I found this “article” in the back of my Korean book, thought some of the Forumosans who also [strike]were imprisoned[/strike] spent time in Korea might get a good laugh out of it. The book is Self-Learning Korean the Easy Way. The author, Keyho Choi, doesn’t have the strongest grasp on English, which makes this all the more hilarious.
Why is Hangul said to be the best alphabet in the world?
Among all the other excellent features, Hangul is scientific, philosophical, linguistically convincing and the easiest letters to learn. The greatest alphabet in the history of characters is the Roman[Latin] Alphabet among the phonic letters and Hangul is the greatest among them. (editor’s note: can anyone translate that?) It is also good for voice recognition for modern IT science because Hangul follows the ‘One Sound for One Word, One Word for One Sound’ rule. Hangul is the most suitable letter for computer voice recognition to replace the keyboard.
Grated that, English gets behind in terms of voice recognition even if it is in alphabetic writing. For example, the letter ‘A’ is pronounced variously in cases, so it is hard to know how to pronounce ‘A’. One can read English words only with the help of phonetic signs. For example, the word ‘knife’ is read as ‘naif’, but it is nearly impossible to restore the word ‘knife’ from its phonetic sign. So there is difficulty in voice recognition.
Korean teenagers could send text messages faster than any other youngsters in the world, and it is certainly because of the scientific superiority of Hangul. According to Professor Jared Diamond at UCLA, Hangul is the best alphabet in the world. That is the reason why we have the lowest illiteracy rate in both South and North Korea, according to a study published in the science magazine in June of 1998. In addition, Professor Sasse of Hamburg University was surprised at phonology in Korea from the 15th century, and he acclaimed Hangul’s systematic and scientific creation principles. Professor Reischauer at Harvard said that Hangul has the most scientific system today. Professor Force in Netherlands said that Hangul is the greatest invention in the world for alphabetic letters. Professor Hiroyuki Umeda, the Dean of Yotaek University in Japan also praised Hangul very highly. Thus, we are given Hangul from King Sejong, which is the best alphabet for the 21st century.
Haven’t been to Korea, but I spent several years teaching Korean students (among other nationalities) in ESL centers in Vancouver (perhaps that’s why I never chose to go to Korea). I sensed, even then, their intense nationalism. And, yes, I heard from Koreans how Hangul is the most perfect (“perpectu”) language (“langwidgee”). Anything Korean was automatically the best, sushi wasn’t invented by Japanese-- it was invented by Koreans (kimbap)-- and Confucious was Korean.
Taiwanese tell me that Koreans claim Wang Jianmin is Korean.
The Japanese got all of their culture from the Koreans. They’re inherently just cultureless inbreds, but they were gifted with a culture one day when Koreans landed on their shores. Didn’t you know that?
That’s my impression of it. Any form of writing following the mentioned “One Sound for One Word, One Word for One Sound” principle gets full thumbs up in my book.
That’s my impression of it. Any form of writing following the mentioned “One Sound for One Word, One Word for One Sound” principle gets full thumbs up in my book.[/quote]
Very true, Hangul is simple and easy to learn. That part of the article wasn’t an exaggeration. Takes most people about two hours.
Ever studied Hangul? It IS superior. It’s a alphabet/spelling system desigened specifically for it’s the Korean language. Many of the languages today, of course including English, use an alphabet/spelling system that was designed for some other language. And a smart man CAN learn it in less than a day.
The funny part is watching people think you understand the language instantly just because you can read it almost instantly. That old education meme that “reading is understanding” (that was so popular in the States about 15 or so years ago) is just silly bunk, and that reaction illustrates that fact very well.
Superior to what? The Roman alphabet, which is versatile enough to be used across the globe? It is certainly systematic and easy to use, but that doesn’t necessarily make it superior. It works for Korean, but it doesn’t work for any other language. As soon as people start using Hangul to write seven or eight other languages, then I will consider its superiority.
As for the claim that there’s a one-to-one sound mapping, that’s false:
Initial zero consonant and final -ng share the same letter.
Initial r- and final -l share the same letter. They could be considered allophones, but in many cases they actually share different etymological origins (final -l often corresponds to final -t in Middle Chinese).
