Learn how to use the negative copula
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Seol: 안녕하세요. 윤설입니다. |
| Keith: Keith here! That’s a Negative. Now, this whole time we’ve been introducing ourselves and we’ve been answering in the affirmative, I am something. I am something. You know what, I’m not in a good mood today. I’m not feeling it. I want to say, “No, I’m not something.” Because I’m in a bad mood, so you’re in a bad mood, too, right? |
| Seol: Yeah, I think I should be in bad mood like you. |
| Keith: Okay. We are connected. That’s why we’re going to jump into this conversation and say “no, no, no, no, no.” |
| Seol: Okay. |
Lesson conversation |
|---|
| 요한 지현 씨는 변호사입니까? |
| 지현 아니오. 저는 변호사가 아닙니다. 회사원입니다. |
| 요한 그래요? |
| 지현 요한 씨는 가수입니까? |
| 요한 아니오. 저는 가수가 아닙니다. 배우입니다. 지현 씨는 일본 사람입니까? |
| 지현 아니오. 저는 일본 사람이 아닙니다. 한국 사람입니다. |
| Seol: 한 번 더 천천히. |
| 요한 지현 씨는 변호사입니까? |
| 지현 아니오. 저는 변호사가 아닙니다. 회사원입니다. |
| 요한 그래요? |
| 지현 요한 씨는 가수입니까? |
| 요한 아니오. 저는 가수가 아닙니다. 배우입니다. 지현 씨는 일본 사람입니까? |
| 지현 아니오. 저는 일본 사람이 아닙니다. 한국 사람입니다. |
| Seol: 영어로 한 번 더. |
| 요한 지현 씨는 변호사입니까? |
| Keith: Jihyeon, are you a lawyer? |
| 지현 아니오. 저는 변호사가 아닙니다. 회사원입니다. |
| Keith: No. I am not a lawyer. I am an office worker. |
| 요한 그래요? |
| Keith: Oh, is that so? |
| 지현 요한 씨는 가수입니까? |
| Keith: Yohan, are you a singer? |
| 요한 아니오. 저는 가수가 아닙니다. 배우입니다. 지현 씨는 일본 사람입니까? |
| Keith: No. I am not a singer. I am an actor. Jihyeon, are you Japanese? |
| 지현 아니오. 저는 일본 사람이 아닙니다. 한국 사람입니다. |
| Keith: No. I am not Japanese. I am Korean. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Keith: So, what did you think of the lesson? |
| Seol: I think today the script is quite long. |
| Keith: Yes. Yes. I think the writer should have broken this probably into four different lessons but, hey, we’re going to do it! |
| Seol: Yeah, we can do it. |
| Keith: Okay, 화이팅! |
| Seol: 화이팅! |
| Keith: Okay, let’s jump into the vocab. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Seol: 변호사 [natural native speed] |
| Keith: Lawyer |
| Seol: 변호사 [slowly - broken down by syllable]. 변호사 [natural native speed] |
| Keith: Next we have… |
| Seol: 그래요 [natural native speed] |
| Keith: Is that so? / That is so. |
| Seol: 그래요 [slowly - broken down by syllable]. 그래요 [natural native speed]. |
| Keith: Next we have… |
| Seol: 가수 [natural native speed] |
| Keith: Singer. |
| Seol: 가수 [slowly - broken down by syllable]. 가수 [natural native speed]. |
| Keith: And next we have… |
| Seol: 배우 [natural native speed] |
| Keith: Actor, actress. |
| Seol: 배우 [slowly - broken down by syllable]. 배우 [natural native speed]. |
| Keith: Next we have… |
| Seol: 아니다 [natural native speed] |
| Keith: To not be. |
| Seol: 아니다 [slowly - broken down by syllable]. 아니다 [natural native speed]. |
Lesson focus |
| Keith: This is a separate word than 이다. the verb “to be”. They sound very similar, 아니다. and 이다., but they’re two separate words. They’re not conjugations of each other. So 아니다 means “to not be.” Let’s take another look at the conversation. |
| Keith: 지현씨는 변호사입니까? The first part is… |
| Seol: 지현씨. |
| Keith: This is the person’s name, Jiyeon, with the honorific suffix 씨. Right after that is… |
| Seol: 는 |
| Keith: The topic marking particle. After that? |
| Seol: 변호사 |
| Keith: This once again is “lawyer.” Next? |
| Seol: 입니까? |
| Keith: The interrogative form of the copular. Literally, we have “Jiyeon, lawyer are you?” We translate this as “Jiyeon, are you a lawyer?” Next we have… |
| Seol: 아니요. |
| Keith: Here’s one of our key points of today. This is the Korean word for… |
| Seol: No. |
| Keith: And we went over this in one of our lessons, right? |
| Seol: No. 아니요. |
| Keith: Okay. All right, good use. Next we have… |
| Seol: 저는 변호사가 아닙니다. |
| Keith: Okay, the first part of that is… |
| Seol: 저 |
| Keith: “I” followed by… |
| Seol: 는 |
| Keith: The topic marking particle once again. And next is.. |
| Seol: 변호사 |
| Keith: Lawyer. Next is… |
| Seol: 가 |
| Keith: Okay. This is one of our grammar topics of today. For now, just regard this as a subject marking particle. After that, we have… |
| Seol: 아닙니다. |
| Keith: This means “am not.” This is the negative form of the copula. This is the verb expressing “to not be.” Here, Jiyeon said “I am not a lawyer.” Can you give that to us once again? |
| Seol: 아닙니다. |
| Keith: “Am not.” |
| Seol: 아닙니다. 아닙니다. |
| Keith: Just like we can say “I am Keith”, 키스입니다. we can say “I’m not Keith” by adding 아닙니다. That sentence would be 저는 키스 아닙니다. “I am not Keith.” Once again, the affirmative form of the copula is… |
| Seol: 입니다. |
| Keith: And the negative form of the copula is… |
| Seol: 아닙니다. |
| Keith: Okay, let’s hear these two together side by side. |
| Seol: 입니다. |
| Keith: The affirmative. |
| Seol: 아닙니다. |
