Nouns: Nouns:

한국 = Korea 사람 = person
도시 = city 책 = book
이름 = name 컴퓨터 = computer
저=I 나무 = tree
나=I 소파 = sofa
남자 = man 중국 = China
여자 = woman 일본 = Japan
그 = that 문 = door
이 = this 의사 = doctor
저 = that (when object is far away)
것 = thing Verbs:
의자 = chair 이다 = to be (acts like an adjective)
탁자 = table
Adverbs and Other Words:
선생님 = teacher
안 = not
침대 = bed
네 = yes
집 = house
아니 = no
차 = car
Greeting Words
When learning a language, people always want to learn “hello,” “how are you,” and
“thank you” before anything else. I know that. However, at this stage you only know
words - and have no knowledge or experience in how to use or conjugate these words.
The grammar within these words is too complex for you to understand right now.
However, you can just memorize these words as one unit and not worry about the
grammar within them at this point.

안녕하세요 = hello

감사합니다 or 감사해요 = thank you

(감사하다 is the infinitive form of this word. It can be conjugated a variety of different
ways [discussed in Lesson 5 and Lesson 6] including ~ㅂ/읍니다 and 아/어요)

잘 지내세요? = How are you

Technically the appropriate expression in Korean, but not as common as "how are you"
in English. I would say that using "잘 지내세요?" is an English style of greeting people
in Korean.

제발 = Please
(no complicated grammar construction)

© HowtoStudyKorean.com – Unit 1 1
It is, of course, important for you to memorize these expressions in in Korean, but you
need to know that there is a reason why they are said that way. For now, don’t worry
about why they are said that way, and simply memorize them. We will get back to them
in later lessons when they become important.

Korean Sentence Structure

One of the hardest things to wrap your head around in Korean is the alien-like sentence
structure. Essentially, Korean sentences are written in the following order:

Subject – Object – Verb (for example: I hamburger eat), Or

Subject – Adjective (for example: I beautiful)

I am going to quickly explain what a “subject” and “object” mean, as your ability to
understand later concepts depends on your understanding of this.
The subject refers to person/thing/noun/whatever that is acting. The subject does the
action of the verb. For example, the subject in each sentence below is underlined:

I went to the park

I will go to the park
My mom loves me
He loves me
The dog ran rast
The clouds cleared up
In English, the subject always comes before the verb.

The object refers to whatever the verb is acting on. For example, the object in each
sentence below is underlined

My mom loves me
The dog bit the mailman
He ate rice
Students studied Korean
In English, the object always comes after the verb. However, a sentence with a verb does
not require an object. For example:

I slept
I ate
He died

Sometimes there is no object because it has simply been omitted from the sentence. For
example, “I ate” or “I ate rice” are both correct sentences. Other verbs, by their nature,
cannot have a subject. For example, you cannot place an object after the verbs “sleep” or
“die.”

© HowtoStudyKorean.com – Unit 1 2
Subjects are also present in sentences with adjectives. However, there is no object in a
sentence with an adjective. The subjects are underlined in the following adjective-
sentences below:

School is boring
I am boring
The movie was funny
The building is big
My girlfriend is pretty
The food is delicious

It is incredibly important that you understand this from the very beginning. Every Korean
sentence MUST end in either a verb (like eat, sleep or walk) or an adjective (like
beautiful, pretty, and delicious). This rule is so important that I’m going to say it again:
Every Korean sentence MUST end in either a verb or adjective.

It is also important to point out here that there are two ways to say "I" or "me" in Korean.
Depending on how polite you need to be speaking, many things within a sentence (mostly
the conjugation) can change. You will learn about the different honorific conjugations
until Lesson 6, so you do not need to worry about understanding those until then.
However, before you reach those lessons, you will see two different words for "I," which
are:

나, used in informal sentences, and

저, used in formal sentences.

As Lessons 1 - 5 make no distinction of formality, you will see both 나 and 저 arbitrarily
used. Don't worry about why one is used over the other until Lesson 6, when politeness
will be explained.

Okay, now that you know all of that, we can talk about making Korean sentences.

Things to indicate parts of speech (particles)

Most words in a Korean sentence have a particle (a fancy word to say ‘something’)
attached to them. These particles indicate the role of each word in a sentence –that is,
which word is the subject or object. Note that there is absolutely no way of translating
these particles to English, as we do not use anything like them.
The following are the most common particles:

는 or 은 (Subject)
This is placed after a word to indicate that it is the subject of a sentence
Use 는 when the last letter of the last syllable of the subject is a vowel. For example::
나 = 나는
저 = 저는

© HowtoStudyKorean.com – Unit 1 3
Use 은 when the last letter of the last syllable of the subject is a consonant. For example:
집 = 집은
책 = 책은

를 or 을
This is placed after a word to indicate that is the object of a sentence.
Use 를 when the last letter of the last syllable is a vowel:
나 = 나를
저 = 저를

Use 을 when the last letter of the last syllable is a consonant:

집 = 집을
책 = 책을

We can now make sentences using the Korean sentence structure and the Korean
particles.

