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The last ZOOM meetings I had with Tommy and our language partner Jimin were focused on the rules of grammar and spacing in the writing component of Korean. These sessions were extremely helpful in my progression with the Korean language because it was the area I struggled, and continue to struggle, the most with. Something about the grammar behind spacing and spelling is so tricky and based on a gut understanding that even native Koreans have a hard time. For my writing skills, these two areas were my two black holes. Because I had never learned written Korean after the 가나다라 alphabets, I had never seen or heard what the rules of spacing (띄어쓰기) and common spelling (마춤법) were. Spacing has rules, but 마춤법 is just spelling. To complicate things even more, the rules and spelling of words are also constantly updated based on the general consensus of the people. One rule of spacing that has been updated is whether or not there is a space between the main root of the word, 본용언 in Korean, and derivational morphemes, 보조용언 in Korean. A good example is “보고싶다/보고 싶다”, meaning I miss you. Before the revision of the rule, “보고 싶다” was the correct grammar. Now, both are accepted as correct. Apart from this rule, there are a handful of others in which some make sense while others are infinitely confusing. After learning about the rules, I always take a second before sending a text in Korean to see if I followed the rules correctly. 마춤법, spelling, is another story. As Korean has a lot of homonyms (because of the difference in spelling and/or Hanja), spelling is one of my weaknesses. One of the mistakes I made when I was younger was the difference between “안” and “않”. They are both negative morphemes that sound the same. “안” is used in the front hile “않” is integrated into the end of a root word. For example, “I didn’t eat” can be either “안 먹었어요” or “먹지 않았어요”. Even in this example, the issue of spacing emerges as well. To end the semester’s SDLAP 105 class, Jimin went over what is called 한글날, Hangul Day. It is a national commemorative day for the establishment of Hangul, also known as 훈민정음 during its creation, by King Sejong the Great. Annually, on October 9, the Korean language is celebrated. As difficult Korean may seem to a beginner learner, or myself attempting to get down the rules of spacing, Hangul was created for all Koreans to be able to simply learn and use. Prior to Hangul, Chinese characters were used in writing form with Korean pronunciation. This method was complicated and the complexity of Chinese characters also led to different interpretations. Reading and writing was so complex that only those of the upper class had the leisure to learn, leaving all commoners without the ability to write out concerns and read important government announcements. Though difficult at times, being able to allocate time to deepen my appreciation of my language has also given me the opportunity to reflect on my culture and its history. I hope to practice my spacing and spelling and improve my overall competence in the Korean language.

This past week, I was finally able to talk with my language partner Jimin and fellow learning partner Tommy via Zoom. After catching up with each other, Jimin shared a document focusing on 고유어 (Native Korean), 한자어 (Hanja, Sino-Korean), and 외래어 (loanwords). This was an interesting topic that I enjoyed because I was able to properly see how 한자 is used, and that 고유어 and 외래어 are the terms to refer to native Korean and loanwords. While I knew they existed and frequently used words under each category, this lesson provided a time for me to connect the dots. 

한자어 makes up around 70% of the daily Hangul people use. A majority of idiomatic expressions, advanced vocabulary, and professional jargon are words formed by Hanja. An example of a  four-character idiomatic expression is 고진감래(苦盡甘來) meaning a mix of "no pain, no gain", "April showers bring May flowers", and "the bee sucks honey out of the bitterest flowers". Loanwords, 외래어, are also highly conventional in daily Korean. An example of a medical jargon, which also happens to be a loanword is “인슐레이션” (insulation). A more colloquial loanword is 콘텐츠 meaning “contents”. Interestingly, loanwords are not always written in Korean to completely reflect the pronunciation. The word “contents” should be written as 컨텐즈 to read it the way it is pronounced in English. However, the spelling of this loanword is 콘텐츠. 고유어, on the other hand, is the “proper” Korean language––expressions and words that always existed only in Korean. Examples range from 어머니 (mother) and 하늘 (sky) to 꽃 (flower) and 구름 (clouds). 고유어 also tends to be used alone as its own word without the addition of derivational morphemes. An interesting characteristic of 한자어 is that alike to the usage of knowing Latin root words, 한자 (Hanja) can be used to decipher a word in Korean that is unfamiliar. For example, knowing the Chinese characters/Hanja for 人 (사람 ‘인’ = mankind) and 力(힘 '력' = power), one can come to the conclusion that “인력” (人力) means manpower. 

Learning about the three categories of the Korean language was enlighting of how historical ties and events, as well as modern-day events, affect the way a language develops and changes. This lesson was all the more interesting due to my limited recollection of learning Hanja coupled with taking Mandarin Chinese in school. I was happy to notice how I could connect my understanding of basic Chinese as well as 한자어 characters I’ve seen before (menus at Chinese restaurants in Korea, for example, use “대/중/소” (= 大／中／下 = large/medium/small for dish sizes) to come to answers to the questions provided by Jimin. I was also happy to see how easily I could understand an excerpt from a news article about COVID-19. I hope to continue studying Hanja characters to aid me in future cracking of unfamiliar terminology and jargon. I also want to uncover how much 고유어, 한자어, and 외래어 I personally use when speaking in Korean. I have a feeling that 외래어 will take up a large proportion of my Korean. 

