had a hard time interacting with deaf people without the help of a hearing person.

Culture for ASL can be slightly difficult because many aspects of the culture are similar to the U.S. However, there are a few differences, like how untrustworthy the deaf community is of the hearing community. The church I attend does have deaf people that also attend, but most of the people there are hearing people that have just learned ASL. This makes it slightly difficult to make friends with the deaf ones, because there are not that many.

However, I would like to learn more about how the deaf interact with the hearing and how the deaf interact with each other. I hopefully will be able to learn about this by interacting with the deaf and with the hearing that know ASL. 

(a) your goals and tasks for weeks 4 and 5

-week 4:

goals: document artifact on Greetings, farewells, introductions

task: I would need to learn how to say Hello and Goodbye (formal and informal). I also need to learn how to introduce myself by saying “my name is Rosemary and I am 21 years old.”

-week 5:

goals: evaluation of 1st artifact

task: assessment of how well you met your learning goals for weeks 4   

(b) the resources and activities you will use to achieve your goals

-week 4: I will use Vocaroo to record myself

-week 5: I will use Youtube videos to find the correct pronunciation of words or phrases I say 

(c) how you will evaluate your success

-week 4: make sure the recording is done correctly  

-week 5: Evaluate for accent, cultural appropriateness, and linguistic accuracy

MyLearningPlan

There are significant differences between Korean and English, particularly in sentence structure and morphology (word structure).In Korean the structure of sentence differ to English sentences, for example the phrase Chal Chinaessooyo literally means "Well have you been getting on?" which is the opposite from English. 

In general the structure of the Korean sentences is broken down as subject - object - verb

"Jon the ball kicked"

I think the reference grammar is useful because it helps understand the Korean sentence structure more clearly and easily. 

To learn this knowledge, I found a useful website: http://www.learn-korean.net/learn-korean-classes-viewarticle-10.html

The following is from part of the website:

"To Go" in order to do sentences

There are a few words that you may add to the end of verb stems at the end of sentences, these include -yo which makes sentences polite, and -ro which means "in order to".
In some cases the verb stems may in effect end in consonants in which case -uro is utilised.
The order of the sentences for an example sentence of "in order to buy bread I am goin to the shops" is restructured as "bread buy-in order-to the shops go"
In Korean unlike English, the subject of the sentences is optional like "I", then the "in order section" is next, which is then followed by "the place you are going".

(In English) I go to the shops in-order -to buy bread
(in Korean) I (optional) bread buy - in-order to shops to go
The Konglish for this sentence in Korean would be na-do ppang sa-ro kayo (I-do bread buy-in order-to go).

* The construction can only be used in verbs involving 'going' and 'coming' and cannot be used with other verbs at the end of sentences.

My goals and tasks for week 4 and 5 are to learn how to express feelings in Korean. I have found the Korean learning card for this topic:

In addition, I also found the Youtube video for this topic:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QVGh--R8t1Q

This is a interesting  which contains cartoon and words and pronunciation. I would recommend this series to all of you who are learning Korean. I am planning to practice my pronunciation after watching this video, hoping that I will be able to pronounce in a similar way.  The way that I evaluate my process on this topic is to see if I can speak out the correct emotion when someones ask how I am feeling today.