Sentence structure
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Compare and analyze the word order in the following sentences before we begin studying grammar.
저는 중국에서 왔습니다.
I came from China. (english word order)
I Chinafrom came. (korean word order)
저도 제 나이를 잘 모릅니다.
I don't know my age well either.
Ieither my age well don't know.
제 아버지는 요리를 아주 잘 합니다.
My father makes food very well.
My father food very well makes.
제 아버지는 식당의 주인입니다.
My father is the owner of a restaurant.
My father a restaurantof the owner is.
저는 쿵푸를 좋아합니다.
I like kung fu.
I kung fu like.
저는 슬플 때 밥을 많이 먹습니다.
I eat a lot of food when I'm sad.
I sad when food a lot of eat.
- In English, prepositions (in, at, for, of, through, to, about, from, until, among, around, before, after, behind, with, during, etc.) are positioned before a noun, whereas in Korean, they come immediately after a noun.
- Verbs in Korean are positioned at the end of a sentence.
- Adverbs (a lot, always, badly, beautifully, easily, enough, exactly, finally, often, etc.) in Korean are positioned immediately before a verb or adjective.
- Unlike in English, very often conjunctions (and, but, or, because, while, after, before, in case, etc.) and prepositions in Korean are not represented as separate words but as grammatical constructions, which means, in addition to studying vocabulary, you need to learn grammatical constructions and their proper usage, which we will cover in upcoming lessons.
Watch this video lesson to learn more about the differences between English and Korean.
Quick reference (click to open)
Vowels: a, e, i, o, u
Consonants: b, c, d, f, g, h, j
Syllable: Bra-zil (2 syllables), Ar-gen-ti-na (4), In-di-a (3), Viet-nam (2), thin-king (2), beau-ti-ful (3), good (1)
Batchim: is a final consonant in a syllable. → Bra-zil (batchim: 'l'), Ar-gen-ti-na (batchims: 'r' and 'n'), In-di-a ('n'), Viet-nam ('t', 'm')
Romanization: is a conversion of text (not pronunciation ! ) from different writing system (Korean, Arabic, Russian, etc.) to the Roman (Latin) alphabet.
IPA: is an alphabetic system of phonetic (pronunciation) notation.
Noun: road, user, sister, table, sky
Pronoun: I, my, we, you, they, her
Verb: to go, to study, to think, to feel
Adjective: cold, kind, hungry, curious, expensive
Adverb: quickly, nicely, never, exactly, urgently
Preposition: from, to, on, in, with, till
Conjuction: and, because, if, but, while
Declarative sentence: I learn Korean.
Interrogative sentence: Do you learn Korean?
Imperative sentence: You must learn Korean!
Exclamative sentence: Wow, you learn Korean!
Verb / Adj. stem in Korean: part of a verb or adj. which is left after removing the last syllable -다 ( e.g. 가다 → 가, 예쁘다 → 예쁘, 듣다 → 듣 ).