Teaching English in Korea
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Pronunciation of Korean Words
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Some information on the romanization of Korean script.
Busan or Pusan? Daegu or Teagu? Why the different spellings in English? Well, before the year 2000, Korean used a system of Romanization called the McCune-Reischauer system, created by two Americans in 1937.
Due to increasing criticism, the government eventually adopted a new system simply called "Revised Romanisation of Korean" in July 2000. But by that time, all the English names for cities, bus routes and airports had already been printed using the old system. That's why today, even though everyone knows Busan is spelled with a B, you can walk around in downtown Busan and see manhole covers with "Pusan" written on it.
When I did some research on a holiday in Thailand, I was amazed at the variety of English spellings for the same place that different people, books or sites would use. Even the International airport in Bangkok which has a long and difficult name is spelled in so many different ways that it's sometimes hard to be sure everyone's talking about the same place! (Though there is a standard spelling that most people use) It would seem that Romanization of Thai script is a mixture of hopefulness and good intentions!
Well, that's not the case with Korean. Since the language is scientific and regular, spelling of Korean words in English remains constant and precise. And since the whole country is using the "Revised Romanization" method, it makes things a lot easier.
I do of course not recommend reading Korean in English script, but learning to read the actual Hangeul. It'll make life a lot easier for you in Korea.
Here's an example of the different English spelling of Hangeul using the old and new system. The Korean reads: "Korea has four distinct seasons".
Due to increasing criticism, the government eventually adopted a new system simply called "Revised Romanisation of Korean" in July 2000. But by that time, all the English names for cities, bus routes and airports had already been printed using the old system. That's why today, even though everyone knows Busan is spelled with a B, you can walk around in downtown Busan and see manhole covers with "Pusan" written on it.
When I did some research on a holiday in Thailand, I was amazed at the variety of English spellings for the same place that different people, books or sites would use. Even the International airport in Bangkok which has a long and difficult name is spelled in so many different ways that it's sometimes hard to be sure everyone's talking about the same place! (Though there is a standard spelling that most people use) It would seem that Romanization of Thai script is a mixture of hopefulness and good intentions!
Well, that's not the case with Korean. Since the language is scientific and regular, spelling of Korean words in English remains constant and precise. And since the whole country is using the "Revised Romanization" method, it makes things a lot easier.
I do of course not recommend reading Korean in English script, but learning to read the actual Hangeul. It'll make life a lot easier for you in Korea.
Here's an example of the different English spelling of Hangeul using the old and new system. The Korean reads: "Korea has four distinct seasons".
Hangeul
McCune-Reischauer (old)
Revised Romanisation (new)
For more info on reading Korean script itself, see this article.
For some more information on learning Korean, see this article.
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