Korean Job Discussion Forums

[ABC KID]

I am open-minded on this one...

Is it possible to reach a 'significant level' of Korean ability without actually studying (or at least only tiny bits here and there) perhaps by fully engaging with Korean people, frequently watching Korean TV, listening to the radio and other means of exposing yourself to the language?
Let's define 'significant level' as advanced or beginning to close in on fluency.

Maybe you can study intensely for a while until you have a solid foundation in the language and then just acquire the rest...

I am not convinced because I studied for a long time to reach quite a good level although I am still not where I would like to be ideally. However, you frequently hear stories of people who pick up languages in next to no time although Korean is surely more difficult than most languages.

So what do you think? Is study the only way or not?

[Gibberish]

Yes, but you'll have to essentially surround yourself with Korean all the time. No English (outside of your job), only watch Korean TV, speak Korean to people, browse the internet in Korean, etc. Total immersion. Most people do what you say and study a bit and then acquire the rest first hand.

Korean isn't THAT difficult to learn, as long as you're open to new ways of speaking (formal, informal) and you're not scared of trying to actually get the pronunciations right.

I swear, most people just don't even try to pronounce anything correctly, it's not that hard, hell, it's easy. Just repeat the sound you hear. Some people are just so thick-skulled it makes me frustrated that they can't say a single word without making it into some kind of god-awful Konglish.

[proustme]

People learn in different ways. Mimicry and memorization, to name two. Some people are naturally better at picking up language. Of course, it requires more than a bit of studying. A lot, actually.

[Goku]

I think what happens is that you are bombarded with tons of Korean words, and certain ones stick.

For example, I remembered da kong (peanut) after like 2 times of hearing it, but the other word dizzy... umm... crap i forgot... I've heard repeated like 20 times but I still can't remember it.

I think what happens is you selectively pick up certain words and the syntax. You can learn it, but theres a lot a lot of immersion that goes into it. I think it's better than actually studying it. Because if you study it, it's kind of like reading a book to fix a car. Whereas you actually go fix a car, you're putting it to use.

[fermentation]

I personally think that's the best way to learn a language. One my friends in HS was from Eastern Europe. Dude couldn't speak a lick of English his first year and there was nobody else around from that part of the world. He had to learn English to survive, and within a year I was having full blown conversations with him. Same thing happened to a Korean girl I knew in the states. She asked me not to speak Korean with her and immersed herself in American society. After a year she was close to fluent.

[PeteJB]

Words and basic grammar are easy to learn that way, but that is about all you can learn. You'd need about 20 years to learn an Ural-Altaic language that way, unless you are blessed with a special kind of brain capable of processing and storing information faster than 99.9% of the general population. Anyone who says they learned a language in a year clearly put in the study time. While it is entirely possible to learn a language by yourself through intensive study, you cannot learn one (to any near fluent level) by simply listening to it.

[Bryan]

http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/

Learned Japanese to fluency, in Ohio in 18 months, without taking a class or studying any grammar, by exposing himself to Japanese 24 hours per day. Including in his sleep.

Lots of success stories have been posted on the site and they are not all to do with Japanese.

[tomato]

The only Korean-proficient English-speaking foreigners I have met are Mormons.
Unlike us, they have a job speaking Korean instead of English.
Moreover, they are forbidden to speak English even to each other.

Whereas the Mormons become proficient in Korean within 2-year term,
I have been here for 10 years
and I'm not where I thought I would be by this time.
These have been my good habits:

▶ staying away from other foreigners
▶ staying away from Koreans who want to speak English to me
▶ enrolling in Japanese classes for Koreans
▶ enrolling in sign language classes for Koreans
▶ enrolling in music classes for Koreans
▶ reading easy children's books in Korean
▶ having fun with my students between classes

These have been my bad habits:

▶ pursuing other interests
▶ reading books in English
▶ shying away from Korean adults whom I don't know for fear that they would speak English to me
▶ wasting time on this stupid forum

Pete JB, thank you for the 20-year time frame.
That gives me hope that I'm halfway there.

[Gibberish]

[Tundra_Creature]

I personally can't, but my sister is the type who probably could. That's how she learned two of her four languages.

[nosmallplans]

my conversational korean has improved ten fold without study. that said i attend family dinners with two different uncles and their families about 4 nights a week and neither family speaks any english.

[I'm no Picasso]

Maybe you can, but I can't.

Currently meeting with a fella who's railing against using any actual materials to study English and wants to learn via conversation alone. Maybe he'll do alright with it. I'm using the time to put to practice what I learn in class, so it doesn't fall right out of my head.

For me, I need to have the reasons explained to me. There were so many things I knew how to say (technically) before I started my classes, but my brain has a hard time picking up on the same structure used with different vocabulary, unless I understand the grammar rule. Every class I sit through "turns on" another phrase or structure for me, and suddenly I can hear it and understand it everywhere.

But that's just me.

[jvalmer]

[samd]

I've had a chat to a few mormons and they all admit to being far from fluent.

As for the AJATT guy, he studied hard, just not the conventional way.

I think it's possible to learn with zero study, but not efficient, or practical.

I remember the students who arrived at school from foreign countries with no English and no-one to speak their native language with, and it took them years to start making sense. These are kids who are forced to study all day in English, get extra ESL classes, and do all of their socialising in English. Of course, most of them went on to achieve native speaker level fluency, but that's after years and years.

I spent countless hours when I first arrived here listening to Korean being spoken around me, to me, on TV etc. and I doubt it was of any benefit at all. The input level was simply too high.

[redaxe]

You have to want it. And I mean really want it.

I got completely fluent in Mandarin in 2 years (one in college in the US, one living abroad in China) because I studied Mandarin like my life depended on it. I wanted to speak Chinese more than anything in the world. I was obsessed. Now, Chinese people tell me that if they couldn't see my face, they would honestly think I was Chinese.

Now I've been half-assedly studying Korean in my free time for about three years now, half of that living in Korea, and my Korean is very good for a white guy but still nowhere near my Chinese. I can't motivate myself to take a class and a private tutor doesn't seem worth the money. I just don't want it bad enough.