Menchi/Hanja

(For Hanja)

North Korea immediately abandoned Hanja after the Division in 1949. How about South Korea? Was Hanja officially abolished by South Korean government in 1970? I've read so in several English sources, but they may be wrong.
-- Menchi, 2003년 6월 2일 (月)
Translation:
북한은 1949년 분단 이래 한자 사용을 금지했습니다. 남한에서는 어떻습니까? 1970년도에 정부에서 공식적으로 사용을 금지했습니까? 영어로 된 자료를 읽어 봤지만 틀렸을 수도 있습니다.
So, am I getting the following right?

1. South Korean government publications, even official newspapers, do not have Hanja, not even a single one, even in headlines, anymore? But the people still do occasionally?
   
2. Noth Korean Hanja were banned. Nobody can use it publically, because it's illegal?
   

--Menchi, 2003-06-07 16:11

Sorry I confused you. It's just a translation of your question.
Hanja is one of the means of expression, like idioms borrowed from other language to use in America. (e.g. ad hoc, de rigeur, et cetera. ) Statististics that almost 70% of Korean vocabularies consist of Chinese-borrowed expressions, all of them originally written in Hanja. So until early 90's, (in my own observation, not sure,) they had wrote Hanja forevery word that should be written in Hanja. But those who thought that writting and reading numorous characters of Hanja, which is impossible without dictionary for who haven't learn Hanja, is wasting time, began to write them in Hangeul, as how we pronounciate them. There was no regulation from government not to write in Hanja. Nowadays government begin to rewrite the Constitution and other official documents in Hangeul, and no one would use Hanja in writings, except for specialists in Korean as language, literature, and so on, I guess. But still, journalism uses Hanja as abbreviations, especially for the name of nation. 北 for North Korea, 中 for China, 美 for America, 獨 for German, etc., as you'll probably know.
--PuzzletChung

I agree with PuzzletChung's explanation. There's no such thing that government regulates to use language in public in South Korea, but people used to recommend not to use other words instead of Korean words, if possible. As you might know already, however, Korean words are based on "sound" not "meaning" unlike Chinese. So, it's true there's an inefficiency to express every thought with every pure Korean word. My favorate word in my life is 靑出於藍. If I should use Korean words for this, I have to explain its double meaning with quite long sentences (to make sure the meaning) compared to just 4 characters. Nowadays, there's a tendency increase that people have just used Korean(Chinese characters) (mostly Korean way to pronounce) as before. In the case that I gave you for an example, people would indicate it as 청출어람(靑出於藍). Also, I'd like to mention that people in mass media use Korean but Chinese way to pronounce for a proper noun in these days. The name of one famous actor who committed suicide a couple of months ago would be appeared on a paper as 장국영(張國榮) according to previous custom, but there's a lot of paper to show that as 장궈룽(張國榮). by 열혈여아

Khakii has a different perspective on this subject. If my memory is correct, the South Korea government abandoned Hanja in all public school textbooks several years after its establishment. They don't even use the 'Hangeul(Hanja) method'(as in 열혈여아's writing) in textbooks. Also it promulgated a law called "The Law of the exclusive use of Hangeul" in 1948, which says "All official documents of the Republic of Korea will be written in Hangeul. Hanja can be used jointly as need for the time being."(see 한글전용에관한법률) In practice, though, Hanja has been used together with Hangeul up until today in official documents, which is not illegal as you can see it in the provision. However, as PuzzletChung said, the South Korea government began to rewrite most of its laws in Hangeul recently.
That is how things have been going in the government(and public education) sector. In the press sector, there has been no regulation about the usage of Hanja(again, if my memory is correct), and newspapers exposed Hanja words in sentences written in Hangeul. But, as the two NoSmokian's above said, newspapers began to use Hangeul exclusively(or to parenthesize Hanja after Hangeul if needed) from 1990's. Now almost all newspapers use Hanja only in parenthesis except possibly for the abbreviation of the name of a country, as was mentioned above.

I'd like to clarify several things. The law about usage of HanGeul between North and South Korea seems quite different. In North Korea, no foreign words have been allowed in public strictly, so people have translated all foreign words into pure Korean. The law that you suggested as 대한민국의 공용 문서는 한글로 쓴다. 다만, 얼마동안 필요한 때에는 한자를 병용할 수 있다. (Any Official document should be written in HanGeul. But it is allowed with Chinese characters for certain period, if necessary.) does not mean that HanGeul in this sentence is pure Korean and that government regulates to use language in public. (In my point of view, it is much closer to recommend or to induce people to use HanGeul. This law didn't even explicate how long the period was going to be.) Regardless of this law, I remember there were sevral cases of HanGeul(Chinese characters) in textbook such as history, literature, and Korean. (I am not saying that all words from China should or would appear in this way, though.) In almost every kinds of authenticated documents (for examples, government official docs, materials for the National Assembly, constitution, written judgments, contracts, and so on), it is the custom that remains quite a lot to use HanGeul with Chinese characters. by 열혈여아

I also found another use of Hanja when reading a newspaper, the title of a topic that says "100th aniversary of something契." (I don't remember of the name of 契 though.) In Korean it's pronounced "계," which when written in Hangeul one can't rightly recognize the meaning in a second. It's written so in Hanja to reduct any possible ambiguity. --PuzzletChung

To PuzzletChung: It's a translation! I should've seen the similarities! :-D I mean, what was I doing asking questions derived from my question?! Hahaha!!