| Keith: The negative, 입니다 / 아닙니다. “I am”, “I’m not”, “I am”, “I’m not.” Okay. Seol, do you know a hamlet at all? |
| Seol: Yes. |
| Keith: Do you say that in Korean, the 입니다, 아닙니다. “to be” or “not to be”? That is the question. |
| Seol: 아니요. |
| Keith: Okay. Do you know what they say? |
| Seol: 죽느냐 사느냐. |
| Keith: Can you tell us what that means? |
| Seol: Like we infer other meaning of “to be” or “not to be”, so like “do you want to die or live?” So it’s different. Like you cannot get it. |
| Keith: Wow. That’s really depressing. I think the English version better. All right, well, anyway, let’s move on. Next is… |
| Seol: 회사원 |
| Keith: 회사원which, once again, is office worker or salaryman. Right after that is… |
| Seol: 입니다. |
| Keith: Which, once again, is the affirmative form of the copula. So literally we have “salaryman am.” This is interpreted as “I am a salary man.” But the “I” , the subject is dropped because it’s inferred. If you remember from our previous lessons, the subject is drop because you’re inferring that the person is talking about themselves. Let’s move on. Next is… |
| Seol: 그래요? |
| Keith: This is a phrase that says “Oh, is that so?” “Oh, really?” Kind of like that. |
| Seol: Yeah. |
| Keith: So Seol, do you use this a lot? |
| Seol: I use this phrase a lot. A lot. |
| Keith: A lot, okay. Like in what kind of context? |
| Seol: When my friend said that he likes pizza so much, I say 그래요? So it doesn’t have any special meaning. It’s just like “oh, really? Is that so?” |
| Keith: Okay. So is it kind of overused do you think? |
| Seol: Sometimes. |
| Keith: Yeah? |
| Seol: Yeah. Among young people. |
| Keith: Among young people. So a lot of people just say it and they’re not really interested in what you’re saying. |
| Seol: Yeah, without any special meaning. |
| Keith: Okay. So it’s like “I’m a lawyer.” 어, 그래요? |
| Seol: Yeah. |
| Keith: It kind of like, “Oh, yeah, whatever, man.” It kind of like that? |
| Seol: Sometimes. |
| Keith: Okay, sometimes. But this really does carry meaning when you….right? |
| Seol: Yeah. |
| Keith: Okay. So the meaning is, once again, “Oh, is that so? Oh, really?” Okay, next is… |
| Seol: 요한씨는 가수입니까? |
| Keith: Okay, what do we have first? |
| Seol: 요한씨 |
| Keith: This is Yohan with 씨, the honorific suffix. After that is… |
| Seol: 는 |
| Keith: Once again, the topic marking particle. Next? |
| Seol: 가수 |
| Keith:This is “a singer.” Okay, after that is… |
| Seol: 입니까? |
| Keith: Once again, the interrogative form of the copula. Okay, next. |
| Seol: 아니요. 저는 가수가 아닙니다. |
| Keith: First part is… |
| Seol: 아니요. |
| Keith: This means “no.” After that is… |
| Seol: 저 |
| Keith: “I” followed by… |
| Seol: 는 |
| Keith: The topic marking particle… |
| Seol: 가수 |
| Keith: “Singer.” |
| Seol: 가 |
| Keith: Once again, the subject marker. |
| Seol: 아닙니다. |
| Keith: The negative form of the copula. Now, let’s address 가. So here, we have two post-position particles. The first one is… |
| Seol: 는. |
| Keith: 는. This is the topic marking particle. So the topic of the sentence is… |
| Seol: 저. |
| Keith: “I.” So the whole topic is about “I, me.” It’s all about me. The next particle in this sentence is… |
| Seol: 가 |
| Keith: A subject marking particle. In the script, we had 가수가 아닙니다.Here, it’s singer followed by the subject marking particle, 가 and 아닙니다.– to not be. So “singer not be.” So here, we have to explain the subject marking particle. In this context, when we’re using 아닙니다 or 아니다 – to not be – we need 가. And that’s the subject marking particle. And this is because they’re a set – the subject marking particle and 아니다. Whenever you use 아니다, you need the subject marking particle. In this case, it was 가. And the subject marking particle changes according to the word behind it. There’s two subject marking particles, 이 and 가. They do exactly the same thing. They just change according to the word behind it. This is a little tough to explain just by talking, so if you have the PDF, look along with us. Here, it’s 가수가 아닙니다. The last syllable of the word “singer” ends in a vowel. If that last syllable ends in a vowel, you add 가. if the last syllable ends in a consonant, you have to add 이. 저는 일본 사람이 아닙니다. Here, it’s 일본사람이, Japanese person, subject marker. But this subject marker is 이 because 사람 ends in a consonant ㅁ / 사람. In this case, you use 이 as a subject marker. And you use it, once again, because it’s followed by 아닙니다 – to not be. Once again, these are used as a set: subject marker, to not be. And the rest of it is just review. So why don’t we go through it really quickly? |
| Seol: 배우입니다. |
| Keith: “I am an actor.” |
Outro |
| Keith: See you later! |
| Seol: 안녕! |
| Keith: See you! |
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