The word '그,그녀' is the influence of European Language during 16~18th century In Meiji Period Japan, They first made these word in Kanji just for detail tranlation 'Kare/Kanojo(彼/彼女)'. And later, Korea adopted this directly-translated words. This is Why it is awkward when using the words in Conversation. It is stll used just for He-She translations from English literature.
Well when you think about it it's also sorta that reason too, but only because it's just so easy to accidentally say rude things in languages like Korean and Japanese.
I am honestly really thankful that people like you exist, I love you all sooo much you’ve changed my year so much i have been a month learning korean and i am in level 6 now! I am able to speak korean to my korean friends now, also i am able to understand song lyrics when i read them , this is a first language i have learned on my own and i am really happy i feel so proud of myself❤️ I want you to know how amazing you are and thank you so much for your free lessons since i live in egypt and its hard to buy anything online❤️
It's interesting that third person in Korean is genderless, just like in Indonesian. I didn't know this before. As an Indonesian learning Korean, I think it's easier to learn this way. Thank you for this. I found your videos are really helpful.
@Erma Nurhidayah actually most native languages outside of Europe (except Afroasiatic family which includes Arabic & Amharic) don't distinguish her & him. It just happened that european languages ended up dominating the world of business today. In Europe itself notable languages without distinction of her & him are Hungarian, Finnish, Estonian and Basque spoken in Spain and France.
I'm a hindi speaker too. It was your comment that cleared the whole concept up for me finally. ☺️☺️☺️It means maybe in the sentence itself, the verb tells whether it is he or she?
@*Fancy June* hmm we have to learn Hindi and English alone with our mother tongue and then if anyone wants to learn another language then its like a challenge so...
Oh! This is kind of similar with Spanish, we tend to omit the subject or use the person' name in a sentence, or as for the bag example, the Spanish possessive pronoun for he/she is 'su' so without a name or previous context you wouldn't be able to tell if you're referring to a he or a she 😊 I'll keep this in mind for when I reach this in my books!
@@danielmartinez7047 for subject pronouns yes we use el/ella but for possessive pronouns we do use 'su' for both genders, at least when speaking OF a third person, like e.g.: esta es su maleta, we wouldn't know if the bag belongs to him/her, but then when speaking WITH someone,of course we could use: esta maleta es tuya/tuyo So I guess in Spanish we use both for possessive pronouns...
@@mayracedeno9684 Tienes razón. Esta es su maleta es correcto. Pensé que se decía diferente. Yo no tuve escuela y creo que esa es la razón de mi falta de comprensión. Gracias por ayudarme. I thought I was right but I wasn't. You are more cunning than I thought. Spanish is my first language but I always make a lot of mistakes when writing. 고마워 내 여자친구. 다시만나요!
@@mayracedeno9684 true, and in Brazil, since most of them don't use tu nor vos, «a sua mala» could mean «your/her/his/their suitcase». to avoid confusion you usually simply say «a mala dele/dela/deles/delas/de vocês» which mostly ends up revealing the gender of the possessor.
I always found this a bit of a struggle. Even though I've understood that they're never really used often from your early lessons, the native English speaker in me always wants to use them. However, now that I'm here teaching in Korea it's been a help to actually hear my coworkers refer to me in Korean as "this teacher" or "[Name] teacher" in contexts where I would normally use "he" or "she."
@@babyphotocards515 actually most native languages outside of Europe (except Afroasiatic family which includes Arabic & Amharic) don't distinguish her & him. It just happened that european languages ended up dominating the world of business today. In Europe itself notable languages without distinction of her & him are Hungarian, Finnish, Estonian and Basque spoken in Spain and France.
