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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_phonology https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_phonology > In 2012, vowel length is reported almost completely neutral
by philliphaydon 6y ago
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_phonology https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_phonology
> In 2012, vowel length is reported almost completely neutralized in Korean, except for a very few older speakers of Seoul dialect,[14] for whom the distinctive vowel-length distinction is maintained only in the first syllable of a word.[13]
So it does have vowel length change meaning but it’s almost kinda died out like tones?
- yongjik 6y agoNative Korean speaker here, born in the 70s and grew up in Seoul. We all learned a dozen short-long pairs at school (like 눈 nun being either eye or snow), and of course the education got all of us tricked into thinking that we're making these distinctions (if only we try hard enough). But looking at it objectively, I don't think a single person around me used vowel length distinction. If you have to "think" whether a word is long or short, that means the distinction is dead. No English speaker has to "think" whether fan or pan is the correct word. An actual sound distinction comes automatically for native speakers. Similarly, ㅐ/ㅔ ("ae"/"e") distinction was dead before I was born, but schools insisted that they're well and alive. Not sure what they're teaching these days.
- philliphaydon 6y agoI can't speak Korean, only a little bit of Mandarin :D so I'm really happy to have your reply, thank you! Makes sense!