Thank you for the translation! How interesting that, for Germany, Hanja uses 獨, while Hanzi uses 德. -- Menchi, June 9, 2003

But they are mostly borrowed from Chinese phonetic translation. (By the way, Hanja is Korean pronounciation for 漢字, same spelling as Hanzi.) For example, 佛蘭西 for France might be also used in China and Taiwan. --PuzzletChung

1. Starting from what grade is Hanja taught compulsorily in South Korean schools?
2. When does this manditory Hanja education finish? The last year of senior high school (grade 12)?
3. How many Hanja are taught as a standard?
-- Menchi, 2003년 6월 2일 (月)

I think I can answer this.

For question 1, there is Hanja subject in the curriculum, starting from junior high school (grade 7-9). But it was non-compulsory when I learned. (?? not sure of this one) I suspect this non-compulsory switch is a recent event. For question 2, I would say "perhaps". Some universities may require taking a course on Hanja to graduate as a part of "liberal arts course" -- dictionary-found-word, not sure it's correct -- but it is not really "manditory".

Question 3 is easy. The latest national standard is promulgated on 2000.12.30, "Basic Hanja for educational purposes". 1800 glyphs in total, 900 for junior high school, 900 for senior high school. It was deadly debated in 2000 that what should be included and what should be excluded from the prior 1972 standard. Final result is 44 letters out, and 44 letters in.

I once heard of similar standard of Japan. Was it 1945 glyphs there?

--서상현

I tried to search the detail of change in the Ministry of Education website, but failed. Anyway, at least I can give you the news article from Yonhap News, Korean equivalent of Associated Press. The following is from Naver News Archive.

http://news.naver.com/news_read.php?oldid=2000112300000111002 (2000.11.23, Yonhap News)

Summary: Ministry of Education announced arbitration proposal to replace 44 letters from 1800 letters of Basic Hanja for educational purposes. Basic Hanja set is establisted in 1972, and never changed for 28 years, but in 1999 adjustment was requested, and after one year and five months of investigation the proposal is prepared. According to the proposal, from Junior set 4 letters, namely 硯貳壹楓 is excluded, and 4 letters, namely 李朴革舌 is included from Senior set. From Senior set, 40 letters, namely
憩戈瓜鷗閨濃潭桐洛爛藍朗蠻矛沐栢汎弗膚酸森盾升阿梧刃雌蠶笛蹟滄悽稚琢兎弦灰喉噫熙 is excluded, and adding those 4 letters moved to Junior set, in total 44 letters are excluded, and 44 letters, namely 乞隔牽繫狂軌糾塗屯騰獵隸僚侮冒伴覆誓逝攝垂搜押躍閱擁凝宰殿竊奏珠鑄震滯逮遞秒卓誕把偏嫌衡 is included. On the other hand, proposals suggested in the public hearing held in the last June, such as including Hanja subject to elementry school curriculum, or extending Basic Hanja set to 2000 letters, is rejected. Main consideration for inclusion and exclusion was frequency, and frequency of glyphs in other Han-ideographic cultures such as China, Japan, Taiwan is considered as well.

--서상현

"Very common and useful"? In what way? You must consider those glyphs in the *context of Korean language*. Letters like "forest", "flute", "rabbit" is almost never used, except for few words, in Korean language. "grey" is common, I think, but in order to understand 회색, you don't need to know 회 is actually from 灰. (I bet, average Korean speakers never notice this.) Et cetera. Since we can say (and write) 피리, we don't need 笛.

I admit I'm not expert in this area. But those who decided what to include and exclude, *they* were expert in these matters, from Korean language to Hanja usages.

--서상현

I'm unclear as to how classes that teach Hanja function.

1. What exactly is the course called officially by school administrators? It's not called "Hanja", right? It just doesn't look parallel to other course names: "Mathematics", "Biology", "English", etc.
   
2. Besides the basic info -- pronunciation/Han-geul equivalent, writing stroke order, examples, and meaning -- What do the students learn?
   
3. Do, after awhile, students regularly write paragraphs mostly (over 70%) or entirely in Hanja as assignments and exercises?
   
4. The lower levels start with artificial short stories written by educators. But how about high levels? Do they read excepts of authentic original Hanja literature? Or do they read the Hanja "translations" of Han-geul publications?
   
5. How many students take the class? 90%? Slightly over half?
   
6. Why would a student, or the parent make the child, choose not to take the class?
   
7. When did the course become non-compulsory?
   

-- Menchi, June 10, 2003, 10:00

1.It's called "Hanmun" 漢文 in Korean High school and Middle school.
1.Nowdays, We learn pronoun, meanings, and structure of sentences.with some short(and easy) Hanmun article, Hanshi(poem that written in Chinise character).
{{| '送人' by 정지상
雨歇長堤草色多
送君南浦動悲歌
大同江水何時盡
別淚年年添綠波
|}}

and in addition, we learn more difficult words important words.(that's not the main text)
-or we learn 한자 with 4-word phrases. like "曲學阿世 , 附和雷同 , ..." we learn external meanings, internal meanings, prounoun-, etc.

well, it's High school's way, in Middle schools-
|}}

Some easy and essencial(but I don't Think so.) Hanja vocabularies are in textbook(and unlike this(the example is made just now;), the vocas are classified and involved vocas are distributed in each Lessons. like, lesson 3. 農事. in it, '米穀, 協同, 秋收, ..."
sorry for my BAD English; I'm on learning;

most student in normal school learn Hanmun for an Year. it normally dicided by school.

Every student's in Science course doesn't take 'Hanmun' in SAT. So we don't consider Hanmun important.
In Normal times, we don't use Hanja at all.
누군가 좀 제대로 수정해주세요~ 콩글리시;;;