Var and Yok (There is / There is not):

The words var and yok are the equivalents of “there is/there are” and “there isn’t/there aren’t” respectively. “Var olmak” means “to exist“. If “var” is used with a subject, this indicates that something exists. Conversely, “Yok olmak” means “disappear“. If used with a subject “Yok” indicates the non-existence of something.

Yok: There is not / There are not

“Yok” indicates something’s or someone’s absence.

Example:

Kalem burada yok.      There is no pencil here

Kendine güvenin yok.             You do not have a self-confidence

Moreover, “Yok” can mean “No”. But please watch out when using this way because this use is a little bit of informal even though it can make you sound like a real Turkish native.

Partiye gelecek misn? Will you come to the party?

Yok      No

Var: There is / There are

“Var” indicates something’s existence. For example, Burada sadece pastahane var. (eng. there is only patisserie here.)

Example:

Annenler evde var mı? (lit. Are your mothers at home? The overuse of the plural suffix -ler/-lar somehow makes the sentence more polite. Even, Annenler evde varlar mı? or Annenler evdeler mi? ) In Turkish, ” sahip olmak ” or “haiz olmak” (old use) means “to have”. Instead of using these words, Turkish people simply use “var” or “yok” to describe the things they have.

Example:

Kedilerin dokuz hayatı var.     Cats have nine lives.

Kalemin var mı?          Do you have a pencil?

Nasıl yani? Hiç paran yok mu?            What? Don’t you have any money?

Benim korkum yok      I have no fear; lit. there is not my fear; there does not exist my fear

The last two translations may look odd in English; however, in Turkish saying “Benim korkum yok.” is easier than saying “Ben korkuya sahip değilim.”

Paradigm of var/yok

In this part, we will see the change of var and yok with different tenses.

Kedim var.       I have a cat; lit. I have my cat

Kedim yok.      I don’t have a cat; I don’t have my cat, it is lost

Kedim vardı.    I had a cat, I had my cat

O yıllarda gri bir kedim vardı.             Those years I had a gray cat

O yıllarda kedim halen vardı.              Those years I still had my cat. it was alive

Kedim yoktu.               I didn’t have a cat; I didnt have my cat

Kedim vardır.              I have a cat when used in a formal way; I surely have a cat

Kedim yoktur.             I don’t have a cat. only one meaning

Kedim varmış.             It is said that I have a cat; It is said that I have my cat

Kedim yokmuş.           It is said that I don’t have my cat, It is said that I don’t have a cat

Kedim varsa.               If I have my cat; If I have a cat

Kedim yoksa.               If I don’t have my cat, If I don’t have a cat

Kedim varken.             While I have my cat; While I have a cat

Var and Yok is the base form of third-person-singular. For other persons, the personal suffixes can be added. You’d mostly encounter var and yok without personal suffix; However, ‘varım’ or ‘yokum’ can be encountered as well. Yet these uses are ‘frozen’ and mostly used for specific concepts.

Example:

Var mısın, Yok musun?           Are you in or out?

İddiaya var mısın?       Do you dare to bet?

Yokum             I am not in

Question Form: Var mı? / Yok mu? :

Question form of var and yok is very simple. It is formed by adding question suffix -mı and -mu at the end of var and yok, respectively.

Example:

Kitabın var mı?            Do you have a book?

Çayın yok mu?            Don’t you have tea?

Bunu yapmaya isteğin var mı?           Do you have the desire to do it?

Idiomatic Expressions with Var and Yok

When Var and Yok is used together, that defines the quantity of something. “Var yok” can be translated as “a little bit”. Also, there exists another way of saying: “Varla yok arası” (var ile yok arası).

Zamanın var mı?         Do you have time?

Varla yok arası            Very little

To be in Turkish:

To be is the easiest grammar structure in Turkish, which only needs two words to put them together: noun and adjective. For example:

Kalem yeşil    Pen is green 

Kalemler yeşil      Pencils are green

You don’t see any suffix or change related to “to be” in the previous examples. BUT, this structure is only correct for the third-person-singular and the third-person-plural.

Generalizations in Turkish:

Anyways, there is also one more function of –dIr. In modern Turkish, it implies generalization. 

Türkler tembeldir     Turks are lazy

Kuşlar ufaktır     Birds are little

Non-verbal Predicates (to be) Example:

Kampüste-y-im. *     I am at the campus

Kampüste-sin     You are at the campus

Kampüste-(dir)     she at the campus

Plural Examples:

Kampüste-yiz     We are at the campus

Kampüste-siniz     You -formal- are at the campus

Kampüste-(dir)-ler     They are at the campus

To be Examples:

Sürücü      driver

Sürücü-yüm      I am driver

Sürücü-sün       You are driver

Sürücü-(dür)       She is driver

Plural:

Sürücü-yüz

Sürücü-sünüz

Sürücü-(dür)-ler

Example Sentence:

Bunu ona söyleyen sensing.       You are the one who told him this

Başarının nedeni biziz.       We are the reason for this success

Evin sahibi Benin.       I am the one who owns this house. or “I” own this house

The past tense of “to be” in Turkish

When talking about past, we use past tense of to be. Simple. But here, it’s a bit different. Because we are not talking about an action. 

