About double consonants...or whatever you call 'em

[kissthequizzer]

How do you know when to use consonants twice, like ㅉ ㄲ ㄸ ㅃ or when to use letters like ㅂㅈㄷㄱ?

Thanks!

[matthew254]

How do you know when to use consonants twice, like ㅉ ㄲ ㄸ ㅃ or when to use letters like ㅂㅈㄷㄱ?
Thanks!

The way I think of it is just like in English. I mean, we could spell "school" as "skool" but that's not where the word comes from originally. We should spell the word "colonel" more like "kurnal" because that's how we say it but that doesn't line up with it's history.

Plus, if you're like me, you're just now getting good at picking out the difference between /ㄱ/, /ㄲ/, and /ㅋ/ in everyday speech. At first it's subtle but after a while, the differences get more and more recognizable.

The pronunciation series explains this a whole lot better than I can: http://www.koreanclass101.com/category/ ... on-series/

[kyuree]

How do you know when to use consonants twice, like ㅉ ㄲ ㄸ ㅃ or when to use letters like ㅂㅈㄷㄱ?

Thanks!

I know my explanation will be a bit contradicting to the explanation from the pronounciation series but it's how I learnt it and if you listen to Koreans pronouncing words it seems to be right...

ㅂㅈㄷㄱ change their pronounciation depending on where they are in a word.
If they are the first letter of a word they sound nearly like Western
p ch t k (unaspirated!!)
If they are the first letter of a syllable that is not the first syllable of the word they sound softer just like
b j d g
the same is true if they are the last letter of a syllable.

The way double consonants (ssang) were explained to me in Korean school is as follows:
ㅉ ㄲ ㄸ ㅃ
You need a short "strength" from your belly to pronounce them. I know it sounds crazy and to pronounce them authentically is difficult if you didn't grow up speaking Korean.
Something that I think was also mentioned in the pronounciation series is how you pronounce the vowel after a double consonant: your voice gets a slightly higher pitch then after pronouncing single consonants!
The double consonants are more stressed?
The double consonant ㅃ is sometimes transcribed as "p". I find that inappropriate. It's more like a very voiced (ling.) "b" in the beginning that ends in a sort-of-"p".

Heh, it's really difficult to explain this in a text...
Regardless of position the double consonants sound the same.

I find it easier to destinguish ㅉ ㄲ ㄸ ㅃ from ㅂㅈㄷㄱ than
ㅂㅈㄷㄱ from ㅍ ㅊ ㅌ ㅋ (aspirated)

here is how phonetic experts describe it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_language#Consonants

but I sort of doubt it'll be helpful...


ㅍ ㅊ ㅌ ㅋ are aspirated, i.e. a bit of air comes out while saying it (listen to pronounciation series, they explain it).
ㅂㅈㄷㄱ are not.
ㅉ ㄲ ㄸ ㅃ are tense (your lips should be tense while pronouncing it)


as to when to use them in writing, either you can memorize from the pronounciation or you will have to learn it by heart.

by the way (ㅂㅈㄷㄱ) + ㅎ = (ㅍ ㅊ ㅌ ㅋ)

[holdfast]

ㅂㅈㄷㄱ change their pronounciation depending on where they are in a word.
If they are the first letter of a word they sound nearly like Western
p ch t k (unaspirated!!)
If they are the first letter of a syllable that is not the first syllable of the word they sound softer just like
b j d g
the same is true if they are the last letter of a syllable.

even though i thought the rest of your explanation is great, i'm going to have to say that i don't think this particular statement is always true. from what i have noticed, usually even the first ㅂㅈㄷㄱ sound in a word is a softer sound (b j d g). for example - 집 is definitely a softer sound (like j) than 친구 (which is definitely a harsher ch sound). or 바다 has a much softer sound (like b) than 편지 (which has a harsher p sound). however i will agree with you about ㄱ - it often sounds (to me) more like a harsh k sound at the beginning of a word (though not always).

as far as syllables ending is consonants go, it all depends on what comes after it. sometimes they are pronounced as normal, sometimes the pronunciation changes completely. usually, if the next sound is a vowel it will be pronounced as normal. if the next sound is the same consonant, it makes a stronger sound. if the next sound is a different consonant, sometimes strange things happen - haha.. for example, ㅈ and ㅅ or ㅆ sound like ㅌ when followed by another consonant. most others stay the same, except they sound kind of... shorter? i don't know how to explain it (help!). but there are other exceptions too, like if the syllable ends in ㄴ and the next syllable starts with ㄹ you wouldn't say the ㄴ sound at all. there are other rules too - i can't remember them all right now. ^^;;;

i hope this doesn't come across the wrong way - i'm not trying to tell anyone that they are wrong, i am just sharing from my own experience. (:

[kyuree]

Yes, I didn't take the exceptions into consideration as say combination of ㄹ + ㄴ.
Hm, I think the 바다 being softer than 편지 comes from it being an aspired or not aspired letter. I was trying to explain that 바다 should not be pronounced like BADA, I think many people make that mistake, sometimes it slips me, too.