Yay you're back with your videos :D 보고 싶었어요 :( I look forward to these - I guess we have been spoilt receiving one nearly every day :p Thank you so much - you are all such amazing Teachers:)
I just love your Korean accent and voice. Either way I don't understand a lot korean ( learning stage) I can listen to you hours and hours just hear you speaking Korean. Can you do 1 hour Korean poetry or novel or anything.. 😁😁
Yayyyy! I love your voice (idk if it’s weird to say that lol) also, even though English is my first language, you speak it better and more clear than I do 😂
Actually, it's easier for me to remember these general rules of speech (drop a lot of pronouns) than it is to learn new words. New words hard. General rules easy. In European languages everything has gender, even non-living things. And verbs and adjectives all have to be conjugated based on various pronouns. Korean is MUCH easier than all that.
I always thought that what was going on with dictionary sentences using 그 or 그녀 is, as you said, the actual identity of the person doesn't matter (there is _no_ person - it's just a sample sentence) so 그 and 그녀 are used to keep the sentence as generic as possible _or_ if the sentence is a translation from, say, English, those words convey the sense of the sentence where "he" or "she" is used. (In actual spoken Korean, you're usually referring to a real person and can use his or her name or title.)
Comparing two languages that I know which are Bengali and English, I see that there are a lot of similarities of Korean with both the languages. I'm happy as I can understand because of the similarities and also all of the teacher in TTMIK's clear explanations :) Thank you. I am an elementary Korean learner, in TTMIK level 2 and I am happy that I can make a lot of sentences by my own with the help of all of you. You do a lot of effort for all the Korean learners. 감사합니다💜😊 화이팅 여러분!! You can do it easily with TTMIK 😊😊
When I learned that we can't remove subjects from sentences in English, I was very surprised. We also can omit subjects in Turkish. And also we don't have male/female things even for the third person (she/he) we always say "O". So easy😄👌
I’m the opposite. I’m a native English speaker trying to learn Korean, and once I got to the lessons where the subject could be omitted, everything went downhill for me. 😂 I never seem to be able to keep track of who or what is being talked about without the subject being stated. I remember thinking to myself, “It only takes a second to say the subject and about 30 seconds to go back and clarify what was being talked about. How is this more efficient?!” Then I realized other languages are just used to not having them.
Yes Koreans are very used to guessing what's being talked about and it takes zero effort. I'm sure you'll realize that not every situation needs to be clarified to communicate 😁 Also, there are many other verb conjugations that indicate the subject.
Well technically they won't specify the subject, but they will help you understand the situation in ways like telling it's citation or showing respect etc.
Great explanations Hyunwoo, great explanations, though sorry 4:59 I was momentarily distracted (in a fun way lol) by Kyeongeun at 4:59 hahaha. Those interstitials are great.
Gasp! Korean has gender neutral pronouns! Thank you so much for making these videos! They help break difficult concepts or concepts we don't see often in other languages down and make it so much easier to understand
I guess Korean is much more practical than my language (Romanian). We have several formal and casual forms for every pronoun (except 1st person), but some plural formal pronouns can be for singular formal usages as well. And we also use names, titles and stuff like "kid". So this rule in Korean is actually piece of cake for me.
I’m Korean American and whenever I talked to my mom and use “그녀는...”, I would accidentally combine “녀+ㄴ” and well...ended up saying something entirely different lolol so i try not to use it.
It was so helpful! Thank you! Our Korean teacher have not mentioned it yet.may be because we have just started to learn Korean and so that we don't get confuse..I am learning Korean language since past 6 months at Korean culture and language center (KCLC) in my city..I am about to complete beginner level..love from India~
In our language, Filipino (Tagalog), we use the word 'Siya' both means he or she and can be used in both context and spoken Filipino. And it can be distinguished depending on the context or person being talked about.
It's been a few months since I started learning Korean through your website and my native friends say I'm getting better everyday :'))) can't wait to leave for dorms and buy your books (mom won't let me buy books at home😩)
@@mehehehek 년 can mean "bitch" and is often used like 나쁜년 "bad bitch" (not in the good way😅), 미친 년 "crazy bitch," etc, so I'm guessing that's another reason not to say these pronouns lol my boyfriend, who is from Korea, even told me to refer to specific years as 20--년도 because of this also lol
Thank you for this video! I realised this is the same for Japanese, where they prefer to use names and titles, and the subject is also usually omitted since both parties (in the conversation) will know what the other person meant. This makes learning Korean for me much easier.
