Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Woland]

Sigh. I am the actual expert here. I do know more about this than practically anyone else here. But, what the hell, it's an internet board. Every opinion is equal.

The Korean 'r' allophone is a flap, not a trill. This is a fact. Korean phoneticians report this. I'll check with one today just to be sure.

The English /r/ (a phoneme) is called a retroflex, produced by curling the tip of the tongue backwards towards the hard palate without touching it. There is an allophonic variation when /r/ follows mid central vowels (as in the word 'word') when the backwards curl of the tongue is less pronounced.

Retroflexes and flaps are distinct from each other.

All clear now?

[Zoidberg]

I don't know why you're bothering. I would have posted more or less the same stuff but decided there's no point as it seems most here prefer a confusing non-technical description or to think of Korean sounds in terms of their own language.

The fact is that there are no sounds in Korean that are the same as any in English, with the exception of ㅁ, ㅇ, and maybe the semi-vowels. Some, like the aspirated consonants, are similar, but most are pronounced very different from the English sounds used in romanisation... (the reason romanisation is loser's way to learn).

Woland's description is the best and most accurate here. Just because sometimes ㄹ is romanised as "r" doesn't mean it is an "r", which is vague anyway, since in different places "r" is different. ㄹ is certaintly not a French uvular fricative is it?

But, since non-technical descriptions are the Dave's way, I'll have a go. When between vowels, ㄹ is like a Japanese "r", before consonants or the end of a word, it's a clear "l", like in French I guess. When before or after a ㄴ, the ㄴ assimilates to ㄹ and you get a long version of "l". At the beginning of a word it generally doesn't exist (in speech) except in rare cases, or in loan words, or if you are a North Korean.

(Woland's description is still better)

[NAVFC]

you guys are making this more complex then it has to be.. way more.
In between to vowels it sounds like a R, with a bit of a roll, not as much as spanish though,. not nearly.
at the beginning of foreign words it also sounds like a R, see "Radio"
other times it sounds like and L, though not as strong as a english L.

[Mashimaro]

glad to see this thread has panned out just like every other korean language thread on daves.

The correct answer is posted relatively early in the thread.
Then inevitably follows a whole bunch of posts confusing the issue, debating the correctness of the original explanations etc. etc. In the end your left with a confusing mess, and any beginning learners heads are spinning.