More early recordings of the Korean language

[soryang]

The video is entirely in Korean. The first half has a general explanation of the difficulty of reconstructing how language may have sounded in the past before recording technology. It then explains the historical context of why Korean scholars perceived a need to preserve the language in the first half of the 20th Century. In the second half of the video, some simple examples of Korean pronunciation from the period are given, some particularly related to a basic Korean language reader for school children. The final portion of the video carries the contemporary recording of the history of King Sejong the Great's effort to change the Korean written language form from traditional Chinese characters to hangul and what a great cultural achievement it was ensuring the spread and continuity of the language for hundreds of years.

This video recounts the effort by Korean scholars to preserve hangul (the printed form of the Korean language) along with the proper form of pronunciation (along with several dialects) from the Japanese Resident General's effort to eliminate Korean language and culture. This was an effort by the Japanese colonial administration to "make the Korean people Japanese." It appears the language collection effort which began in the twenties was consolidated by 1935. One of the recordings is that of an existing Korean language basic textbook at the time for school children. Japanese classes were introduced into Korean education as early as 1911 by colonial edict. Formal government and business activity were conducted in Japanese, but learning of Korean was still allowed. By 1938, the third and final edict on the elimination of Korean from school curricula for all purposes in Korea was declared.

I don't expect many people here to understand the video but I posted a similar video concerning the earliest known Korean recording from the Sorbonne archives reflecting a similar effort by the Korean Language Society in 1928, and I can see that some people still look at it and have an interest. I think even a basic Korean language student might be interested to hear the pronunciation of simple words such as vegetables, clothing, mother, father, etc., at that time. So I'm posting this here for reference for those who may wish to use the video for academic or historical purposes. Below is the link to the earlier related video.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/1165601

[xocetaceans]

1. A very interesting post! Thanks for posting it and the other as well.

I don't know Korean but am generally interested in languages. That being said, I do have some friends who might be more able to appreciate the audio in these posts, so I plan on recommending the videos to them.

[soryang]

2. My pleasure

I find these historical videos on cultural conditions during the colonial period very interesting. My mother in law spoke Japanese as well as Korean because of these conditions when she was growing up. Unfortunately I wasn't proficient enough in Korean at the time to discuss her experience with her then before she passed away. I enjoyed the Kdrama Mal mo i (collect words) about the movement to save the language as well. I know from her younger brother that their experience during the Korean conflict resembled the experience of Suki Kim's mother described in her book about teaching English in North Korea, Without You There is no Us.

Language wise the break through experience was reading and listening to TTMIK online (Talk to me in Korean). These are the best Korean teachers in the world imo. I think they are supported to some degree by the South Korean Ministry of Culture Sports and Tourism. The first 15 chapters were free and they have a quite a few of free youtube videos.