Yes, I was (pleasantly) surprised to find that out only after I started learning Korean. I am also fluent in Chinese (Mandarin) so it helps a lot when learning Korean. I instinctively try to find the Chinese “equivalent” when learning new Korean vocabulary. Knowing the Hanja (if applicable) helps me remember the words.
Or if there are a lot of people and you're trying to specify which one, you just describe something about them like, "읽는 사람" (the person who is reading) or "안경을 쓰는 사람" (the person wearing glasses).
Ofc, one no longer must say "he is" or "she is". It's now (or very soon will be) grammatically allowable to say "they are" to refer to a single person in a gender-neutral way.
but what about when you dont KNOW the person to say their name or social title? like you are with a friend and want to say "did you see that girl? she was pretty" wouldnt 그녀 fit in this case?
jesus, 그 is used for so many things, i'm going crazy over this at least now i don't have to worry about it in this case! thank you for your great videos!!!
I haven’t learnt many pronouns yet but this is a good tip even though I know it’s going to make me even more confused. Sometimes when I’m reading korean sentences I get so confused with who they are talking about. But I know over time I’ll get better and with more practice since I’m only at level two.Your lessons really do help me a lot. 감사합니다 선생님.
정말 감사합니다 it was veryyyyy interesting and i really was waiting for a new video because i watched all your very usefull video ❤❤ please continue to help us to learn korean 😄😄
strange...i was told by korean people that 그 and 그녀 were not formal or poetic at all, but often seen as rude...this is an area of Korean that is very hard to get solid information on, since Koreans themselves almost never use pronouns at all in the way that they are used continuously in English...but that is what I've been told by more than one Korean. Better to use words like 아주머니 (or 이모) (for middle-aged women), 할머니 (old women), 할아버지 (old men), 선생(님), (respectful term for any adult), 학생 ("student" used for younger people)...these words seem to be very safe and in widespread use, wouldn't you agree?
you're are saving us for sure, you have the best explanation ever. i've seen many other channels but you're the BEST of all. thank you so much. always your videos are on point and so helpful and useful.
i wish i could take an actual real life korean language class...just like i did for spanish for 4 years. I just think its so much easier for me. Ive been trying to self teach for over a year now and ive given up about 3 times. its so difficult D: the things i do for my idols i swear....i still want to learn. ive recently fallen off but i guess ill just start up again. i love the way korean sounds and how smooth it is, i just love hearing people speak korean, and i want to learn so so so so bad. maybe when i get a new job i can hire a teacher or take a live class online i dunno....i just feel like i need lessons and structured learning when it comes to language learning. ive even looked on amino for people who actually tutor and teach others to speak korean but none of them have been committed to learning. i started learning with 4 friends, and i seem to be the only one still really interested in learning it after a year....i just need help XD if anyone has advice, please feel free to help me out here.
It'll be hard for Indo-European languagers because Korean is One of the Isolated languages in the world. But once you speak and write Korean fluently, You will be able to move another step to Japanese, which is also the isolated language. Korean and Japanese, grammatically and vocabular-ily, share so many things which is unbelievably easy if you learned one of this. And Mastering Japanese will make learning Chinese so easy.
Hi! I've also been a bit desperate about learning Korean because it seemed so hard. but now it's going pretty well for me since I'm using Duolingo. I also use Drops, LingoDeer and memrise. and then I think persistence is really important too. hope that helps a bit? I can also add you on some social media or messenger if you want (don't know which one would suit you best)
Hello! Thank you very much for this lesson! I really appreciate it. I've been learning Korean for a couple of months now and I feel like I'm stuck, so I am thinking about purchasing some books from your store, however, I'd like to know.. I already know that the e-book for level 1 has the same content as the physical textbook for level 1, but does the e-book come with a workbook? do you have an e-workbook? Once again, thank you very very much!