I was handsome

Yakışıklıydım

Let’s investigate this word, yakışıklıydım. this ‘m’ must be of ‘I’. y’ is the buffer letter. Yakışıklı, then, is the adjective: handsome. Past refer is given by the suffix –di. The same suffix, past tense suffix is also used when describing actions.

This biweekly journal is different from the rest of all biweekly journals for it covers my SDLAP experience during the beginning of my experience of social distancing caused by COVID-19. Upon nationwide confusion, I was unable to coordinate a meeting with my learning partner Tommy and language partner Jimin. On the bright side, being home meant a more frequent usage of Korean, and inevitably Konglish. The majority of my entire family speaks both English and Korean quite comfortably and sometimes interchangeably. Both sets of grandparents hold nominal to fluent knowledge in English (one couple are immigrants while the other experienced American living for a temporary time working abroad) and long-story-short, both of my parents speak two languages. But, it is important to note that it is pretty obvious that my dad is more comfortable with English and that my mom prefers Korean a little more. This difference is nonetheless caused by their childhood. My personal relationship with the two languages is, alike to my parents’–especially my mom’s–experience, a little confusing. My first language is undoubtedly Korean as it was the language I spoke in first and the language of the country I was born and raised in. Yet, with the beginning of school taught in the English language (both British and American English), I began to develop far more advanced English skills than Korean. Since then, I have been more practically comfortable speaking in English while feeling emotionally close to the Korean language. I like to watch videos and forms of entertainment in Korean all the while writing papers and reading the news in English. I also continued to improve English through school while Korean remained by the rudimentary level (though, I was quite the talker at a young age). The inconsistency of my relationship with learning Korean as English became my dominant, academic language is what I think caused a setback in my improvement of Korean. At this point in my second semester of college, I had begun to pursue the Korean language again in a more serious matter. Being home following this pursuit, unfortunate to the typical college experience, has helped me more as I find myself in a household that can help me with my Korean practice. It also helps that I have been spending my extra time binge-watching Korean dramas. The one thing I find frustrating, and a need for improvement, is being able to verbalize words at the same speed as my thinking with correctness. To explain, I sometimes find myself tripping over a couple of words in a sentence I wish to say. Usually, I know what I would like to express in my head, but once I begin to verbalize it, I find myself stuttering over a specific form of a word to find the correct expression or tense. This is a little irksome because I know what it is that I want to say. Even so, I struggle to say it as quickly as I think it as I’m stuck between two grammatically different ways of expression. Being home, I realized I did this on numerous occasions. I hope that as we all practice safe social distancing that I will be able to pinpoint the issue and work to fix this small error in my Korean think-and-speak system. 

Present Tense:

In Turkish language, you will see two different tenses that can be considered as present tense. ‘present continuous tense’ and ‘simple present tense’. Actually, the latter is specifically called aorist.

Turkish doesn’t use continuous tense for the things that English would use continuous tense. That’s why many sources confuse when naming them.

Simple Present Tense – Aorist

By its definition, aorist seems to fit into present tense, but it differs from the simple present tense of English for lots of situation. Some sources consider aorist as simply present tense but you may want to learn the distinct features of aorist (that would greatly help you to understand and have a better idea).

The main suffix of aorist is -r and depending on the verb base that it is attach, -r can transform to -ır,-ir.-er,-ur,-ar. You’ll decide which letter is the best by vowel harmony rules.

Simple Present Tense – Examples:

In Turkish, Simple Present Tense or Aorist is called ‘geniş zaman‘ which literally translates into ‘broad tense‘. Simple Present Tense is used to describe actions that are done ‘almost’ always. My favorite example of it is ‘döner’ which means ‘(thing) that rotates always’. The following example also shows you how a verb can be derived from another verb by adding suffixes.

Sevmek

to love, like

Sevinmek

to rejoice, to be pleased

Sevindirmek

to make someone happy

Sevindirir

s/he makes someone happy

Emre herkesi sürprizleriyle sevindirir

Emre makes everyone happy with his surprises

Examples：

Telefonu öyle tutarsan ekranını kırarsın.

If you hold your cellphone like that, you’ll break the screen.

O tatlıyı çok sever.

He/She/it likes very much sweet things.

The Circumflex Accent (Şapka) (^) in Turkish Language:   

In Turkish, the thing on top of the letters is called “şapka” which means exactly “hat”. Most of the Indo-European alphabets don’t have it. The circumflex is a diacritic sign usually written above a letter in some languages such as Latin, Greek, Turkish, Portuguese etc. In Turkish, It affects the pronunciation of the word to some degree whereas, in French, it indicates that the letter has been dropped over time. You do not see this sign in English but only on loanwords.

Circumflex Accent Usage in Turkish

1. In Turkish, some adjectives are made from nouns by adding –i with a circumflex accent. This rule is only valid for Arabic loanwords.

Hayat
life

Hayatî
vital

“Yaşamsal” is the Turkish encounter word for “Hayatî” which is derived from the Turkish word “Yaşam”. Hayat is an Arabic loanword but is still in use. Also, you may meet a man named “Hayatî”.

