Usage of "ㅂ" in place of "ㅁ"?

[cram2289225]

When "jal meokgesseumnida" is written in Hangul,
[잘 먹겠습니다]
why is ㅂ (b/p) used instead of ㅁ (m) at the end of the "seum" syllable?

I'd appreciate it if someone would clear this up for me!

[trutherous]

hahahaha what a good question..

"Nobody knows, that's just the way it is" according to my 55 year old Korean wife - born and raised in Korea until age 25...

As a good foreign student of Korean. I never bothered to ask about the ㅂ/ㅁ thing - I just accepted it, but it was one of the few pet peeves I had while learning Hangul:

1. Why not use ㅁ where ㅂ sounds like ㅁ? -- I have wondered for 26 years but they still haven't changed it.
2. Why not write 했 읍니다 like 했습니다? --this, believe it or not, they changed -- yep used to be written 했읍니다 - 있읍니다 (and it still only looks correct to me when written that way).

In the long run, I never had a real problem with either 1 or 2, but carrying the final consonant sound over to a syllable that began with ㅇ (pet peeve#2) turned out to be the easiest and most natural thing -- yet they changed that... however, getting used to a symbol that could be pronounced p/b-or-m (pet peeve#1) bugged me for a bit longer --just one of those "i before e except after c" kinda things -- yeah ㅂ before ㄴ is pronounced like ㅁ

anyway, sorry I didn't answer your question..

George - fellow student

[arianebroome7029]

Honestly, if you read the University of Hawaii books on Korean, they explain this. I wouldn't bother worrying about it. It's just the way it is. My seonsengnim told me that it has been this way for many years because the Korean government chose for it to be so. They update the language rules about once a decade to make them more relevant, and the pronunciation is-and this is just MY opinion, mind you-a very subtle similarity.

All properly conjugated verbs are going to have that in there so it's better to just learn the spelling, memorize it, and not worry about it.

[timandyou]

Thanks for leaving the question.
That's a great point out!
To be honest, I pointed the same thing to my co-worker in KoreanClass101.com.
"Haha~~!" So I really do understand what you are saying.

My "personal" answer is here...
First, you may say both "ㅂ (b/p) and ㅁ (m).
As many languages have the same issue, Korean is one of them.
Think about "what's up!" Some people say, "wha seop!"
some people simply say "seop"...

The point is, in many languages, writing and speaking are different.
In writing, "잘 먹겠습니다" is correct.
in Speaking, both 'jal meok-get-seup-nida' and 'Jal meok-get-seum-ni-da' are correct.
Especially, when you speak fast in Korean, you will find so many changes in sound.

Personally, if you want to learn Korean academically, it's better to write and say, "jal meok get seupnida"; however, if you want to learn korean for pleasure, it's good to say,"jal meok get seum nida".

There are so many rules for the changes in Korean syllables in speaking.
My advice to you is you learn both - writing and speaking together.

Let's go back to your question.
why do we say, "seum" instead of "seup"? Because we tend to speak Korean faster.
Is it wrong to say "seup" instead of "seum"? No! No one makes problem with that (I think...)

I could create lessons for pronunciation in Hangeul, which will cover so many changes in sound and rules for pronouncing words. But, I don't have a plan for that yet.

Again, thanks for your question.
I hope my answer will help you understand better in Korean.
cheers,

Tim

ps. "Thanks George!"

[trutherous]

Tim -- the dilemma for us native English speakers is that in our English language between words or syllables that end in P or B and ones that start with N there is no such sound change -- not in a million years.

In the English sentence "It's time to eat your soup now" no native English speaker would change the P sound of 'soup' to soum (M) -- a native Korean may make this sound change when speaking similar English sentences -- this is one of the telltale accent problems Koreans face when speaking English, but a native speaker of English will not generally make this sound change no matter how fast we speak the sentence (Although I have to admit that I now make this sound change without thinking, and the second generation kids at our church often ask me why I speak English with a Korean accent).

"Give it to Bob, not Bill." ---we don't say 'Bom, not'
"You hop nicely." ---we don't say 'hom nicely'
"When did you stop needing me?" --we don't say 'stom needing'
등등

And by the way, I get your point, but 'seop?' (sup?) is slang and not a valid example.

[julialim]

Let me add some explanations.

There are many languages in the world.
And it's difficult to explain exactly as you guys know.

But I want to explain 습니다[seumnida] like this way.
OK. In English, there is a word "phone" but pronounce "ph" as [f]. why is that?
I think it is same reason as 습니다.
If a consonant comes after a consonant, it is hard to pronounce them at the same time and then it is changed in a natural pronunciation.
That is why "했습니다[haesseumnida]" is pronounced.

Look at this word "pneumonia".
The "p" in pneumonia is not pronounced.

Pronunciation is one of the important parts when you are learning languages.
You guys will get used to this as listening to Korean in many times.


화이팅!! 여러분!!:lol:
조지 님 아직도 설명이 부족한가요?

[manyakumi]

I second to Julia.

