Learning a foreign language is always a challenge, but learning Korean is especially hard for a number of reasons. Having lived in Korea for nearly five years, I have struggled to learn the Korean language. Let me share some of my experiences with you in the hope that it may help you in your learning process as well.

You must be very assertive if you intend to improve your speaking skills. Even if you choose to study abroad, there is no guarantee that your language ability will improve. One must take the initiative to practice speaking as often as possible.

When I first came to Korea, I was very eager to learn Korean, so I studied very hard. I attended Korean classes and hired a tutor. I made flash cards and read them as I traveled on the subway and bus. I looked up all the words that I didn’t know on signs and advertisements. I was a model student. But as time passed, I lost my original drive to learn.

Why is that? Generally speaking, Koreans are so interested in learning or practicing English that they won’t speak Korean with Westerners. When a Korean sees a Western-looking person, they automatically revert to English. This mindset causes many problems in communication. Oftentimes people don’t understand my Korean, because they assume that I am speaking English. They are expecting me to speak English, so their brain is looking for an English word rather than a Korean one. So when I speak Korean, they become very confused.

Or if a person does not know what to say in English, they will often not speak at all and just use hand gestures. I have no problem with using gestures to communicate, but why not speak Korean as well? Frankly, I think that this is a very rude to gesture at a person without saying a word. That is the way animals are usually communicated to, not humans. Come to think of it, people usually talk to their pets even though they can’t understand them. So when a person makes hand motions to me without uttering a word, I am offended. Even if I don’t understand what one is saying in Korean, there is no benefit to being silent.

And it is impossible to learn a language without listening to it. Listening is the most important thing for learning how to speak a new language. Just like infants learn from mimicking their parents, second language learners learn best by hearing other people speak the language and copying what they say. If this step is missing, then the learning curve becomes a lot more difficult.

Another thing that makes communication with foreigners difficult is that Koreans are not used to hearing non-standard Korean pronunciation. Of course, in a country like the United States, we are very accustomed to non-native speakers of English. This is due to our national history of immigration. But in Korea, there have been very few Westerners who have immigrated to the country. Nowadays, there are a good number of Chinese and Filipino immigrants who are bringing much needed diversity to the country, but there are still very few Westerners in Korea. Because of this, Koreans are not used to hearing non-standard pronunciations of Korean. So the pronunciation seems exceedingly precise to foreign learners of Korean, and this causes an enormous amount of frustration.

Just last week, I experienced this when I stopped at the gas station to fill up. Speaking in Korean, I asked for premium unleaded, but the lady working there could not understand what I wanted. Since I thought that I was pronouncing it perfectly, I became agitated, and the lady gave up and sent another man to take my order. I thought that this was absurd, because there were only three choices at the fuel pump: unleaded, premium, and diesel. And they all sound very different from one another in Korean. Perhaps if she had considered the options, then she would have been able to decipher my poor pronunciation.

For this reason, pronunciation is often the most important thing that you can study. It may even be more important for speaking than having a large vocabulary, and oftentimes it is overlooked by both teachers and students as something secondary. But since it is a basic part of conversation, it should not be neglected.

There is another thing that can prevent one from learning a language while living abroad. This happens when the city that you visit has many people from your country. If this is the case, you will find that you naturally gravitate towards people of the same cultural background. For me, as I live in Itaewon, it is all too easy for me to have exclusively foreign friends. So I have to take the initiative to make Korean friends and talk to them as much as I can. Otherwise my Korean will never improve.

These are some of the challenges that exist for an American to learn Korean. For those of you who studied or plan to study in a foreign country, I hope this was helpful for your understanding. Good luck and hope to talk to you soon (maybe in Korean).

Jonathan Foster(Professor, Dept. of General Education)

j.foster@hanmail.net