So, I’m all done for the semester finally. So far I have two A’s and an A- … Not too bad ;-)
I took some photographs today:
A random bauble on my tree... with an image of me!
_
Winter Garden was so Beautiful!
I also decided that I would post some Korean today, since I haven’t for a while. I thought I would go back to the basics and give you all a drilling in Hangeul. It’s still useful for me to listen to the audio files and practice my pronunciation!
Hangeul [한글] – Korean Alphabet
Here is a list of consonants and vowels in Korean. There are 14 consonants and 10 vowels, and there are a further 5 double consonants and 11 double vowels. (In addition, there are 11 final double consonants.) Please become familiar with these beautiful geometric shapes.
Click on the alphabets to listen to their respective pronunciations (from Sogang University website).
자음[Consonants]
ㄱ = g
ㄴ = n
ㄷ = d
ㄹ = l, r (ㄹ is a sound somewhere between l and r)
ㅁ = m
ㅂ = b
ㅅ = s
ㅇ = “no sound” when used as a first consonant, “ng” when used as a final consonant.
ㅈ = j
ㅊ = ch
ㅋ = k
ㅌ = t
ㅍ = p
ㅎ = h
모음[Vowels]
ㅏ = a
ㅑ = ya
ㅓ = eo
ㅕ = yeo
ㅗ = o
ㅛ = yo
ㅜ = u
ㅠ = yu
ㅡ = eu
ㅣ = i
쌍자음[Double consonants]
ㄲ = gg Click on the link to hear the difference between the sounds of ㄱ, ㄲ and ㅋ.
ㄸ = dd Note the difference in sounds; ㄷ, ㄸ and ㅌ.
ㅃ = bb Note the difference in sounds;ㅂ, ㅃ and ㅍ.
ㅆ = ss Note the difference in sounds; ㅅ and ㅆ
ㅉ = jj Note the difference in sounds; ㅈ, ㅉ and ㅊ
쌍모음[Double Vowels]
ㅐ = ae
ㅒ = yae (rarely used)
ㅔ = e
ㅖ = ye
ㅘ = wa
ㅙ = wae
ㅚ = oe
ㅝ = wo
ㅞ = we (rarely used)
ㅟ = wi
ㅢ = ui
● How To Form A Letter
There are two ways to form a letter using any combination of 14 consonants and 10 vowels.
- initial consonant + vowel
- initial consonant + vowel + final consonant
1. Examples
- 가 = ㄱ + ㅏ = ga
- 너 = ㄴ + ㅓ = neo
- 도 = ㄷ + ㅗ = do
- 루 = ㄹ + ㅜ = lu/ru
- 므 = ㅁ + ㅡ = meu
- 비 = ㅂ + ㅣ = bi
2. Examples
- 각 = ㄱ + ㅏ + ㄱ = gag
- 넌= ㄴ + ㅓ + ㄴ = neon
- 돗 = ㄷ + ㅗ + ㅅ = dod
- 를 = ㄹ + ㅡ + ㄹ = leul/reul
- 쟁 = ㅈ + ㅐ + ㅇ = jaeng
Letters with final consonants of ㄱ, ㄲ and ㅋ, all sound the same. Thus 각, 갂 and 갘 will sound exactly the same.
Eg.
국, 엌, 밖 Their final consonants all sound the same. Click on the links to hear.
Now, below is a list of the final consonants and their respective sounds.
- ㄱ/ㄲ/ㅋ = ㄱ
- ㅂ/ㅃ/ㅍ = ㅂ
- ㄷ/ㅌ/ㅅ/ㅆ/ㅈ/ㅊ/ㅎ = ㄷ
- ㄴ= ㄴ
- ㄹ= ㄹ
- ㅁ= ㅁ
- ㅇ= ㅇ
Eg.
낚시 [낙시] = fishing
부엌 [부억] = kitchen
앞 [압] = front
씨앗 [씨앋] = seed
낮 [낟] = day
For a more detailed explanation and audio files, click here.
When the initial consonant of second and/or third characters is ㅇ, for example, 돌이 and 만악이, the sound of the final consonant of each letter is pronounced with the next vowel. Because ㅇ has no sound, 돌이 is pronounced as 도리 and 만악이 as 마나기. These are just made-up words to show you how these work.
- 돌이[도리]
- 만악이[마나기]
For more examples on this pronunciation, click on the link.
쌍받침[Final double consonants]
There are also 11 additional final double consonants. Their sounds are as follows. As you can see, the first consonant of the double consonants is pronounced. (except ㄺ = ㄱ,ㄻ = ㅁ and ㄿ = ㅂ) I do not recommend that you learn these exhaustively right away because that is a hard work and I rarely employed them in my grammar lessons anyway. So it would be better to come back to these when you come across them from time to time.
- ㄳ = ㄱ
- ㄵ = ㄴ
- ㄶ = ㄴ
- ㄺ = ㄱ
- ㄻ = ㅁ
- ㄼ = ㄹ
- ㄽ = ㄹ
- ㄾ = ㄹ
- ㄿ = ㅂ
- ㅀ = ㄹ
- ㅄ = ㅂ
Eg.
삯 [삭] = amount
앉다 [안따] = sit
많다 [만타] = many
읽다 [익따] = read
삶다 [삼따] = boil
넓다 [널따] = spacious
외곬 [외골] = a single way
핥다 [할따] = lick
읊다 [읍따] = recite (a poem)
잃다 [일타] = lose (a thing)
값 [갑] = price
Excellent pronunciation lessons by Sogang Unversity
source: http://korean.sogang.ac.kr/
I also recommend listening to Korean audio and video files and try matching the sounds with the letters. That would be the quickest way to learn accurate pronunciation.
Wow, beautiful images. You’re such a talented photographer!