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Vocabulary
Hover your mouse over any word to see examples of that word in use (you probably wont be
able to understand the grammar within the sentences at this point, but it is good to see as you
progress through your learning).
A PDF file neatly presenting all of these words and example sentences in addition to common
usages and specific notes can be found here.
Nouns:
= store assistant
= actor
= neck/throat
= noise/sound
= voice
= application
= meaning
= situation
= chicken
= sentence
= oil/grease/gasoline
= lifestyle/life
= them
Verbs:
= whisper
= review/re-study
= change
() = study abroad
= to fall
= read
= depart
= drink
= get off, go down, come down
= come out
= go out
= write/also wear a hat
= to write
= to wear a hat
= to not know
Adjectives:
= thin (not people)
= moderate
= young
= glad
Adverbs and Other Words:
= floor (2nd floor = 2 [])
= fairly/quite
= adverb hard/well (study hard)
= perfectly, completely
= some ____, how many (used with a counter)
= time (a time)
= at that time
__ = side/direction
For help memorizing these words, try using our Memrise tool.
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Introduction
As of now, you have learned a few different Korean particles. The particles you have learned so
far are: /, /, /, and . There are many more particles that you will need to learn
and this lesson will cover a lot of them. In this lesson, you will learn about ~ , ~, ~, ~,
~ and ~()! Lets get started!
This could mean I bought an apple OR I bought apples. This seems crazy to English
speakers, but this is just how it is done in Korean. In most cases, the context can make it clear if
you bought an apple or if you bought apples. If you really want to make it clear that you bought
one apple, you could say:
1 = I bought one apple
When dealing with the ambiguity of singular/plural sentences in Korean, you could also use the
word which can replace a number in these examples: 2 /2 /2 . When replaces a
number in these cases ( / / ), it has the meaning of some ____. For example,
instead of saying: 1 , you could say:
= I bought SOME apples
More examples (remember that 1 and 1 have the same meaning):
= I bought some pens
= I met some people
= I went to school a few/some times (not sometimes)
(remember, acts as an adverb so it doesnt need a particle to be attached to it).
Anyways, back to what I was trying to say earlier. ~ can be attached to a noun to make that
noun plural. However, adding ~ to a noun that is not referring to a person is usually unnatural.
Therefore, it would be unnatural to say something like this:
Instead, ~ is usually only attached to the word person () or other words with the meaning
of people (for example: actors, workers, doctors, etc).
= doctors have a lot of money
= The teacher will meet the students tomorrow
= All the teachers left (went out)
* = actors usually dont like their movies
*By adding the possessive particle to (them) it becomes (their)
The examples above show ~ attached to nouns, but really it can be attached to a wide variety
of things including grammatical principles and other particles. We cant get into these right now
because you are still learning the basics of Korean.
When ~ gets attached to more complicated things, it usually doesnt replace something, but
overlaps it. What I mean is, when ~ is attached to the subject or object, ~/ or ~/ get
eliminated. However, when ~ is attached to something else, everything usually stays in place.
I can show you how it can be attached to ~, but I cant show you how this is done with other
particles because you havent learned them yet. Some examples:
= We only went to school
= The students are only in their classrooms
= I only exercise at night
= I only drink coffee during the day
= I only loved her at that time
When using , ~ is often omitted because it can be assumed.
Korean Particle ~
Foreign learners of Korean are often very confused as to when they should use ~ instead of
~, as they both denote places in Korean sentences. ~ is used to denote the location in
which the subject is doing something in.
For example:
= I will study at school
= I saw my friend at the hospital
= I will meet my husband at the park
= I learned Korean in Korea
In order to help you understand the purpose of ~, I would like to make a distinction between
~ and ~. As I said, ~ is used in indicate the location in which the subject is doing
something.
This does not mean the location that he/she is going to
This does not mean the location that he/she looking at
This does not mean the location that he/she places something on
This does not mean the location that he/she places something in
All of the locations from those examples above would require the particle ~ to denote the
location.
