Hangul:
Korean Characters
Yong Uk Song
Yonsei Univerisity Wonju Campus
Why Hangul in Programming Class?
 Encoding
 Encoding is “mapping a meaning to a series of symbols.”
 E.g.
 HTML, …
 Program
 Human language
 Voice
 Letter
How People Learn Languages?
 Baby
 Language, and then characters
 Adult
 Characters, and then language
 We are adults!
 Let’s learn Korean characters first.
Introduction to Languages and
Characters
Languages vs. Characters
Country
United Kingdom
U. S. A.
Canada
…
Philippines
Indonesia
Malaysia
Russia
China
Japan
Korea
Language
Character
English
Alphabet
Tagalog
Bahasa Indonesia
Bahasa Malaysia
Russian
Chinese
Japanese
Korean
Alphabet
Alphabet
Cyrillic alphabet
Chinese character
Kana
Hangul
Examples of Characters
 Cyrillic alphabet
 АБВГДЕЖЅЗИІКЛМНОПҀРСТѸФХѠЦЧШЩЪꙐЬѢꙐѤЮѦѪѨѬѮѰѲѴ
 Chinese character
 係印歐語系嗰斯拉夫語族嗰大多數語言用嘚嗰字母書寫系統
 Kana (Japanese character) mixed with Chinese characters
 主にスラヴ諸語を表記するのに用いられる表音文字の体系の一種である。
伝統的には、正教会の宣教師キュリロスとメトディオスの兄弟がスラヴ
人に布教するためにギリシャ文字を元に考案されたとされるが、彼らが
実際に考案した文字はグラゴル文字であったらしい。しかし、グラゴル
文字はすぐに廃れたため、キリル文字が広く用いられるようになり、
キュリロスが作った文字であるという意味からキリル文字と呼ばれるよ
うになった
 Hangul (Korean character)
 동유럽(러시아, 우크라이나, 벨라루스와 몰도바, 세르비아, 몬테네그로,
보스니아 헤르체고비나 일부지역, 크로아티아 일부지역, 루마니아
일부지역, 불가리아, 마케도니아 공화국)과 중앙아시아, 북아시아와
아제르바이잔, 그루지야 일부지역(압하스/압하지야, 남오세티야),
몽골에서 쓰이는 문자이다.
Categories of Characters
Categories
Sub-categories
Meaning-based
(ideogram)
-
Chinese Character
Syllable-based
Ancient Phoenician
Kana (Japanese)
Sound-based
(phonetic
symbol)
Examples
Alphabet
Phoneme-based Cyrillic alphabet
Hangul (Korean)
Terminology (1)
 Meaning-based character scheme maps a mean directly into a
character.
 E.g. Water (in meaning)  水 (in Chinese)
 Sound-based character scheme maps a mean into a sound,
and then maps the sound into a series of characters.
 E.g. Water (in meaning)  [wɔ́ːtəːr]  water (in English)
 E.g. Water (in meaning)  [mul]  물 (in Korean)
 E.g. Water (in meaning)  [tu bik]  tubig (in Tagalog)
Terminology (2)
 Syllable
 A unit of complete sound
 A segment of a spoken word consisting of one sound or of two or more sounds said as a
single unit of speech
 Examples of one-syllable words
 Sing, song, run, go, …
 Examples of two-syllable words
 Singing, forget, knowledge, …
 Examples of words with three or more syllables
 Philippines, remember, …
 Phoneme
 The smallest unit of sound in a language that has significance in distinguishing one word
from another
 A syllable can be divided into several phonemes.
 Two categories of phonemes
 Consonants (e.g. B, C, D, F, G, H, J, K, L, M, N, P, Q, R, S, T, V, W, X,Y, Z (in Alphabet))
 Vowels (e.g. A, E, I, O, U (in Alphabet))
Evolution of Characters
 Characters have been evolved in the sequence of meaning-
based, syllable-based, and finally phoneme-based, even
though some languages still use meaning-based (China) or
syllable-based (Japan) characters.
 Why?
 To reduce the number of symbols (characters)
 The more there are symbols, the more it is difficult to learn.
 E.g.
 Chinese : 30,000 or more symbols
 Kana : 50 + 1 symbols
 Alphabet : 26 symbols
Uniqueness of Hangul
Unique Feature of Hangul (1)
 Hangul is phoneme-based, but it can represent syllables, too.
 Example
 English
 For “river”, we can identify only consonants (r, v, r) and vowels (i, e).
 There is no specification about syllables.
 Korean
 For “서울” (Seoul), we can identify two syllables (서, 울) firstly, and
then, one consonant (ㅅ) and one vowel (ㅓ) from 서 (Seo), and two
consonants (ㅇ, ㄹ) and one vowel (ㅜ) from 울 (ul).
Coverage by Alphabet and Language
Phoneme
English
Syllable
Alphabet
Korean
Hangul
Word
English
Korean
 In English,
 If you do not learn a word, you may not read or write the word.
 E.g. School, Chair
 In Korean language,
 Even though you do not learn a word, you can read and write the
word.
Unique Feature of Hangul (2)
 Transparency (from Computer Science)
 The representation is transparent from its meaning in Korean
thanks to Hangul.
 You can learn reading and writing (Hangul) without the
knowledge about Korean words (vocabulary), whereas you
should learn reading and writing with English words
simultaneously.
 Reading & writing are separated from vocabulary in Korean,
but reading & writing are combined with vocabulary in
English.
 So, Hangul is very easy to learn, read and write.
Unique Feature of Hangul (3)
 Syllable-based representation scheme of Hangul enforces no exceptions. (There are some
exceptions, though)
 Thanks to Hangul, Korean language has a tendency to adapt itself as a pronunciation for a
word is changed.
 Adaptation example
 삯월세 (rent-fee) [sag-wol-se]  사글세 [sa-gl-se]
 Korean government changed the standard from 삯월세 to 사글세.
 English allows many exceptions.
 English do not adapt itself even though a pronunciation for a word is changed.
 Example
 School vs. Skul
 UK or USA governments do not change the word from SCHOOL to SKUL.
 Writing “school” but reading “skul” is still OK for them.
 The issues is not government officers’ attitude (diligentness or lazyness), but the
tendency by the characters (Hangul and Alphabet).
 There is no “spelling bee” competition in Korea.
 Because every Korean (except babies) is a spelling bee.
To Learn Hangul
 Symbols for Phonemes
 Consonants:
 ㄱ, ㄴ, ㄷ, ㄹ, ㅁ, ㅂ, ㅅ, ㅇ, ㅈ, ㅊ, ㅋ, ㅌ, ㅎ, ㄲ, ㄸ, ㅃ, ㅆ, ㅉ
 Vowels:
 ㅏ, ㅑ, ㅓ, ㅕ, ㅗ, ㅛ, ㅜ, ㅠ, ㅡ, ㅣ
 ㅐ, ㅒ, ㅔ, ㅖ
 ㅘ, ㅙ, ㅚ, ㅝ, ㅞ, ㅟ, ㅢ
 Rule of layout for consonants and vowels to represent
syllables ( distinguished from other characters)
Layout
Rule of Layout for Syllable
 Con. : a consonant
Section I
Con. (M) Section III
Section II Vow. (B)
Vow. (B)
Section IV Section V
Con. (O) Con. (O)
 Vow. : a vowel
 M : mandatory
 B : at least one vowel in
sections II and III
 Vowels with a vertical bar (ㅏ,
ㅑ, ㅓ, ㅕ, ㅣ, …) locate at
section III.
 Vowels with a horizontal bar
(ㅗ, ㅛ, ㅜ, ㅠ, ㅡ, …)
locate at section II.
 O : optional
Example: Layout for Syllable (1)
ㅅ
Con. (M)
Vow. (B)
Vow. (B)
ㅗ
Con. (O) Con. (O)
 소 [so]
Example: Layout for Syllable (2)
ㅅ
Con. (M)
ㅏ
Vow. (B)
Vow. (B)
Con. (O) Con. (O)
 사 [sa]
Example: Layout for Syllable (3)
ㅅ
Con. (M)
Vow. (B)
Vow. (B)
ㅗ
Con. (O) Con. (O)
ㅇ
 송 [song]
Example: Layout for Syllable (4)
ㅅ
Con. (M)
ㅏ
Vow. (B)
Vow. (B)
Con. (O) Con. (O)
ㅇ
 상 [sang]
Example: Layout for Syllable – What if “Con. (M)”
not exist?  Void (empty, zero) consonant (ㅇ)
ㅇ
Con. (M)
Vow. (B)
Vow. (B)
ㅗ
Con. (O) Con. (O)
 오 [o]
Special Consonant - ㅇ
 When “ㅇ” is in section I, it
means “void”.
 오 [o]
 When “ㅇ” is in section IV,
it is a consonant with its
own sound, “ng”.
 송 [song]
Section I
Con. (M) Section III
Section II Vow. (B)
Vow. (B)
Section IV Section V
Con. (O) Con. (O)
Example: Layout for Syllable (5)
ㄱ
Con. (M)
ㅏ
Vow. (B)
Vow. (B)
ㅗ
Con. (O) Con. (O)
ㅇ
 광 [kwang]
Example: Layout for Syllable (6)
ㅁ
Con. (M)
ㅏ
Vow. (B)
Vow. (B)
Con. (O) Con. (O)
ㄴ
ㅎ
 많 [man + h]
* ‘h’ sound goes to next syllable.
What is Good Layout?
 The layout result should be a square if possible.
나
(Bad)
(Good)
누
(Good)
(Bad)
Symbols
Consonants (1)
Symb
ol
Example
Sound
(in English)
G
Get, Gag
Name
ㄱ
기윽 (기역)
ㄴ
니은
N
Name, Moon
ㄷ
디읃 (디귿)
D
Dad
ㄹ
리을
L
Large, Little
ㅁ
미음
M
Moon, Mom
ㅂ
비읍
B
Baby, Bob
ㅅ
시읏 (시옷)
S
Song, Get
Consonants (2)
Symb
ol
Example
(in English)
Name
Sound
ㅇ
이응
ㅈ
지읒
(void)
Ng
J
Ask
Song
Job
ㅊ
치읓
Ch
Chair
ㅋ
키읔
C, K
ㅌ
티읕
T
Top
ㅍ
피읖
P
Popular
ㅎ
히읗
H
Have
Car, Kid
Consonants (3)
Symb
ol
Example
Sound
(in Taglog)
Kk
Calamansi
Name
ㄲ
쌍기역
ㄸ
쌍디귿
Tt
Tagalog, Ate
ㅃ
쌍비읍
Pp
Opo
ㅆ
쌍시옷
Ss
Sinigang
ㅉ
쌍지읒
Jj
Jaz
* “쌍” means “two”.
Naming Rule for Consonants
 If ‘C’ is a consonant,
C ㅣ
ㅇ
ㅡ
C
 E.g. ㄴ (니은), ㄹ (리을), ㅁ (미음), …
 Exceptions: ㄱ (기역  기윽), ㄷ (디귿  디읃), ㅅ
(시옷  시읏)
Vowels (1)
Symb
Name
ol
Sound
ㅏ
아
A
Example
(in English)
Ask (in England)
ㅑ
야
Ya
Yahoo
ㅓ
어
Eo
Seoul
ㅕ
여
Yeo
Young
ㅗ
오
O
Song
ㅛ
요
Yo
Yogurt
ㅜ
우
U
Glue
Vowels (2)
Symb
Name
ol
Sound
ㅠ
유
Yu
Example
(in English)
You
ㅡ
으
Eu
Group, Field
ㅣ
이
I
It
ㅐ
애
Ae
At
ㅒ
얘
Yae
ㅔ
에
E
Get
ㅖ
예
Ye
Yes
Vowels (3)
Symb
Name
ol
Sound
ㅘ
와
Wa
Example
(in English)
What
ㅙ
왜
ㅚ
외
Ō (German)
Kōnig (German)
ㅝ
워
Were
ㅞ
웨
Wage
ㅟ
위
ㅢ
의
We
We
Naming Rule for Vowels
 As it is, by adding the “void” consonant, ㅇ in Section I.
 E.g.)
ㅏ아
ㅗ오
ㅐ애
ㅘ와
Writing
 Guideline
 Left to right, then top to down
 Maintain SQUARE layout if possible
Writing Consonants (1)
Symb
ol
Name
ㄱ
기윽 (기역)
ㄴ
니은
ㄷ
디읃 (디귿)
ㄹ
리을
ㅁ
미음
ㅂ
비읍
ㅅ
시읏 (시옷)
Sequence
Writing Consonants (2)
Symb
ol
Name
ㅇ
이응
ㅈ
지읒
ㅊ
치읓
ㅋ
키읔
ㅌ
티읕
ㅍ
피읖
ㅎ
히읗
Sequence
Writing Vowels (1)
Symb
ol
Name
ㅏ
아
ㅑ
야
ㅓ
어
ㅕ
여
ㅗ
오
ㅛ
요
ㅜ
우
Sequence
Writing Vowels (2)
Symb
ol
Name
ㅠ
유
ㅡ
으
ㅣ
이
ㅐ
애
ㅒ
얘
ㅔ
에
ㅖ
예
Sequence
Vowels (3)
Symb
ol
Name
ㅘ
와
ㅗㅘ
ㅙ
왜
ㅗㅙ
ㅚ
외
ㅗㅚ
ㅝ
워
ㅜㅝ
ㅞ
웨
ㅜㅞ
ㅟ
위
ㅜㅟ
ㅢ
의
ㅡㅢ
Sequence
?