From: hjkim@sol.UVic.CA (Hyong-Joong Kim)
Subject: Re: Super-set system
Followup-To: soc.culture.korean	
Summary: vowels and distribution
Keywords: Korea, writing system
Organization: University of Victoria, Victoria, B.C. CANADA
Date: Fri, 10 Apr 92 18:22:11 GMT
Expires: 10 Avril	

In article <1992Apr10.153845.11222@sunb10.cs.uiuc.edu> ywlee@sunc6.cs.uiuc.edu (Youngwhan Lee) writes:
>
>OK. Just one more contribution to this thread....
>
Good. just some correction for your info.
>
>>languages existed live and well before any kind of writing system came
>
>Say, a writing system is not perfect at the beginning and include 
>incomplete set of characters including vowels and consonants for the 
>language. Some characters should be created later and imployed [sic] in the the
>writing system. But some characters would not newly created. Instead,
>
>IMHO, there are a couple of examples of Hangul affecting Korean language.
>(Warining: followings are my personal opinion with NO scientific 
>evidence.) ----  i'm warned. 
>
>For example, the vowels are pretty long in Korean. This as I stated 
 What do you mean by this?   The phonetic value is long, or the inventory
is large.  Curious ..
>Korean to perceive vowels such as "_" (eu) or "|" (e) for the consonant
>only syllables in language. This must have resulted we Koreans have
>a habit trying to pronounce the vowles distinctively. The caused
>the phenomena of having long vowels in Korean language.
>
Yup, the fundamental ideas behind the Korean vowel system can be put:
there are three elements which will be put together in order to express
the actual vocoid sounds.  One  is "." (heaven, sky), the second is "-"
(earth, or horizon), and the third is "|" (human-being).  The phonetic
value of "." is lost except in Cheju island dialect.  With these three
you are supposed to write a vowel.  For instance, if "." comes before
"|", then you will have "-|" which is similar to schwa in English (e.g. 
the second e in `letter').  If "." comes after "|", then you'll have
"|-" [a].  The former is known to be a dark vowel (YING); while the 
latter is known to be a light vowel (YANG).  So on so forth..
Well, the vowel length is being lost.  I remember my granny did not like
the sloppy vowels performed amongst youngsters.
>For a second example, we Koreans have difficult time to distinguish
>'r' and 'l.' According to a record, King Se-Jong knew we Koreans 
>use 'r' and 'l' in different occasion. But he mistakenly decided
>to use one character for the two different sounds. As a result,
>Koreans don't really distingish 'r' and 'l.' 
>
hmm.. As I wrote about a month ago, Korean speakers do not have to    
distinguish the difference btw [r] and [l].  Because they are not
phonemes but allophones.  E.g., /loin/ `old man' [loin] (N. Korean spelling,
since they do not apply l-dropping rule word-initially; /noin/ in the
South), /kalam/ `the river (Middle Korean)' [karam], and /tal/ `the moon'
[tal].   If the lateral sound occurs btw vowels, then it is realised
[r].  Elsewhere it is [l].  However, in English you have /raw/ and /law/
in which the difference btw /r/ and /l/ makes two separate words.  If you
are a native speaker of English, then you need a little training to tell
the difference btw k's in /sky/ and /kye/. (skip vs. keep, etc. )
Hence, don't ask Korean speakers to choose right one every time they
have to choose one in English.  They including me need some drill.  
This applies to English speakers who like to learn Korean too.    

>The spelling rules would have been easier, for example, because
>we would've spelled 'dogil' instead of 'dok-il' in spelling Germany.
>
According to the principles above, /dok-il/ is preferable, isn't it? 
Of course, the actual sound is [dogil] after vocing.
>youngwhan.
>
Hyong-Joong Kim
It is hard to write a good piece of essay in English; i believe so in Korean
too.