2. In the recent years, Turkish language society has restricted the use of the circumflex accent unless the absence of it leads to an uncertainty or misunderstanding.

Kar
snow

Kâr
profit

To indicate whether it is profit or snow, you need to use a circumflex accent.

NOTE “Shift + 3 + a” gives you â when typed on keyboard.

EXTRA: Apostrophe (Kesme işareti) in Turkish

1. Apostrophe, Apostrophy, or Keşme işareti, whatever you call, it’ll be correct. In addition to the 29 letters in Turkish, “kesme işareti” (‘) (apostrophe) is commonly used. You might also hear “ apostrof ” instead of “kesme işareti.”

Ali’nin
of Ali

Istanbul’da
in Istanbul

Türkiye’den geliyor.
S/he is coming from Turkey

2. In some cases, an omission of a letter may occur. To indicate this, you must use an apostrophe.

How to say “what’s up” in Turkish?

Ne haber? (eng. What’s up? – informal saying– ) < N’aber?

Ne yapacaksın? (eng. What will you do?) < N’apacaksın?

3. Homonyms can lead to misunderstandings. To distinguish between them, you must use an apostrophe.

Selin
a female name

Sel’in
of flood

Selin’in
of Selin

4. Abbreviations indicating size should take an apostrophe.

4-meter-long fish
tr. 4 m’lik balık

5. For the names from mythologyand religion, you must also use an apostrophe and never forget to use capital letters. This is because it is believed that the capital letter at the beginning of the word shows some kind of respect.

Zeus’un oğlu
the son of Zeus

İsa’nın
of Jesus/Jesus’

Muhammed’e
to Muhammad

If I received a research grant to conduct a linguistic study of my target language and culture, I would like to investigate how to better teach the usage of Hanja/sino-Korean (한자어) in terms of morpheme categories since Hanja is purely phonemic or the effects of the integration of non-native Korean terminology in the younger generation of Koreans. These two linguistics-related topics are interesting and areas of personal confusion. When studying morphemes, specifically derivational and inflectional morphemes, I struggled to label a lot of possible morphemes as derivation because of the fact that it was a Korean compound based on Hanja. Historically, Hanja is the Korean name for Chinese characters, the Chinese characters the Korean language had borrowed and incorporated into the language with Korean pronunciations as a form of written communications. With the creation of Hangul, however, Hanja continues to be the basis of many Korean words and phrases (thus the flooding list of homonyms). For example, 수도(水道) and 수도(首都) are both pronounced “su-do”, yet one means (water "su" and way "do") aqueduct while the other means (head "su", capital "do-eup") capital city. On the other hand, I also find the linguistic aspect of the integration of English, for example, into modern-day Korean, aka Konglish/slang (ex. 셀프 for self-anything; 버스 meaning bus; TMI used as TMI, etc.) I think the cultural influence this has is something worthy of time and research, if not done already. 

Although writing in Korean continues to be one of my top concerns, I have learned to write basic Korean as a young child. I learned how to write the language by hand while learning the alphabet and basic vocabulary before I started primary school. I had a chart of the Korean alphabet, starting with “가, 나, 다, 라, 마, 바, 사…” that I would sing and practice writing. If I remember correctly, I learned Korean writing around the same time as English. However, with the beginning of my school career at a British preschool, English became the main language of my academic experience. This background has helped me pick up writing in Korean at a fast rate in my recent years of self-improving my Korean language skills. Personally, I find spacing and spelling difficult. It is something I intend on getting better at. Also, I have improved my Korean writing in recent years through texting/typing. So, I would like to improve my handwriting more. 

The basics of Korean writing is relatively easy as it consists of simple, compoundable consonant and vowel characters (ㄱ,ㄴ,ㄷ,ㄹ,ㅏ,ㅓ,ㅣ,ㅡ) invented based on mouth shapes upon pronunciation. The difficulty arises after one begins to construct phrases and sentences as spacing and grammar/spelling rules get complicated. This is also where even natives stumble. The Korean language consists of a lot of homonyms, homophone-like morpheme, and extremely detailed expressions. Examples consist of 눈 (eye or snow) and 안/않 (not a word but a morpheme). Some helpful pointers are understanding that English and Korean don’t share a syntactic order of subject, verb, object. Korean is generally S+O+V. It is also important to note that while English sentences can be spoken with a tone or accent to express different points of emphasis, Korean sentences can exchange the object and subject of a sentence (ex. Engish can’t do this, English can’t do this, English can’t do this vs. 영어는 이거 못하잖아, 못하잖아 영어는 이거, 이거 못하잖아 영어 - may not seem correct in an academic paper, but in colloquial speech, this happens often). 

