Sentence Structure

The most basic thing about grammar of any language is sentence structures. Sentence structures are like Subject + Verb + Object. ‘I like girls’, ‘you like boys’, blah blah blah. However, it can be really boring even though it’s not so hard. But I promise, Korean language, it would be super duper different and interesting no matter what you’ve known. By the way, I’m JUN from KOREAN JUN, REMEMBER ME. REMEMBER YOUR TEACHER’S NAME.

Guess The Correct One

Why don’t we make it more interesting? Let’s play a guessing game for fun and warming up your brain. I’m going to make 3 sentences with the same words. Guess which sentence order is correct for ‘I eat fruits’ in Korean language.

So, which sentence did you choose? A? B? or C?

Answer

In the Korean language, All 3 sentences you just saw exactly mean ‘I eat fruit’ and native Koreans can always find which word is the subject no matter where they are placed. But how is it possible? Are Koreans some master of guessing games? 😂 Of course, no. Then, how do they find each language component?

Korean Sentence Structure

Let’s imagine something like this. These words are actually people and they use a name tag so other people can see who is who. So, my name is Jun and I’m your teacher and my name tag says ‘Teacher : Jun’.

Probably you would be able to find me at a party at first sight as long as I use the name tag. No matter where I’m sitting or where I’m dancing. You just need to find the person with the right name tag. The Korean language uses the same way for sentence components.

저는 과일을 먹어요
[jeo-neun gwail-eul meogeoyo]
I eat fruit

Korean language uses some sort of name tags that mark which word is a subject or an object of a sentence. And you just need to find the name tag. In the example sentence, 는 and 을 are those name tags. 는 is the name tag for the subject and 을 is the name tag for the object. So, even if I mixed up the words, you only need to find 는 and 을.

The Real Korean Language

That’s how the Korean language really works. For Koreans, stuff like S + V + O or S + V + iO + dO aren’t very important. Even when I talk to my friends, I often ignore the order of sentence structures. It’s really common and natural especially when you have casual conversations in Korean language. For example, I often add ‘I’ at the end.

그게 싫어요 저는
Don’t like it, I.

Many students probably learned the Korean sentence structure like S + O + V. I’m not saying they are taught wrong or they are doing bad. That’s great and also what you have to learn. However, if you didn’t know that you can ignore the sentence structure, it would be really confusing to understand the Korean language often. Also, you can’t mess up Korean sentence structure because you are free from it.

Remember, this is how the Korean language really works. Not by putting a word in a particular position or in an order but by using some special words to tell which is the subject or the object.

Korean Language And Yours

Just like this, almost everything will be different between Korean language and your language. It makes learning very difficult but also very interesting. And with me, it won’t be so hard! By the way, don’t you want to know how the Korean language can be so free from structure? I’ll explain everything in the next tutorial, let’s go! Was this tutorial helpful? Why don’t you join me on Patreon?