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The ’I Hate Korean’ Thread | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Kitchen.Sink Newbie United States Joined 6214 days ago 20 posts - 67 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 1 of 131 01 July 2011 at 3:16am | IP Logged | ||
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I apologize. This is not a thread for constructive discourse or personal betterment.
No, this is a thread for us sorry suckers who tried our hands at the Korean language and failed. This is a thread for whiners. If you are one such person and if you have the humility to confess to your own failures; if you have not enough stubborn pride to plow ahead with a fruitless, perplexing language, please, post here. Let me know that I am not the only one. I have studied many languages to varying degrees of fluency. French, Spanish, Swedish, Japanese, and Mandarin I have all become fairly competent in. Nothing, however, prepared me for the enigma that is Korean. The various verb and noun endings seem almost infinite, the combinations numbering in the hundreds, if not thousands, but this is not the reason why Korean is hard. The sentences are backwards, but this not the reason why Korean is hard. There are a minimum of two words for every meaning, native Korean and Sino-Korean, oftentimes many more than two, and using the wrong one at the wrong time will not result in awkward speech like mixing an Anglo-Saxon or Latin-based word in English, but rather, complete incomprehension; but even this is not the reason why I find Korean so hard. After months of thinking about it, the reason why I find Korean so difficult is not the complex grammar or the massive list of vocabulary -- it is how Korean is spoken. I cannot identify word boundaries. This is a subtle point that most language learners overlook because it comes to us naturally. "Je m'appelle Francois", to hear this spoken in French is not difficult. Even a man who knows no French can hear the word boundaries, and by that, I mean, even if he does not know what "je" or "m'appelle" means, he can identify them as words. With Korean, however, words blend into one another and sounds, very important sounds, get stifled under the breath of speakers who can mysteriously hear through all the mumbling. I have listened to hundreds upon hundreds of hours of Korean radio. Literally, I am not exaggerating this claim one bit. I have been listening to Korean news radio nearly everyday for three or four years. And even after all that time and effort I still can only make out a few words per day. That's right, a few words. Not sentences, not excerpts: mere words. I have listened to Japanese and Mandarin news radio for a fraction of that amount and can occasionally pick out sentences and can get the gist of what is being said overall. Not so with Korean. With Korean, I am almost as clueless as the day I started learning the language, so many years ago. Anyone else find him or herself mired in the linguistic morass that some call Korean? Feel free to talk about it here. I suppose, too, if you have some piece of stellar advice that will help the rest of us overcome our hurdles with Korean, feel free to share those too. After all, we've sunk so much time into this thankless language so far, why not continue ahead like a beaten mule? Edited by Kitchen.Sink on 01 July 2011 at 3:24am 22 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Minya Newbie United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4936 days ago 22 posts - 38 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 2 of 131 01 July 2011 at 3:44am | IP Logged | ||
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I think your first problem is being so negative. What makes you think it's a thankless language?
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| Kitchen.Sink Newbie United States Joined 6214 days ago 20 posts - 67 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 3 of 131 01 July 2011 at 4:07am | IP Logged | ||
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Because, as with any endeavor, there must be both reward and effort. Without the two,
there will be an imbalance. Reward without effort leads to complacency, and effort without reward is a sign of insanity. I have tried many approaches to language learning, all of which work in their various ways. The comprehensible input method, as popularized by many sites nowadays, has worked wonders for me with conventionally difficult languages, such as Japanese and Chinese. No technique, however, has helped me make any breakthrough with Korean. I would not describe my attitude as negative. It is a simple, humble admission of failure; the kind so total that there is not even a foreseeable solution. I think the last time I felt rewarded for my effort in learning Korean was when I learned the ins and outs of hangul, with the various rules and exceptions, and was able to start reading newspapers online. That was one of my first steps in Korean, and that was years ago. I deem Korean thankless based on the very subjective burn out that has arisen from my fruitless studies. I did not mean it to be some absolute statement about the language as a whole. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Minya Newbie United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4936 days ago 22 posts - 38 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 4 of 131 01 July 2011 at 4:38am | IP Logged | ||
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Oh okay. Hmmm...well what exactly is the problem you are having with the language?
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| lichtrausch Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 5994 days ago 525 posts - 1072 votes Speaks: English*, German, Japanese Studies: Korean, Mandarin | Message 5 of 131 01 July 2011 at 5:41am | IP Logged | ||
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All this talk about how Korean is the hardest language in the galaxy is making me want to learn it.
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| Beysic Diglot Newbie United States Joined 5100 days ago 20 posts - 39 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 6 of 131 01 July 2011 at 7:37am | IP Logged | ||
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Just think about how fine Korean men are. If speaking to them isn't a reward, what is?
On a more serious note, I don't know if listening to news radio is such a good idea if you're prone to discouragement. The speed at which newscasters tend to speak combined with relatively sophisticated/specific vocabulary they have to use makes it incredibly hard to understand even after many years of study. I just came back from a year in China and I can still only understand what's being reported on and the main points, not the entirety of the broadcast. You really need to have to right attitude when you tackle something that hard, which can probably be said for Korean in general. Oh, and funnily enough, I ordered a Korean textbook this morning and plan on beginning the language this summer :P Edited by Beysic on 01 July 2011 at 7:47am 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Kitchen.Sink Newbie United States Joined 6214 days ago 20 posts - 67 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 7 of 131 01 July 2011 at 8:03am | IP Logged | ||
I would be very satisfied with this level of understanding after a year of Korean study, but that has just not been the case. I studied Mandarin for four months, a mere fraction of how long I have studied Korean, and I am at this same level of comprehension as you. I can listen to Mandopop and get the gist of the lyrics and listen to BBC Chinese and get a rough understanding of the main points. Speaking Chinese is significantly easier than reading it. With Korean news, however, I am lucky if I can pick out four or five words a newscast. I don't want to discourage you from learning Korean. Go right ahead. I wish you the best of times with it. I mean that sincerely. But I do advise listening to some Korean news radio and then trying to pick out individual words or patterns, so that you know exactly what you're getting into. It's a much deeper sea than you'd ever expect. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Minya Newbie United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4936 days ago 22 posts - 38 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 8 of 131 01 July 2011 at 8:12am | IP Logged | ||
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Korean mennnnnn. <333333 The sexiest of asian men.
@lichtrausch I like the way you think. ;D That's one reason I started learning it. Difficulty. But I really like how it looks written/typed. I have the cutest korean fonts, but I need to buy those keyboard stickers because it's impossible without them. 4 persons have voted this message useful |
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