Why learn Korean? 

The “Korean Wave” has continued to inspire people to learn the Korean language! Korean food, K-pop, and South Korean dramas have been inspiring people around the world to learn Korean in order to enjoy Korean culture. Roughly 80 million people across the world speak Korean, and that number is increasing every day! 

Is it difficult to learn Korean? 

Korean grammar is similar to Japanese, which means sentences are backwards for English speakers, with the verb at the end of the sentence. This can be a big challenge to get used to! But there is hope - unlike Japanese and Chinese, Korean is written phonetically with an alphabet! The Korean alphabet is called Hangul, and it is unique among East Asian writing systems for its ease of use. It only takes about a day to learn the basics of the alphabet, and then you can start reading and writing right away. 

Fun facts about Korean:

• Korean uses honorifics in every level of the language, so the words that are used will change depending on the relationship between speaker and listener. 

• Korean has two different number systems, one set of numbers is used for hours and counting and the other is used for minutes and math! 

• King Sejong developed the Korean alphabet, Hangul, in the mid-15th century. Before that, Korean was written with  Chinese characters! Some popular characters are still used today. This change led to Korea having one of the highest literacy rates in the world.