~, on the other hand refers the location in which the subject the acting agent of the
sentence is in when actually doing the action. Lets look at the following example:
In this sentence, where is the subject () when doing the action ()? ~ is not used in this
sentence, so it is unknown as to where the subject was when he/she saw the sign. It might be
known from context, but this specific sentence is not describing it. Therefore, the person is saying
that he/she saw the sign on the building as if he/she was walking by and saw the sign
attached to the building in some way. The action did not occur at/on/in the building, its just that
the location in which he/she was looking at.
Conversely, look at this sentence:
In this sentence, where is the subject () when doing this action ()? ~ is attached to
. Therefore, the subject was in the building and saw the sign.
Another example:
In this sentence, where is the subject () when doing the action ()? ~ is not used in this
sentence, so it is unknown as to where the subject was when he/she put the bottle on the table. It
might be known from context, but this specific sentence is not describing it. Therefore, the person
is saying that he/she put the bottle on the table.
Conversely, look at this sentence:
This sentence is nonsense. It is indicating that, the action actually occurred on/in the table. That
is, the subject somehow within the table placed the bottle somewhere. But the sentence is so
nonsensical that it is not even indicating where the bottle is placed. It could translate to
something like (While I was) in the table, I placed the bottle. Dont get too hung up on that
translation because its hard to translate a sentence that doesnt make sense.
However, because ~ can be used to indicate where the subject is acting, and because ~
can be used to in this sentence to indicate where the bottle is placed, both ~ and ~ can be
used in the same sentence. For example:
= I placed the bottle on the table in the room
This is the same reason that the particle ~ is placed on the location in which a person is going.
For example, if I said something like this:
(This sentence is correct, but it is stating that the person left from Korea because the action of
going () is occurring at/in Korea). This function is talked about a little bit later.
Instead, in order to indicate the place in which you are going (and, therefore, not currently in/at),
you must use ~. For example:
= I will go to Korea
~ can also be attached to a location where an adjective occurs. The word occurs is a bad
way to describe this (because adjectives dont really occur, but I cant think of a better word.
Just like how a verb can be used with a subject:
= I slept
and a location can be used in this sentence to indicate where that action occurred:
= I slept at home
In that same sense, adjectives can be used with a subject:
= Fruit is expensive
and a location can be used in this sentence to indicate where that adjective occurs:
= Fruit is expensive in Korea
Here are some other examples:
= I was cold at school
= High school is difficult in Korea
= Green Tea is famous in Korea
I dont want to provide a ton of examples for this because in order to make perfectly natural
sentences, it requires the use of other, more complicated grammar that you havent been
introduced to yet. For now, try to understand this specific function of ~ and how it can be
used to indicate where a verb or adjective occurs.
Also note that when you indicate where something is by using , you should use ~ instead
of ~. For example:
= Im at home
= Im in the car
The other main usage of ~ has the general meaning of from. In its most basic sense, it can
be used to indicate the place in which the subject is departing from. This is the usage I
mentioned earlier. For example:
In this same respect, ~() can be used to indicate the language in which something is spoken
in. Here, just like in some of the examples above, the language acts as the tool in which
something was communicated. For example:
= I said that sentence (using) in Korean
= I will say that (using) in English
If somebody does an action in line with a bunch of other people, you can use ~( ) to indicate
the order something is done by attaching it to a number + . For example:
= I did that second (I was the second person to do that)
= I came to school second (I was the second person to come to
school)
= I will go (do it) first
The other main meaning of ~() is to indicate the direction that something is happening in.
This sometimes has the same meaning as .For example:
= I will go in the direction of home (simply I will go home), which would be
the same as:
= I will go home
~() is often added after ~ to make ~. ~ can be added after some nouns and
some direction words (above/below/East/West/etc) to mean the direction of ___.
= that way/direction
= upper direction
= the direction of the people, etc..
To make sentences like:
= My friend went that way
= Students walk towards/in the direction of their class
Notice the difference between these two: