PRONUNCIACIÓN

FINALES

Words where one syllable ends in ㅇ and the next syllable starts with ㄹ
In these words, the ㄹ sound changes to a ㄴ sound. Listen to an audio recording of
each of these words to train your ear:
Play 정류장 (pronounced as 정뉴장)
Play 종류 (pronounced as 종뉴)
Play 대통령 (pronounced as 대통녕)
Play 등록 (pronounced as 등녹)
Play 능력 (pronounced as 능녁)
Play 명령 (pronounced as 명녕)
Play 입장료 (pronounced as 입장뇨)
Play 동료 (pronounced as 동뇨

Words where one syllable ends in ㄴ and the next syllable starts with ㄹ
In these words, the ㄴ sound changes to a ㄹ sound. Listen to an audio recording of
each of these words to train your ear:
Play 안락 (pronounced as 알락)
Play 훈련 (pronounced as 훌련)
Play 관련 (pronounced as 괄련)
Play 관리비 (pronounced as 괄리비)
Play 권력 (pronounced as 궐력)

Words where one syllable ends in ㄱ and the next syllable starts with ㄹ
In these words, the ㄱ sound changes to a ㅇ sound and the ㄹ sound changes to an ㄴ
sound. Listen to an audio recording of each of these words to train your ear:
Play 국립 (pronounced as 궁닙)
Play 학력 (pronounced as 항녁)

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Words where one syllable ends in ㅁ and the next syllable starts with ㄹ
In these words, the ㄹ sound changes to a ㄴ sound. Listen to an audio recording of
each of these words to train your ear:
Play 음료수 (pronounced as 음뇨수)

Words where one syllable ends in ㅍ and the next syllable starts with ㄴ
In these words, the ㅍ sound changes to a ㅁ sound. Listen to an audio recording of
each of these words to train your ear:
Play 앞니 (pronounced as 암니)

Words where one syllable ends in ㅌ and the next syllable starts with ㄴ
In these words, the ㅌ sound changes to a ㄴ sound. Listen to an audio recording of
each of these words to train your ear:
Play 끝내다 (pronounced as 끈내다)
Play 끝나다 (pronounced as 끈나다)

Words where one syllable ends in ㄱ and the next syllable starts with ㅁ
In these words, the ㄱ sound changes to a ㅇ sound. Listen to an audio recording of
each of these words to train your ear:
Play 박물관 (pronounced as 방물관)
Play 목마르다 (pronounced as 몽마르다)

Words where one syllable ends in ㅊ and the next syllable starts with ㅁ
In these words, the ㅊ sound changes to a ㄴ sound. Listen to an audio recording of
each of these words to train your ear:
Play 몇몇 (pronounced as 면멷)
(Notice that the second “ㅊ” also doesn’t sound like ㅊ. It sounds like “ㄷ” because ㅊ
is not aspirated)

Words where one syllable ends in ㅅ

If a syllable ends in ㅅ, it’s possible that it might be a “Middle ㅅ.” This is a very
difficult concept, and is discussed in detail in Lesson 131.

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The Pronunciation of ~습니다 or ~ㅂ니다
In Lesson 6, you will be introduced to politeness in Korean. One way to make a
sentence polite, is to add ~습니다 or ~ㅂ니다 to the end of a verb or adjective (the
distinction between the two will be made in that lesson). When saying ~습니다 or
~ㅂ니다, the ㅂ sound changes to an ㅁ sound. For example:
~Play 습니다 (pronounced as 슴니다)

Sílabas de cuatro letras

The pronunciation of syllables that contain a fourth letter is a little bit different than
above. If you are a beginner, you definitely do not need to memorize these
rules/sounds/concepts from the very beginning. Being comfortable with Korean
pronunciation takes years, and is not something that you can wrap your head around
in a day. The best thing you can do as a beginner is to simply familiarize yourself with
what is presented below (and above, for that matter). As you progress through our
lessons, you will eventually come across these words in our Vocabulary Lists and in
example sentences in our Lessons. Lucky for you, our vocabulary words and example
sentences have audio files attached to them so you can listen to them as they are
presented (if they don’t have an audio link, they will eventually). Familiarizing yourself
with what is presented below will help you when you are introduced to these words
later in our lessons. I’ll repeat my point one more time: While it is important to know
how to pronounce things in Korean – this will not happen overnight. Use the concepts
presented here to set yourself off on the right foot, but don’t get too bogged down on
memorizing everything right now. It will come – with time.
If a syllable contains a fourth letter and is pronounced by itself, usually only one of the
two final consonants is audible.

For example, if you listen to the word “Play 닭“, the “ㄹ” is not audible and the word
is actually pronounced as “닥”
Another example is the word “삶”, where the “ㄹ” is not audible and the word is
actually pronounced as “삼”

This is hard for me to explain because you probably haven’t learned very much (if any)
Korean grammar by this point. If I explain something that goes over your head in terms
of grammar – don’t worry about that too much and try to just focus on the
pronunciation notes I mention.

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The two words above are nouns.

For all intents and purposes, it would be rare to find a noun just sitting by itself in a
sentence. Rather, in Korean, one of many particles (or other things) would be attached
to it. You haven’t learned about these particles yet, but you will be introduced to them
throughout our lessons.