Languages go extinct when it loses active members who speak, write, and read in the language. According to the YouTube video featuring author and linguist K. David Harrison, languages are oftentimes lost and forgotten because there is no written record of the language along with the loss of native speakers. This is also highlighted in the New York Times article, Tribe Revives Language on Verge of Extinction, mentioning the extinction, and revival, of the Siletz Dee-ni language. In a world where some languages are being appointed as an international language, others face the brink of extinction as fewer and fewer people speak it. This was the case about the Siletz language. As a local, native language of a tribe located in the West of the US, there are only five speakers in the world. This once-dominant language belonged to one of the last-standing, large tribe. In the 1950s, however, the tribe was declared dead by the US. The establishment of schools taught in English, decreased tribe population, and declaration of extinction were three large threats in the extinction of the Siletz language. Two decades later, the tribe was federally recognized as a living tribe and thus, the culture and language prevailed. Since then, the language has been dwindling yet again. Differently from the past, however, with the creation of a charter school where the language has been reintegrated into the education program, the publication of a Siletz Dee-ni dictionary worked on by tribe members such as Bud Lane has given the Siletz Dee-ni language a written long-term record. A dictionary is a perfect example of the ways people can document linguistic diversity. Both the article and video underline the importance of the younger generation’s participation in the preservation of a language. To bring a language back from the brink of extinction, or from the dead, people from the outside are important agents in strengthening the content available on a language. Native speakers are necessary to provide the information on the language, but those from the outside of the young people of the population are the ones responsible for the future of a language. 

Here is the podcast with my language partner Brenda Lim.SDLC112 podcast.m4a

After reviewing the recording and slides of my presentation of my intended learning plan, I noticed changes in my course of action as well as success in following the plan. One of the changes I saw was that I intended to incorporate the learning of business terms into my studies this semester. I realize, however, that the lessons I did cover with my language partner are more appropriate and suitable for the level I am at with Korean. Business vocabulary can come in future semesters. I also did not get the chance to utilize the Global Studio’s online resources as my language partner prepared most of the hardcopy lesson materials. The discussions about language structures have helped me in learning my target language because it added details and the name to the different aspects of the language I have been unconsciously using. For example, I didn’t know what to refer to as when mentioning what I now know as derivational morphemes. I believe I am always culturally close to Korean. With the actual language, however, I always felt distanced from the pure usage of Korean as a native “Konglish” speaker. Through my SDLAP experience, I am happy to say that I am uncovering more about the language and will become more proficient. To further improve my communicative competence, I think verbal practice is key (for anyone on any level of learning a language). Based on the H.D. Brown reading, my plan, and what I ended up learning focused on organizational competence, specifically grammatical competence.

I was able to meet Prof. Sumi Kim and we went over a lot of new vocabulary and lots of new particles and how/when to use them. She also gave me some reading practice which was really nice because that is what I have been focussing on lately. I kept up my speaking practice that I mentioned in my last journal, and reviewed what I have learned so far with Prof. Sumi Kim by asking and answering questions as usual. I also realised that it has been a long time since I have reviewed Korean numbers and Sino-Korean numbers, so obviously I did some sudokus with different types of numbers to review them in a way that I find fun. I also started watching a new Korean drama called Itaewon Class on Netflix and so far it has been really interesting.

This is going to be my last journal entry, and I will not be taking Korean next semester at least, so I want to take some time to reflect on my language learning journey. 

I first started learning Korean because of my interest in BTS. Eventually, my interest in BTS has kept reducing as my priorities changed but I started really enjoying simply learning Korean. I find Korean culture fascinating and I am really grateful to have had the opportunity to dive into it and see new traditions and perspectives. I have come a long way from when I first started. Going from basically knowing nothing to being able to reading, write, and speak basic Korean feels amazing. I was able to really acknowledge how much I have grown when I was telling my family about learning Korean and they asked me whether I could do certain things and my response to most of them was ‘yes’. My grandfather randomly came up to me and said, “ask me what I ate in Korean,” and I was able to use the word for grandfather, use the right honorifics, and had good enough vocabulary to respond to his request on the spot and it made him and me really happy.

Simply learning Korean with Prof. Sumi Kim and Gavin has been extremely fun. They made it a very comfortable space to learn where I made a lot of mistakes, and did not always get the right answer, while also learning a lot, and getting a lot of things right. Them along with my friends who supported me through this journey by helping me practice and making sure I understand are people I am grateful for. As I reflect right now, I see that a lot of why I appreciate Korean as a language and a culture is because of the people I have met through it and the memories that I have made. So, I will make sure to carry forward what I have learned and keep making more memories with different people. I hope to definitely dive deeper into Korean. For now, as this semester comes to an end, there is one thing I can say for sure: I definitely need to eat more Korean food!

Korean architecture is characterized by naturalistic tendencies, simplicity, economy of shape, and the avoidance of extremes. I’m going to dive into it and how it evolved over time based on the time periods.

Prehistoric Period

There were three types of prehistoric dwellings in Korea: pit houses, log houses, and elevated houses. Pit houses consisted of a deep pit and a frame of grass and clay supported by timber. Log houses were made by laying logs horizontally one on top of one another like bricks with clay being used as cement. Elevated houses were constructed in two stories to keep food away from animals.

Three Kingdoms Period

The three kingdoms were Koguryo, Paekche, and Shilla. Koguryo was influenced by Chinese culture which can clearly be seen in Koguryo’s palaces, temples, and tombs. It was characterized by powerful lines and sturdy construction. Paekche was also influenced by Koguryo and China. A characteristic of Paekche architecture is its use of curvilinear designs. Shilla’s temple was separated from China by Koguryo or Paekche, so China's cultural influence was much diluted. 