1) I speak Korean = I 는 Korean 을 speak

는 is attached to "I" (the subject)
을 is attached to "Korean" (to object)

2) I like you = I 는 you 를 like

는 is attached to "I" (the subject)
을 is attached to "you" (to object)

3) I wrote a letter = I 는 letter 을 wrote

는 is attached to "I" (the subject)
을 is attached to "letter" (to object)

4) I opened the door = I 는 door 을 opened

는 is attached to “I” (the subject)
을 is attached to “the door” (the object)

5) My mom will make pasta = My mom 은 pasta 를 will make

는 is attached to “my mom” (the subject)
를 is attached to “pasta” (the object)

I am sure that you will be tempted to start substituting Korean words into those
constructions to make real Korean sentences. However, at this point, that is too
complicated. The goal of this lesson is to familiarize yourself with the structure of
Korean sentences.

© HowtoStudyKorean.com – Unit 1 4
The same could be done for sentences with adjectives. However, remember that
sentences with adjectives will not have an object:

1) My girlfriend is pretty: My girlfriend 은 is pretty

은 is attached to "my girlfriend" (the subject)

2) The movie was scary = The movie 는 was scary

는 is attached to "the movie" (the subject)

There is one more particle that you should be aware of before we go any further.

에 (Place or time)
We haven’t talked about places or times yet, but if you do an action at a time, you must
attach the particle “에” to the word indicating the time.
"에" is also attached to a word to indicate that it is a place in the sentence. I want to write
more about what "에" does, but at this point, it would only confuse you. For now, it is
sufficient to know that "에" is used to indicate a place in a sentence.
Again, it is hard to translate these particles into English, but, “에” plays the role of the
underlined words in the following sentences:

1) I went at 3pm
2) I went to the park

Sentences with a place/time can also have an object in them. For example:

3) I ate hamburgers at 3pm

If I were to write those same sentence using Korean structure and particles, they would
look like this:

1) I 는 3pm 에 went
2) I 는 park 에 went
3) I 는 hamburgers 을 3pm 에 ate

In these cases, "at 3pm" or "to the park" act as adverbs (a word that tells you when, where,
how, how much). There is no set place for an adverb within a sentence, and it can
generally be placed anywhere (except the end). Adverbs will be discussed at length in
Lesson 8.

Again, the purpose of this first part of Lesson 1 was to familiarize yourself with the
different Korean particles and sentence structure. This knowledge will act as your base
for upcoming lessons when you will apply yourself to make actual sentences with
verbs/adjectives in Korean. While you will have to wait a little bit to create those types of
sentences, we can now talk about creating actual Korean sentences with the word "to be."

© HowtoStudyKorean.com – Unit 1 5
 To be: 이다
Now it is time to learn how to make actual sentences in Korean using ‘to be.’ English
speakers don’t realize how difficult this word actually is in English. Look at the
following examples:

I am a man
He is a man
They are men
I was a man
They were men

In each of those sentences, the word ‘be’ is represented by a different word

(is/am/are/was/were) depending on the subject and tense of the sentence. Luckily, in
Korean, the same word is used to represent is, am, are, was and were. This word is 이다

The hard part about 이다 is that it is not a verb. It is not an adjective either, but it acts
like one. I always thought that ‘be’ was a verb in English but maybe it is not. I don’t
know because I’m not an English teacher. In any event, 이다 is not verb in Korean… nor
is it an adjective. However, it acts as an adjective.

Why is this important? I don’t want to teach you all about English grammar here, but this
one thing needs to be said: Sentences with adjectives do not have objects in them. Only
sentences with verbs have objects. Let’s look at some examples:

I eat hamburgers (eat is a verb, the object is a hamburger)

I meet my friend (meet is a verb, the object is my friend)
I study Korean (study is a verb, the object is Korean)
I listen to music (listen is a verb, the object is music)

All of those sentences have objects because there is a verb in the sentence. However, if I
were to say sentences with adjectives:

I am pretty
I am beautiful

Notice that there is never an object in a sentence with an adjective (unless you want to
say “I ate a delicious hamburger” – but that will come in a later lesson).

Okay, let’s see if we can do this. Remember, 이다 is an adjective:

I am a man – the Korean structure is:

I 는 man am.

Now use the words provided above for “man,” “I” and “am”

© HowtoStudyKorean.com – Unit 1 6
나=I
남자 = man
이다 = am/is/are/(to be)

나는 + 남자 + 이다

이다 gets attached directly to the noun that one is "being." So, the above construction
looks like:

나는 남자이다 = I am a man
It is very important that you remember that 를/을 is not attached to words in sentences
with "이다." The following would be very incorrect:
나는 남자를 이다.
Rather, 이다 is attached directly to the noun that one is "being." 이다 is the only word
that acts like this.

