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11 Comments on "Hangul for Indonesians"

1. 

   3gyupsal
   07/08/2009 at 12:08 am Permalink

   Suck it Jon Huer.

   http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2009/08/272_48728.html

2. 

   samedi
   07/08/2009 at 8:43 am Permalink

   Seoul Village posted a write-up on the subject back on Wednesday with some additional background information. Worth checking out for those following the story.

   http://seoulvillage.blogspot.com/2009/08/hangeul-lands-in-bau-bau-indonesia-to.html

3. 

   Fan Death Avenger
   07/08/2009 at 11:49 am Permalink

   From Samedi’s link: “In Indonesia, ethnic minority communities are losing their own spoken languages. We realized that the Korean alphabet could actually help preserve these endangered local languages.”

   So, it is used to preserve the written language. Great. How exactly does that help when it is the SPOKEN LANGUAGE that communities are losing?

4. 

   Jaim
   07/08/2009 at 2:24 pm Permalink

   It’s nice to know that Koreans consider Huer to be as much of a buffoon as foreigners like me do.

5. 

   Gomushin Girl
   07/08/2009 at 5:27 pm Permalink

   The ability to write down and record does in fact help languages ~ written communication makes it easier for communities to spread while still maintaining linguistic ties, helps preserve language in the face of fewer speakers, and provides a small amount of prestige. Think of latin ~ a supposedly “dead” language, without speakers, but one that does have academic communities and people who read and perpetuate the language. For a culture in danger of losing their language altogether, a written form that you can return to, even if speaking dwindles, is a valuable record.

6. 

   Stranger
   08/08/2009 at 12:13 pm Permalink

   I wonder how much money they gave to these guys to adopt Hangul.

7. 

   samedi
   08/08/2009 at 9:18 pm Permalink

   There’s not really any reason why someone would need to give them money to adopt Hangul. In the context of majority-minority interaction it’s usually easier to maintain a sense of distance and separation through easily-identifiable characteristics — clothing, accessories, or which language one uses / writes in. (Just think of fancy nose plugs, neck braces, wearing a cross, never shaving or cutting one’s hair, Welsh or Quebecois French vis-a-vis English on public signs or the decision to use Latin or Arabic scripts over Cyrillic in the Central Asian Republics of the former USSR.)

   Bahasa Indonesia is written with the Latin alphabet, so using a different alphabet is one way to help create this distinction in Bau Bau. From all the scripts they could have chosen from, Hangul may have offered the closest approximation to the sounds used in the local language. Even if that isn’t necessarily the case, English is a pretty “loose” language when it comes to pronunciation – see “fish” vs. “ghoti” for an example – while Korean is not. Knock it all you want for being called scientific, but the Korean alphabet is pretty straightforward when it comes to learning how to pronounce the letters correctly. Depending on dialect, the words Paul, doll, awl, caught, father, hawk, chalk, and wrought are all pronounced with the same initial vowel sound. (/ɒ/ and /ɔː/). There is not, however, a rule on when to use one over another. In Korean, however, 아 is 아 with no funny exceptions. (I will concede that ㄷ, ㅌ, ㅅ, ㅈ, and ㅊ may be a problem …)

   So really, you have a group of people who chose to use an alphabet that allows distance from the majority population, consistent spelling and pronunciation rules that make learning it relatively quick, and who may receive aid in publishing dictionaries and other literary works. Seems like a few good reasons to adopt Hangul without the need for bribery, wouldn’t you say?

   Unless you actually have some proof that bribery was involved. In which case, I’d love to see the evidence to back up your claim, Stranger ….

8. 

   Fan Death Avenger
   09/08/2009 at 2:05 am Permalink

   “The ability to write down and record does in fact help languages”

   Only if the written system adopted represents the spoken language well. We don’t know how accurately hangeul represents the spoken tribal language in question. (eg. If English were to adopt hangeul as it’s new alphabet, learners of English would no longer sound like they are speaking it properly)

9. 

   Roboseyo
   09/08/2009 at 2:11 am Permalink

   If they chose it, I imagine the shoe fits.

   Other languages use the roman characters to represent different sounds: “V” has a different sound in spanish than it does in English, V and W have different sounds in German than they do in English, and so forth; I imagine Indonesians are smart enough to reassign any sounds that don’t fit, or even invent new symbols for sounds not included in Hangeul (which I’ve always thought Korean should do, too, so that they can at least get a little closer on some of the loan-words).

10. 

    samedi
    09/08/2009 at 8:36 am Permalink

    Roboseyo brings up a very good point. The capital of Austria is “Vienna” in English but “Wien” in German — and both use the Latin alphabet. [*] One of my favorite examples is actually the Cyrillic alphabet, as you can often tell which language you’re looking at based on the appearance (or non-appearance) of certain letters. Looking at the table from the provided link, only the blue-shaded letters are used in Russian – the language most people think of in association with Cyrillic – but the other inclusions illustrate how speakers of other languages have added to the growth of the alphabet.

    Also, Roboseyo, are you familiar with the obsolete jamo? Hangul used to have letters to represent sounds similar to the English [ f ], [ v ], [ β ], and [ x ] (among others) when the Chinese syllabary was a part of one’s normal studies, but these gradually fell out of use. I would love to see these added back to normal circulation for loan words.

    [*] For my final example, take a look at Vientiane, the capital of Laos. English borrowed the French pronunciation of the city’s name, but since the French language doesn’t have a hard “ch” sound a “t” was substituted in its place. A more accurate (English) transliteration would have been “Wiangchan” — which has only a passing resemblance to the French equivalent. And this is involving another two languages that use the Latin alphabet … noticeably in slightly different ways.

11. 

    Sonagi
    10/08/2009 at 12:16 pm Permalink

    As Roboseyo has clarified, a number of European and non-European languages use variations of the Latin alphabet, well-suited to languages with few vowel sounds like Spanish or Italian but not so well-suited to languages with many vowel sounds like English. Korean has more than twice as many vowels but fewer consonants and at present, Korean cannot accurately accomodate consonant blends.

    There is no evidence of bribery, but there is plenty of evidence that Korea’s National Institute of Language actively courted the local tribe by giving them an expenses-paid visit to Seoul to learn Hangeul and by establishing a local language center. Indonesia ranks near the bottom in international surveys on corruption, so it would not surprise me if local officials asked for ‘help’ in making a decision. Hangeul is an easy alphabet to learn, and there’s no harm in Koreans providing resources to help an Indonesian tribe use it to create a way to write their local language.

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