The Unified Shilla Period

Architectural ornamentation, such as roof tiles decorated with floral and animal designs, was seen more often. The ‘two pagodas’ style, was prevalent at the time. Note: a pagoda is considered the grave of Buddha and is a structure commonly found at Buddhist temples.

Koryo Dynasty

The architecture during this time was very similar to Tang architecture in China. 

Toward the end of the Koryo dynasty, building pagodas essentially stopped. The adaptation of the Tang architecture is called the chusimp’o style which is the ‘column-head bracket system’. The picture shows how it looks. 

Choson Dynasty

The chusimp’o i.e. the column-head bracket style of the Koryo period, continued during the early part of this period. But, a new architectural style was introduced from Song China. This became the dominant architectural style of the Choson period and was called the tap’o, or the inter-columnar bracket style. The new tap’o buildings are much more decorative than those in the chusimp’o style because the intercolumnar brackets fill up the otherwise empty spaces between columns. The picture shows how it looks.

Modern Period

Western art began to influence Korean art in the later part of the 19th century. Until the 1970s the trend in Korean architecture was to adopt the western style. In the 1980s, the variety of architectural projects expanded, leading to the adoption of postmodernism which included the reinterpretation of traditional Korean architecture. The picture below is of the Seoul City Hall.

These two weeks were the last two weeks of this semester. So Brenda and I did the podcast and some research about North Korea which is also the topic of my final presentation. During the podcast, we discussed the topics we have learned through the whole semester. We talked about each other’s favourite Korean slangs and new words. We also made up sentences using those grammar rules and suffixes we have learned this semester. When we were making up sentences, I think I was using it fairly fluently. It didn't take much time to think. Moreover, we recalled the movie and TV drama we have wathced this semester. We talked about those classic senses of the movie and drama. Overall, the podcast was good.

The research we did about North Korea was very interesting. We learned about the language difference first. It was bery interetsing to hear those North Korean people speaking their language when I already know how South Korean lanugae sounds like. For me, it is still difficult to hear exactly which word or part of sentences is used differently in North Korean lanuage. But I can hear the difference of tone of North and South Korean. I found that the unique tone of North Korean is very strong and strict, which can also reflect their rigid national characteristics. I would include more details about the difference between these two Korean lanuage  in my final presentation.

Another thing we researched about North Korea was North Korean food. The biggest difference between North Korean food and South Korean food is that North Korea does not have as many different kinds of food as South Korean does, and the North Korea has different name for food that appear in both country. For example, North Korea does not have 치킨（fired chicken）which is a very popular and famous food in South Korea. Also, North Korea does not have김밥(Kim bab), it only has 인조고기밥 (rice rolled in fake meat). The original kim bab is made with differet kind of real meat and vegetables. More interestingly, North Korean call coca-cola 미제단물 (American sweet water), where in South Korea it is 코카콜라(the transliteration of Coca-Cola). These also reflect that North Korea is not very receptive to foreign things, languages and so on. They prefer to do it in the most local way. Again, I will include more details about this in my final presentation.

Since this is the last biweekly jounal of this semester, I also want to talk about the future plans and the future challenges I might have. My lanuage partner Brenda is going to graduate this year, which means that I will have another lanuage partner next semester. This would be a challenge because it will take some time for us to learn each other and catch up with my progress in learning Korean with Brenda. Before being partner with Brenda, I also have another partner. So, I believe I can still be on the right track very quick. For the next semester, I want to keep learning the formal written Korean lanuage and try to have every class completely in Korean.

Due to the delay of spring break and the fact that I recently spent three days returning to China from the United States, this journal will only contain one week of Korean learning.  Since we were in different time zone, and the Internet in my quarantine hotel in China was not very good, Brenda and I had some difficulties in our online class. However, fortunately, there are only three weeks left before the end of the semester. Brenda and I decided to save the last two weeks for the podcast and the final presentation. Therefore, this week, we summarized the knowledge we learned in the whole semester and reviewed the knowledge points that are easy to be confused and easy to make mistakes. I've been ignoring the importance of summaries. In previous semesters, I learned new language knowledge with my language partner until the last week, and I never made a formal semester summary. This will undoubtedly allow me to learn more, but it also increases the likelihood that I will forget something. At the beginning of the term I found that I had forgotten some of what I had learned. I think this situation should be addressed and avoided in a timely manner so that the foundation is solid. So this week's summary I think is very necessary and helpful.

This semester, I pay more attention to the application of grammar rules and formal written Korean. In the class, Brenda and I spent more time practicing making up sentence and situational deduction than simply learning how the rule works. By learning two formal Korean articles, I also gained a general understanding of the structure and rules of formal written Korean. At the same time, I also did a timely search and understanding of Korean events and recent trends. For example, I watched the Oscar-winning movie “parasite” and talked to Brenda about the gap between rich and poor that the movie reflected. Brenda and I are both bilingual and culturally proficient, so we discussed the similarities and differences between the three countries (US, South Korea, China) on this social issue. Inter-Korean relations is also a hot topic in South Korea recently, so I also watched some TV dramas and interviews about North Korea life and people and decided to make this the theme of my final presentation. I think these cultural learning is also an important part of language learning.