This question

why is ㅂ (b/p) used instead of ㅁ (m) at the end of the "seum" syllable?

should be adjusted as below..

"Why does the syllable 습 in '습니다' sound like ㅁ (m) instead of ㅂ (b/p)?"



Let me explain this.

Why do they spell "phone" instead of "fone"?
That's because of the word's root.

Today, there is no other way but to use 습니다/입니다 in order to end your sentence formally.
However this ending was called "합쇼체" in general when i was younger.
You might have heard they saying "잘 먹었습지요(jal meogeosseupjiyo)" in a historical drama or something.
That means exactly same with "잘 먹었습니다(jal meogeosseumnida)" though, an example of the ending variations.
You can see how the same syllable sounds differently due to the following consonant.
We call this rule of pronunciation "자음동화".

[timandyou]

"Long time no see, Manyakumi~~!"
Where have you been!?

Thanks for your explanation. "That's more than great!"

How do you think about this issue?

When I write lessons and put romanization to Korean, should I consider "자음동화"?
Or should I simply write romanization letter by letter?
So far, I've been simply writing it letter by letter. (Since I have taught about 자음동화 현상)

It's quite hard and very challenging for me to explain about 자음동화 현상 to foriegners.
I think this 자음동화 현상 happens when two consonants (받침 & 뒷 자음) are pronounced together, right? Which means 자음동화 현상 happens when we try to say the two consonants together at once. It's very hard... it's crazy!
All I normally say or recommend to students is "practice, practice and practice!"
The more they speak Korean, the more chance they would understand the rule of 자음동화 현상. Don't you think so!?

I really do appreciate you of the explanation on 자음동화.
cheers,

Tim

[cram2289225]

Wow, thank you so much for your replies, everyone!

I've just recently joined this website, and it's so comforting to know that you all are eager to help others out.

Your explanations helped me understand this tremendously, especially with the English language comparisons to give me that familiar perspective on it.

Thanks again!

[timandyou]

"Hello cram2289225,"

Please visit us often. Leave any question or comment here.
As you said, "we are eager to help others out!"
cheers,

Tim

[trutherous]

Tim - to avoid confusion I'd recommend using the current common standard of romanization because this is likely what students are going to see and use elsewhere. I think you are right about practice practice practice --the students will figure out the sound changes -- there aren't that many of them in Korean. Pronunciation of things like 연락 and 국립 will come naturally over time.

In any language there are bound to be sound/ spelling mismatches - there are perhaps more examples of this in English than any other language. Of course this is partly because we use a borrowed writing system for English.

Isn't it ironic that the great English language, which has in some strides nearly reached global domination, doesn't even have its own alphabet?

Think about this, unlike Hangul which was created specifically as a phonetic representation of the Korean language, we speakers of Anglo-lysh (English), a language of the Anglo-Saxons of ancient Europe, didn't create our own alphabet, but borrowed mainly from the Latin and adapted it to our use.

Now somebody explain why Knowledge and Knee are spelled with Ks

Finally, I must reiterate: a sound change from P/B to M is not natural to native English speakers --this is why we ask about it.

[julia3202]

Just because....

The silent 'k' in words like 'knight', 'knock' and 'knob' is a remnant of Old English, and wasn't silent at all but was pronounced along with the 'n'.

[Old English gecnāwan; related to Old Norse knā I can, Latin noscere to come to know]
[Middle English knouen, from Old English cnwan; see gn- in Indo-European roots.]

Take 'gec' and barley voice it before saying nawan, and you'll get the idea.

The basic problem is that spoken language is a living thing. It changes over time and phonetic writing systems invariably struggle between historical consistency and prudishness, and phonetic accuracy.

Hangul itself has undergone several revisions if my information is correct.

English's dominance is impart due to the fact that it is quite the patchwork language. =) It makes spelling an absolute bear.

ㅂ -> ㅁ when preceding ㄴ makes a lot of sense. 'ㅂ' involves mashing the lips together like 'ㅁ', but is unvoiced, followed by 'n' where the tongue presses on the ridge behind the teeth and is voiced.

[trutherous]

lol - good points Julia! here here!

BTW Hangul has undergone changes since I started learning it.. and just for the record, there was no Hangul dictionary until 1957.. yep Hangul writing system was first promulgated in 1446 but no dictionary until 1957, and 훈민정음 (what is now called Hangul) was not called "Hangul" until the early 1900s.

[julia3202]

I'd vote for avoiding romanization and sticking it out with hangul. Romanization lures one back to English phonetics.

The designer of the writing system was some good Linguist and it rightly is said that it fits the language like a glove.

[orbiter]

When I first saw the title, I thought of something altogether different:

I’m not sure if this is evident, but Koreans pronounce theirㅁ (m) sometimes asㅂ (b/p).
For instance, “맜있다” sometimes sounds like “MBashidda”. One common word is “뭐”. It often sounds like it is pronounced with a B rather than an M.


I don’t know how to express this… Anyone understands what I’m referring to or am I the only weirdo...?