Once I wanted to point out that I saw a nashi pear which is
배
(among other things...)
but I pronounced it like Bae and what the Korean person understood was
빼
(to take away, to throw away... sth. like that).
As I said the aspired or not aspired sound is kind of subtle for me to distinguish probably b/c it doesn't exist in German or English (I think it exists in Thai but I don't speak it hehe). I would have been on the safer side saying Pae. Then the only thing you have to keep in mind is not to make it aspired. But an English B is just too voiced for 배, hence it is heard as 빼 even if that is also pronounced differently from the English B.
(Come to think of it the "English" version of 빼빼로 is Pepero )

When we take 가방 if I was to transcribe it I would write Kabang. Not Gabang, Gapang or Kapang.
As for when to use ㄱ ㅂ ㅈ ㄷ or ㅋ ㅍ ㅊ ㅌ as I said either distinguish the sound of it or do it as I do... most words that start with something that to me sounds like K P CH T are actually written with ㄱ ㅂ ㅈ ㄷ and the usage of ㅋ ㅍ ㅊ ㅌ is in comparison rather rare. I memorize those.
As a rule of thumb I think one can say that English words always start with ㅋ ㅍ ㅊ ㅌ instead of ㄱ ㅂ ㅈ ㄷ ?

Also if I hear a K P CH T sound within the word (not at the beginning of a word) I'm pretty sure it must be ㅋ ㅍ ㅊ ㅌ, e.g.
도착하다 [dochakhada]
경찰 [kyeongchal]
카페 [kha-pe](also an English word!! hence it starts with ㅋ)
이틀[iteul]
지키다 [chikida]
Alternatively they could be (ㄱ ㅂ ㅈ ㄷ) + ㅎ
솔직히 [soljikhi]

(hm... maybe the trick to memorize this one is to think of 열심히)

So of course you are right, holdfast!
I just know quite a few people that pronounce every ㄱ ㅂ ㅈ ㄷ as G B J D and it sounds really really unnatural. I think it's a common mistake that seldomly gets corrected by Korean teachers.
The letters get introduced as ㄱ ㅂ ㅈ ㄷ G B J D and ㅋ ㅍ ㅊ ㅌ K P CH T and students just stick to it

[holdfast]

ah, yes. i think i understand your explanation now

i guess this just proves that you can't learn korean from any other language - you absolutely must learn to read and pronounce the korean sounds without relying on what it would sound like in another language (especially korean, with so many different ways of romanizing things). of course we all have to start somewhere - i started out thinking about how something would sound spelled in english too - but if you really want to sound natural, you have to listen a lot and be able to hear what korean sounds like, period. i guess it's the same for any language though - for example, my friends who can barely speak english pronounce every english word like it would be written in korean because they haven't yet been able to distinguish english sounds without relying on korean. this is especially true if you want people to understand what you are saying - i personally think that my pronunciation is not too shabby, but people still ask me to repeat myself a lot. i can only hope that the more i speak and listen, the better my pronunciation and ability to distinguish sounds will be.



so, all that being said (i talk a lot, sorry), my response to kissthequizzer's initial question is this: just like in english, you need to memorize how words are spelled. distinguishing between ㅂ ㅃ ㅍ is very hard just by listening, especially at first. the honest truth is that ㅂ sounds like ㅂ and not like anything else (not like an english b OR p, or any other sound from another language). this probably sounds like a cop out answer, but the more you listen to korean (especially if you know how the words you are hearing are spelled), the better you will be able to distinguish the sounds.

[kyuree]

ㅋㅋㅋ
very wise answer

it's the same with syntax. we must stop "translating" sentences from our language to the language we learn - we must learn to think in the language we learn!!
It's hard but it's the only way we will sound natural.

My pronounciation is also rather good but I rely on hearing and copying, I'm not trying to stick w/ spelling and logic haha (cos the logic of Korean often defies me...) .
In Korean school they had some kind of grade for pronounciation, mine said: "As good as you can get not being a native speaker" does that mean I shouldn't make an effort to improve b/c it's impossible anyways? *lol*

I think listening carefully is a good way to improve one's pronounciation. Another one is native speaker's always criticizing you

Actually that reminds me of my beginner's Arabic class, my teacher was Moroccon, he explained how to pronounce the letters and vowels. I just pronounced it how I heard it but the others tried to stick to his explanation and got confused b/c he was sometimes contradicting himself in his explanations. When they asked him about it he didn't see what the problem was.
Sometimes native speakers can't even explain it to you!! So just copy them
(the problem is that in Arabic some vowels aren't as static as in other languages. a/e, o/u are practically the same. So when our teacher explained that the vowel was "ah" but pronounced it as "eh" he didn't see why he was contradicting himself ㅋㅋㅋ)