In addition, we reviewed the suffix which is something easy to be confused. There are 이/가 for topic, 은/는 for subject, 을/를 for object, 에/에서 for place/time, and 의 for possessive. We wrote a lot of examples to practice not missing them up. For example, 나는 니콜이 웃을때 좋아요(I like when Nicole smiles), and 니콜은 마크를좋아해요(Nicole likes Mark), which both use two of those suffixes. The conclusion I got was that always ask yourself two questions when using these suffixes. Which part of the sentence does the word you want to add suffix belong to? And does this word has a consonant or not? By thinking of the answers to these two questions, you will never mistake these suffixes.

This week's summary and review not only allowed me to check what I had learned in the past, but also gave me an opportunity to prepare for the podcast.

With the shift to remote learning, and lesser meeting with Prof. Sumi Kim, I have been able to explore more resources and get creative with existing ones to make sure that I am on track in my language learning journey. This shift has finally pushed me to find a good way of practicing speaking and bettering my pronunciations.

I first started with rewatching the Korean drama that I enjoyed, Cheese in the Trap. This time when I saw it, I wasn’t as involved in the story as the first time because I knew what is going to happen now. So, this time I put all my focus on picking up the words that they were using. After every dialogue, almost every word, I tried to repeat the sentences that the actors were saying out loud and tried to make sure that I’m making it sound like they are. I paused frequently and made sure to try and grasp every sound and repeat it as is. Once I started getting the hang of just saying the words, I also tried putting my focus replicating the emotion that was behind it because there are a lot of context clues hidden in the way a sentence is said. A Korean drama was a good resource for doing this because the dialogues are very clear and easy to grasp and often have good grammar and well-formed sentences unlike everyday conversations that people have with each other. 

After I got a good grasp of this, I wanted to make sure that the sounds that I’m am listening to and saying are actually correct. So, I turned to another source of entertaining for me: VLive. I absolutely love watching BTS’s VLive videos, so I turned on the Korean subtitle option, and started repeating after them by using the subtitles. I still had to pause frequently because I can’t read very fast, but this definitely helped improve my reading and speaking. BTS members’ conversations with each other are more casual, which is good for improving my conversational Korean. This was actually surprisingly really helpful while being super fun at the same time.

The biggest challenge to overcome with this was not needing to know what everything I’m hearing and saying means. At first, I wasted a lot of time pausing and looking up the meanings of every word, and eventually I realised how time consuming this was, and how this was really not helping at all because I often forgot all the words I looked up because I was just taking in so much information without repetition. I eventually stopped doing this and simply started speaking without knowing what I was saying, but this helped a lot! While I was doing this, I was actually even able to pick up some words that were being frequently used in the show/video and their meanings registered well too.

To take this a step further, I also started using voicenotebook. I read the subtitles to the videos out loud and voicenotebook would record what I am saying and based on what it would record which was fairly accurate, I could see which pronunciations I’m getting right and which ones I’m getting wrong. Some days when I didn’t feel like watching videos, I would just open random Korean websites and read the contents into voicenotebook. I am really glad that I started using this strategy and I can clearly see an improvement in my pronunciation, reading, and confidence.

Because of the COVID 19 outbreak, we started the online course two weeks ago. As a result of the outbreak, our spring break was extended by one week, which meant that the course was delayed by one week. So Brenda and I, in our first online class, first talked about what we were going to do for the rest of the semester. As the number of courses decreased, we decided to make the course content more focused on the completion of the set goals and keep up with the pace of the syllabus. At the same time, Brenda and I both believe that the content of the course can be updated with the times, such as understanding the covid-19 epidemic in South Korea, and learning some language and culture from it. With that in mind, our focus for the last two weeks would be on the COVID 19 outbreak in South Korea. An important part of my goal for this semester is to learn more formal written languages through more formal Korean articles. Therefore, Brenda and I searched for a news report about the local epidemic in South Korea, and read the article in detail, had a deep understanding and learning together.

In the process of reading, I found that my vocabulary is still lacking, so my reading speed is relatively slow. However, considering that this is my second formal in-depth reading of a Korean article, everything is still in its infancy. As long as I accumulate the vocabulary, practice the different sentence pattern expression more, certainly I will have the enhancement. Since I have already studied an article about the Korean general trend movie “parasite”, I applied the structural characteristics of the Korean article I summarized last time to this reading. Therefore, in the process of reading, I quickly grasped the main points of the whole article and the refutation of the author to the holder of the opposite point of view. I think it is very important to master the main tone of the article when reading the article, because it can make us have a clearer and accurate understanding of the content of the article. This way of reading I think is also very helpful for beginners like me, because it prevents us from misunderstanding the main points of the article at the beginning.

Through reading this article, I learned how covid-19 became popular in South Korea and what measures were taken in South Korea. Of course, reading the article alone can only reveal one side of the truth. Brenda and I then looked for videos about the Korean coronavirus outbreak. As a Chinese student whose country has suffered the same pain before, I can well understand the feelings of the Korean people, and I am deeply impressed by the efficient drive-through test in South Korea.