For example:

닭과
닭만
닭이랑
닭이다
닭이나
etc…

You will learn about the meanings of all of these in later lessons, but don’t worry about
that now. Let’s just focus on pronunciation.

If the thing that attaches to these words starts with a consonant, the same rule from
above applies, and only one of the two bottom consonants is pronounced. For
example (There are two separate examples in the audio file below. I thought it would
be better to give two examples instead of one in each case):
Play 닭과 – 닭만
(This sounds closer to “닥과 – 닥만”)
However, if the thing that attaches to these words starts with a vowel, the
pronunciation of the final consonant, in theory, should move to the upcoming syllable.
For example:

Play 닭을 – 닭이다
(This should sound closer to “달글 – 달기다”… but I admit it does sound like 닥을 –
닥이다.)
That is a native Korean speaker pronouncing those words, and there probably is a
reason why she pronounced it that way. This is way beyond the scope of this lesson.
Again, just try to understand what is being presented here in theory. You will have
thousands of audio files to help you as you progress to later lessons.
닭 is a noun, but various things are also attached to verbs/adjectives as well that
change pronunciation.

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The following are three common verbs in Korean that have this fourth letter (All verbs
end with “~다” but don’t worry about that for now):

Play 앉다 = to sit
Play 읽다 = to read
Play 없다 = to not have
Listen to the pronunciation of each of those words. You will notice that (just like the
word “닭” above), because each of the four-letter syllables is followed by a consonant
(다), only one of the two final consonants is pronounced. As you can see here, the
letter that is not pronounced is not the same in every word.

In Play 앉다, ㅈ is not pronounced (sounds like “안”)

In Play 읽다, ㄹ is not pronounced (sounds like “익”)
In Play 없다, ㅅ is not pronounced (sounds like “업”)
This is beyond your understanding right now, but various grammatical principles can
replace “다” to have different meanings. You will learn about all of these in later
lessons. For example:

앉겠다
앉고
앉거나
앉는
앉아
앉으면
앉아요
앉아서
앉을
앉은
etc…

If the thing that replaces “다” starts with a consonant, the same rule from above (with
nouns) applies, and only one of the two bottom consonants is pronounced. For
example, if 앉 is followed by a consonant:

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Play 앉겠다 – 앉고
(This sounds closer to “안겠다 – 안고”)
However, if the thing that replaces “다” starts with a vowel, the pronunciation of the
final consonant moves to the upcoming syllable. For example, if 앉 is followed by a
vowel:

Play 앉아 – 앉으면
(This sounds closer to “안자 – 안즈면”)

You can see the same phenomenon with all words that have this 4th letter. Let’s listen
to “읽다” when “다” is replaced by something starting with a consonant compared to
a vowel.

Followed by a consonant:
Play 읽겠다 – 읽고
(Sounds closer to “익겠다 – 익고”)
Followed by a vowel:
Play 읽어 – 읽으면
(Sounds closer to “일거 – 일그면”)

Let’s do the same thing with 없다

Followed by a consonant
Play 없겠다 – 없고
(Sounds closer to “업겠다 – 업고”)
Followed by a vowel
Play 없어 – 없으면
(Sounds closer to “업서 – 업스면)

Let’s do the same thing with 긁다 (to scratch)

Followed by a consonant
Play 긁겠다 – 긁고
(Sounds closer to “극겠다 – 극고”)

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Followed by a vowel
Play 긁어 – 긁으면
(Sounds closer to “글거 – 글그면”)
Again, explaining the difference in meaning and purpose between…

앉다 vs. 앉고 vs. 앉아
읽다 vs. 읽고 vs. 읽어
없다 vs. 없고 vs. 없어
닭 vs. 닭과 vs. 닭을

Pronunciación de ㅢ

When ㅢ is found in the first syllable of a word, and the syllable begins with “ ㅇ”
(making the first sound be “ㅢ), the pronunciation is “ㅢ.” Here is a recording of two
words where this can be heard:

Play 의자 = chair
Play 의사 = doctor
—————————–

When ㅢ is found in the first syllable of a word, but the syllable begins with a
consonant, the pronunciation can be “이.”

Play 희망 (pronounced as “히망”) = hope (the noun, not the verb)

Play 띄어쓰기 (pronounced as “띠어쓰기”) = a space in writing
When ㅢ is found somewhere other than the first syllable of a word, the pronunciation
can be “이.” For example:

Play 저희 (pronounced as “저히”) = a formal way to say “we”

Play 동의 (pronounced as “동이”) = an agreement
Play 정의 (pronounced as “정이”) = a definition
Play 회의 (pronounced as “회이”) = a meeting
—————————–

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In Unit 1: Lesson 3, you will learn about “~의” and how it can be used to have a
meaning of possession. In English, we can put “’s” on the end of a word, or change “I”
to “my” or “him” to “his.” For example:
저 = I/me
친구 = friend
저의 친구 = My friend

책 = book
저의 책 = My book
저의 친구의 책 = My friend’s book

차 = car
저의 차 = My car

When used like this, the pronunciation can be “에.” For example:

Play 저의 책 (pronounced as “저에 책”) = My book

Play 저의 차 (pronounced as “저에 차”) = My car
Play 저의 친구 (pronounced as “저에 친구”)= My friend
Play 저의 친구의 책 (pronounced as “저에 친구에 책”)= My friend’s book

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