Korean Job Discussion Forums

Cohiba · Joined: 01 Feb 2005

Korean people endure 8+ years of mandatory English education.
There are also 30,000 whities here trying to improve their English.
Moreover, they have access to western movies and media.

With this massive, multi-billion won industry, Koreans are still unable
to properly pronounce the letter "F".

It boggles the mind.

seoulsucker · Posted: Wed Mar 22, 2006 6:24 pm Post subject:

From what I gather, they're not trying to say the "F" when they say ȭ��. It's a butchered Konglish/hijacked word...

I feel your pain, though. I still wince everytime I hear it.

Ya-ta Boy · Joined: 16 Jan 2003 Location: Established in 1994

SPINOZA · Joined: 10 Jun 2005 Location: $eoul

billybrobby · Joined: 09 Dec 2004

do you consider it pretentious when english speakers pronounce words like rendezvous with a big french accent?

laogaiguk · Joined: 06 Dec 2005 Location: somewhere in Korea

Mashimaro · Joined: 31 Jan 2003 Location: location, location

I've spent a couple of thousand hours studying korean and I still have trouble pronouncing certain sounds correctly. Does that make me stupid?

jinju · Joined: 22 Jan 2006

SPINOZA · Joined: 10 Jun 2005 Location: $eoul

Cheer up, fellas, it's not that bad. I thought it was quite a funny and not unreasonable observation. Two of my coteachers' pronunciation is excellent but they're the exception (in my humble opinion) and have lived in Canada for a year. For many Koreans, adults and kids I find, they still pronounce 'f' as 'epp-ugh', age as 'age-ee' etc etc.

I_Am_Wrong · Joined: 14 Sep 2004 Location: whatever

Well, if you weren't so ignorant and lazy, maybe you could study some Korea. By doing this, you would discover that there is no F in Korean! When people say "hwaiting," they are say a konglish version of an English word.

Oh and, by the way, mandatory English Education starting in Elementary School is extremely recent. It's only been in the last 2-3 years that they didn't start studying English in the public school classroom in Middle School. Also, ask any Korean over 30 about what their class sizes were like and what English teaching methods were like. Maybe you should learn a little bit about the country you're in Jackass.

From now on I expect you to pronounce all words imported into English with their correct pronunciation. Let's see...over 10,000 words in English were adopted from French. Maybe you should learn to pronounce them correctly mofo

JAWINSEOUL · Joined: 19 Nov 2005

All teachers should learn Korean. It will give them a better, less ignorant, view on phonics.

itaewonguy · Joined: 25 Mar 2003

HapKi · Joined: 10 Dec 2004 Location: TALL BUILDING-SEOUL

The rants on phonics are well taken. However, even if Koreans pronounced it perfectly (with the hard "f" and a soft, blended "t") the word appropriateness is still what bothers me more. And I can't believe no one has mentioned it yet. "Fighting?" Come on. Koreans have a word for "to fight"- �ο��- and no Koreans I've ever talked to knew that what they were yelling was the equivalent to "lets stop this game and start throwing punches."
When foreign opposing teams see that written 20 meters long in the bleachers, who knows what they're thinking?

Hater Depot · Joined: 29 Mar 2005

Many Koreans don't know that ȭ�� comes from an English word. My students just learned today that ��Ÿ�� comes from English.

peemil · Joined: 09 Feb 2003 Location: Koowoompa