Through these two weeks of learning about the local situation in South Korea, as well as the discussion with Brenda, I have learned more about the real situation in South Korea. I think it is necessary to keep abreast of the country's news and so on in language learning. This kind of study can let us know more about the country and the nation. On the other hand, I kept on track to achieve my goals for the semester by learning formal Korean articles. In general, although the time, form and schedule of our courses have changed to different degrees due to the coronavirus outbreak, we still keep on track through good plans.

Hanbok (한복) is a collective term for traditional Korean clothing. Though there have been slight changes in hanbok over time in terms of material, colors, and the length of the skirt or jacket, the hanbok's basic format has more or less remained the same for the past 1,600 years. The general design of hanbok aims to create a delicate flow of lines and angles. The top part is called a jeogori (저고리) and is blouse-like and well-fitted with long sleeves with the men's version being longer, stretching down to the waist. Women wear loose skirts (chima 치마) while men wear baggy pants (paji 파지). The colors of a hanbok are decided according to the “five colors theory” known as obangsaek 오방색. This refers to the theory of yin and yang and the five elements metal (white), fire (red), wood (blue), water (black) and earth (yellow). Most hanbok are made of naturally obtainable colors.

Hanbok can be classified into ceremonial and everyday dress, and then further categorized by gender, age and season. The colors and material of a hanbok used to specify social status and marital status. The material that the hanbok was made of could be telling of one’s social status. The upper class wore closely woven ramie cloth or plain and patterned silks while the commoners wore cotton. The color could also be telling of this: the commoners usually wore white except for on special occasions when they would wear pale pink, light green, gray, and charcoal, while the upper classes wore bright colored hanboks with beautiful embroidery. Eventually, when more people started wearing colored hanboks, bright colors were generally worn by children and girls, and muted hues by middle aged men and women. Unmarried women often wore yellow jeogori and red chima while married women wore green jeogori and red chima.

About a century ago, people use to wear hanbok everyday, but with globalization, all cultures have changed over time. For modern Koreans, hanbok is the formal clothing worn during Korean holidays or on special occasions. Children wear hanbok on their first birthday and adults wear it for their wedding ceremony or for other such major events within the family. But as cultures keep evolving, getting back in touch with traditions in our own way is also a big part of evolving. The runways at Seoul Fashion Week are constantly filled with new ideas for modernizing and incorporating hanbok in everyday clothes today. Many people have started wearing stylish hanbok modified into a suit as an everyday item of clothing, and many people also enjoy outings and taking pictures in hanbok by renting one from hanbok rental shops.

Traditional Hanbok-

Modern hanbok suit-

These past two weeks have been really rough weeks for everyone I am guessing. During spring break I was just relaxing and watching a Korean variety show called running man which I have started finding extremely entertaining, and then all of a sudden I had to put all my things in storage and fly back home within 24 hours. This has been a big shift for everyone and I wasn’t really able to find a good time to meet with Prof. Sumi Kim either. So, I was not able to learn a lot of new things these two weeks, but I did do something that I found really fun and useful. I tried to simulate random conversations in Korean in different settings with different people and see how to structure sentence and what kinds of words to use. A lot of Korean culture is based on your reputation and how you present yourself. So, with the different levels of politeness and respect and different words that convey them, it is very important to know how to communicate with different types of people, so this was a fun activity to do. It felt kind of like a matching game which also served as a great review of everything I have learned so far. These are some vague English translations of some of the hypothetical conversations that I came up with-

Conversation 1-

Setting: In a cafe alone

Waiter: Hello how are you?

Me: Hello, I’m good. How are you?

Waiter: I’m good. What can I get for you?

Me: Could I have 1 cup of oolong tea please, thank you.

Conversation 2-

Setting: Working on a group project

Older group mate 1: Which part of the project do you want to do?

Group mate 2: I think I would like to do <this>.

Me: I am pretty good with this, so I think I can work on this.

Older group mate 1: I think we should do it this way. 

Me: That sounds like a good idea. What if we also added <this> perspective?

Group mate 2: Yeah we can look into that too.

Conversation 3- 

Setting: Making plans to hangout with friends

Me: Hey guys! Do you have any plans for Thursday night?

Friend 1: No, have not come up with anything.

Me: We should do something together.

Friend 2: How about seeing the new movie that came out.

Friend 3: I was planning on checking out the new sushi place that opened downtown.

Friend 1: I already watched that movie and it wasn’t that great. I do like sushi though.

Friend 2: Let’s get sushi then.

Me: Sounds good what time should we meet?

Friend 3: How about 6pm?

Everyone: *agree*

Conversation 4-

Setting: Job interview

Me: Good afternoon, sir. Thank you so much for giving me this opportunity.

Interviewer: It is good to have you. Why do you want this position?

Me: *praises the company and the interviewer and mentioned how I want to be a part of it*

Along with having fun with all these conversations and getting a few good laughs out of them too, another thing that made me really happy was an email I wrote to Prof. Kim Sumi. I asked how she has been, told her how I have been, and also mentioned a few good times to schedule a call. The part that made me super happy was that the entire email was only in Korean. I was really glad to see myself using the material that we covered about dates, days, and time.