Posts written by Transparent Language

YouShoe: Submit Your Videos in Korean

Posted by Transparent Language No Comments
Jul 8 2010

We’ve recently discovered that many fans of Korean are also big fans of shoes. This may seem a bit weird to some, but Koreans exhibit great pride in what they wear and how they touch the earth. When entering a Korean home it is common practice to remove your shoes. If you neglect to do so, this is a sign of disrespect because many Koreans maintain a special relationship with their floor (on which they sit and often sleep, so a dirty floor is intolerable in a Korean home).

We’re curious to see what makes our avid fans of Korean language and culture such big die hard shoe fans. So, as promised, Transparent Language is holding its second YouTube video contest.

Our last contest asked you to submit a video on an exotic Korean custom, in which Rafiqah was the winner. This time we’re taking it a step further.

Tell us: What is your favorite pair? How many shoes do you own? Are there Korean varieties or exotic customs that others should know about? What is it that you love about shoes?

If you are a native Korean speaker, you can speak so that other people can practice listening to you. If Korean is not your native tongue, don’t sweat it. This might be a good time to practice speaking!

The winning video will be put on our YouTube channel, TransparentKorean. It will also be posted on this blog, Tweeted from our Korean Twitter account, and published for our 31,000+ Korean fans on Facebook to admire.

File:Korean traditional shoes-01.jpg

As an added bonus, you’ll also get a great Byki Deluxe language software kit from Transparent Language for free if your video is selected.

Every minute, 24 hours of video content is uploaded to YouTube, and about 75% of that comes from outside of the United States! So clearly it’s easier than ever to make videos and upload them. Show us what you got, Korean fans!

SUBMIT YOUR VIDEO HERE

Submission deadline is Friday, July 16, 2010.

Our YouTube Winner: Rafiqahsari (Gyeongbok Palace)

Posted by Transparent Language 3 Comments
May 25 2010

First off, we’d like to thank all of you who submitted videos regarding exotic Korean customs. We really enjoyed reading all of your insightful comments on our Facebook page. The cultural practices you all mentioned — from the Korean BBQ to eccentric bridal piggybacks — were very enlightening.

Without further adieu, our video winner is (drum roll, please): Rafiqahsari.

YouTube Preview Image

The reason we chose this short clip was far from arbitrary. One of five palaces built in 1395 during the Joseon Dynasty, the Gyeongbok Palace was and remains the main palace of Korea. In English, Gyeongbok Palace means the “Palace of Shining Happiness.” Located in northern Seoul in South Korea, the palace has a dense history of destruction and reconstruction. It was once comprised of approximately 300 of buildings. After the Japanese invasion of 1592 the palace was left in ruins for over 200 years before being rebuilt in 1865. The palace faced attacks from the Japanese again in 1910 after which only a few buildings remain.

The Gyeongbok Palace still features about a dozen buildings. Notably, there is a large gate (Kwangha-mun) protecting the palace from Seoul, and a lone-standing chimney that was once part of the Queen’s living Quarters (Chagyong-jon) which is adjacent to the courtyard. The palace also contains Korea’s largest wooden structure — Keunjeong – jeon which serves as a throne room and is considered a national treasure. Not surprisingly, the palace attracts a massive amount of tourism.

Photo: Dance ritual

Young women perform a dance ritual. Photograph by Heimo Aga.

Gyeongbok Palace certainly stands out as a Korean gem for historical reasons, but as this video implies, Koreans pay homage to their past every day. Thus, the poignancy of such a submission can be striking no matter what the sound quality or pedagogical stance.

To reward Rafiqahsari’s efforts, we are featuring this video on our new YouTube Facebook tab and will be tweeting it to the world on our Korean Twitter account. Besides these perks and the fact that this blog will be in the inboxes of hundreds of people, Rafiqahsari will also receive a free Byki Deluxe, which supports over 70 languages and allows you to hear native speaker audio with accompanying photos. Of $70 value, it also allows you to create your own lists for perfect recall, play games with your lists, and eventually upload your vocabulary to List Central for the rest of the world. Congratulations, Rafiqahsari!

We plan on holding more video submission prompts soon. What would YOU like view?

Help Us Help You

Posted by Transparent Language No Comments
May 18 2010

YouTube home

Citizen reporters are now all the rage for big organizations. Companies such as The New York Times and ABC News are now using YouTube Direct as a way to get feedback from readers.

We at Transparent Language thought we’d do something a little more educational in order to serve you: by getting your video feedback we will educate others about Korean language and culture.

As mentioned on Facebook, we’d like to know what you think is the most exotic or interesting Korean custom (and why). The deadline is FRIDAY MAY 21.

The video need only be a short length. It can be as simple as you talking in front of your computer, maybe about something you saw while living in Korea, an interesting fact you heard about that maybe nobody else knows, or perhaps it could even be an interesting anecdote that you’ve been dying to get off your chest and share with the world.

Bottom line: share what you know and that can not only help others learn about Korean language and culture, but make you a Korean super celebrity.

It takes a minute to make a video and even less time to upload. We’re loving your responses about Korean customs thus far, so keep them coming! Yours could appear on our blog, website, and social media accounts in front of tens of thousands of people!

Korean Pronunciation for English Words

Posted by Transparent Language 24 Comments
May 22 2008

french fries fry potato fast foodI’ll have fries with that! “French fries 주세요 juseyo,” I said to the cashier at 버거 킹 beogeo king. Her only response was a confused look. I repeated myself. She tried to follow my line of vision to locate what I was looking at on the overhead menu. It was written in Korean, so I went ahead and sounded it out with Korean pronunciation: 후렌치후라이 hurenchi hurai. A look of relief as she rang up my order.
I had until then been avoiding saying any words borrowed from English (and there are thousands of them!) with Korean pronunciation because I was afraid I would sound like I was mocking their accent. This French fry experience helped me to realize that Koreans regard such words as Korean, not English. To put this into perspective, Americans pronounce hors d’oeuvres and fondue nothing like the original French, and trying to pronounce it like a Frenchman while speaking English just ends up sounding pretentious. The same is true in Korean for pronouncing loan words from English. Just keep that in mind when ordering a 라지 치즈 피자 raji chijeu pija*!
*large cheese pizza!

Hwaiting: ‘Fighting’

Posted by Transparent Language 13 Comments
May 22 2008

hwaiting korean for fighting and also a cheerFar from a battle cry, 화이팅 hwaiting is a commonly used word of encouragement, as well as a cheer. I’m told it made its way into Korean from its obvious English origin via the Japanese—and hence the unusual pronunciation. Language purists insist that it should be spelled 파이팅 paiting to reflect a closer approximation to the English word fighting. (As I typed 화이팅 above, and again here, the spell check tried to change it to 파이팅!) However, it’s universally pronounced hwaiting and so you will encounter both spellings. Although in use for decades, it’s inclusion into dictionaries has been met with some reluctance, still considered merely slang.
You’ll often hear Koreans try to translate 화이팅 as fighting, understandably, but we can actually translate it a couple of ways, depending on the situation…
At sporting events, the crowd will cheer on their team with 화이팅, sometimes preceded by 아자, 아자! aja aja! just to get pumped up, and in international matches: 대한민국, 회이팅!! daehanmin-guk, hwaiting!! or even 코리아 화이팅!! koria hwaiting!! Go, Korea!!
To wish someone luck before a difficult endeavor, such as before a test, parachuting out of a plane or approaching a woman in a bar! 파이팅! hwaiting! Good luck!

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