[quote=“Chris”]As for the claim that there’s a one-to-one sound mapping, that’s false:
Initial zero consonant and final -ng share the same letter.
Initial r- and final -l share the same letter. They could be considered allophones, but in many cases they actually share different etymological origins (final -l often corresponds to final -t in Middle Chinese).[/quote]
Pretty close though, huh? That the Roman alphabet has come into such wide use isn’t an indication of any superiority to other alphabets. Not to say it’s not a perfectly good tool. It’s a different beast than the rather unique Korean alphabet. That’s to be expected as Korean is very different from the Indo-European languages that gave rise to the Roman alphabet. Hangul does a good job in what it is supposed to do, much as the Roman alphabet does for Spanish, but for hella sure not for English That doesn’t show any deficiency of the Roman alphabet, or major unsuitability for its use in English, but only that the English writing system is inferior to the Spanish and the Korean. The Roman alphabet could do as well for English with some tweaking.
I didn’t know about the “featural” feature of Hangul
I have heard and (been explained to me by Korean friends) why Hangul is a simple, straightforward alphabet that’s easy to learn relatively speaking. and it sounds logical.
I guess, my problem is that I would never bother to learn Korean as I see no use for it (for me personally) other than ordering food.
I told my Korean friends there’s a legend that after the Shang was defeated, a junior line (some prince) refused to submit, went near the Korean border (present) and founded a new kingdom which influenced Koreans. Amazingly, this is one of the few times my Korean friends are in agreement. They also want to tell me the Japanese imperial family descends from Koreans (and there is some archaeological evidence supposedly to lend credence to this) which of course pisses off anyone who is Japanese.
Chinese characters are not an alphabet, apples and oranges. (Agree though, way more efficient to learn an alphabet than thousands of characters.)
[quote=“Chris”]As for the claim that there’s a one-to-one sound mapping, that’s false:
Initial zero consonant and final -ng share the same letter.
Initial r- and final -l share the same letter. They could be considered allophones, but in many cases they actually share different etymological origins (final -l often corresponds to final -t in Middle Chinese).[/quote]
Not to mention the consonants that change sounds depending on what they are followed by (감사합니다 anyone?)
[quote=“Tempo Gain”]I didn’t know about the “featural” feature of Hangul
That “featural” claim is most likely bogus too. I don’t think the field of physiological linguistics was advanced enough 700 years ago to come up with such a system. And some of the ideas expressed by supporters of the featural claim are a bit of a reach.
And it just occurs to me that any language with an alphabet/writing system that was designed written in relatively modern times (less than 50 years?) should be good. The study of linguistics has been around for quite some time now yes?
And vowels in English are so difficult to distinguish from consonants! give me a break! I think learning one of several ‘regular’ European languages would ease the self-pride that K. feel for their national language. We won’t mention the loss of culture that resulted from the no doubt violent adoption of this system across the countries. Nor will we mention the loss of freedom that groups may have experienced at being forced to choose a writing system that was different from their own.
I’m sure these are things to be proud of, too.
[quote=“Chris”][quote=“Tempo Gain”]I didn’t know about the “featural” feature of Hangul
That “featural” claim is most likely bogus too. I don’t think the field of physiological linguistics was advanced enough 700 years ago to come up with such a system. And some of the ideas expressed by supporters of the featural claim are a bit of a reach.
Sushi by Koreans? this is as cool as the time I found that fortune cookies were not invented by chinese…But I prefer sushi over kimbap. And Confucius?
Great article! Makes me regret not taking korean class when I was in korea because I thought it would be too complicated, guess not!
Here’s my 2 cents on to add to these facts - Korea was originally spelled Corea, but the Japanese changed it so K would be alphabetized after J (for the american press). K is easier for Japanese to say. Also, “K” is considered to an inferior letter signifying childlike misspellings like “kitty kat or skool”
That doesn’t show any deficiency of the Roman alphabet, or major unsuitability for its use in English, but only that the English writing system is inferior to the Spanish and the Korean. The Roman alphabet could do as well for English with some tweaking.