Important: The focus of this lesson (and Lessons 2 and 3) is to introduce you to simple
Korean sentence structure. Until you reach Lesson 5 and Lesson 6 you will not be
exposed to the conjugations and honorifics of Korean verbs, adjectives and 이다. In
reality, these words are never (or very very rarely) used without these conjugations and
honorifics. Therefore, while I stress the importance of understanding the structure of the
sentences presented in this Lessons 1, 2, 3 and 4 do not use the sentences in any form of
communication with Korean people, as they will most likely not be understood.
In order to completely understand what is presented in Lessons 5 and 6 (and for the rest
of your Korean studies), it is essential that you understand what is presented in these first
four lessons - even though they may be seen as "technically incorrect."

For all of the "technically incorrect" (un-conjugated) sentences presented in Lesson 1 - 4

I will provide a correct (conjugated) version of the same sentence in parenthesis below
the un-conjugated version (one formal and one informal conjugation). Note one more
time that you will not understand these conjugations until Lessons 5 and 6 (for verbs and
adjectives) and Lesson 9 (for 이다).

Other examples of 이다 in use:

나는 여자이다 = I am a woman
(나는 여자야 / 저는 여자예요)

나는 선생님이다 = I am a teacher
(나는 선생님이야 / 저는 선생님이에요)

저는 ______이다 = I am a _______
(나는 _______ 이야 / 저는 _____이에요)
You can substitute any word into the blank space to make these sentences.

© HowtoStudyKorean.com – Unit 1 7
 This and That (이/그/저)
You can see in the vocabulary above that the word for “this” is 이 in Korean.
We use 이 in Korean when we are talking about something that is within touching
distance (For example: this pen - i.e. the one I am holding). Just like in English "이"
(this) is placed before the noun is it describing. For example:

이 사람 = This person
이 남자 = This man
이 여자 = This woman
이 차 = This car
이 탁자 = This table
이 의자 = This chair

Unfortunately, there are two words for “that": 그 and 저. English learners are always
confused with the difference between "그" and "저."

We use 그 when we are talking about something from a previous sentence. Providing
examples would be too difficult right now because you do not know any Korean
sentences. However, if I were to say: "I don’t like that man [when your friend mentioned
him in a previous sentence]." The word "that" in that sentence would be how "그" is used.

We use 저 when were are talking about something that we can see, but cannot touch
because it is too far away.

Just like "이" we can place "그" or "저" behind a noun to describe "this" or "that" thing
저 사람 = That person
이 사람 = This person
저 남자 = That man
저 여자 = That woman
저 것 = That thing
그 것 = That thing
이 것 = This thing
그 의자 = That chair
저 탁자 = That table

We can now use these nouns as subjects or objects in a sentence. We will look at how
they can be used with "이다" next.

© HowtoStudyKorean.com – Unit 1 8
 Using This/That with 이다
Remember, 이다 can be used to say am/is/are. So, if we want to say this:

“That person is a doctor,” We can do that.

First, we can start by putting those words into the Korean structure:

That person 는 doctor is

And then change the English words to the appropriate Korean words:
그 사람은 + 의사 + 이다
그 사람은 의사이다
(그 사람은 의사야 / 그 사람은 의사예요)

More examples:
그 사람은 선생님이다 = that person is a teacher
(그 사람은 선생님이야 / 그 사람은 선생님이에요)

이 것은 탁자이다 = this thing is a table

(이 것은 탁자야 / 이 것은 탁자예요)

저 것은 침대이다 = that thing is a bed

(저 것은 침대야 / 저 것은 침대예요)

그 사람은 남자이다 = that person is a man

(그 사람은 남자야 / 그 사람은 남자예요)

그 사람은 여자이다 = that person is a woman

(그 사람은 여자야 / 그 사람은 여자예요)

저 것은 차이다 = that thing is a car

(그 것은 차야 / 그 것은 차예요)

이 것은 나무이다 = this thing is a tree

(이 것은 나무야 / 이 것은 나무예요)

Wow! That was an extremely difficult lesson. If you were to pick up another Korean
textbook, I am sure the first chapter would be much easier than this. Trust me though;
learning this at the start will be very useful to you later on. When I was learning how to
speak Korean, it took me months to realize some of these things (not because they were
hard, but because I was using a text book that never taught me the reason why things the
way they are in Korean).

Before you move on, make sure you understand the simple Korean sentence structure
presented in this first lesson. Also, remember that these sentences are technically
incorrect (or very very uncommon) because they have not been conjugated.

© HowtoStudyKorean.com – Unit 1 9