English → Korean
Korean uses 34 sounds. You already own 15 of them from English. The other 19 are the work — and 19 of those are the dangerous kind: close enough to something you already say that you will substitute them without hearing yourself do it.
The silent swaps
Your mouth has something close enough to reach for. These survive for years precisely because they sound right to you — the fix is hearing the difference first, not trying harder.
the move: postalveolar → alveolo-palatal
Korean: house · written "ㅈ (initial)"
Plain ㅈ — between English ch and j, with the tongue flat. Voiced to /d͡ʑ/ between vowels.
Your /t͡ʃ/ is the one in church (church).
the move: postalveolar → alveolo-palatal
Korean: very · written "ㅈ (between vowels)"
Your /d͡ʒ/ is the one in judge (judge).
the move: postalveolar → alveolo-palatal
Korean: time · written "ㅅ before i, y-vowels"
The sh of Japanese shi, not the sh of English ship — tongue flat.
Your /ʃ/ is the one in ship (ship).
the move: near-open → open
Korean: country · written "ㅏ"
Your /æ/ is the one in cat (cat).
the move: near-close → close
Korean: milk · written "ㅜ"
Your /ʊ/ is the one in book (book).
the move: near-close → close
Korean: this; two; tooth · written "ㅣ"
Your /ɪ/ is the one in sit (sit).
the move: aspirated
Korean: arm; eight · written "ㅍ"
Aspirated — a strong puff of air. The p of English 'pot'.
Your /p/ is the one in pen (pen).
the move: close, but not identical
Korean: bread · written "ㅃ"
Tense: the throat stiffens, the release is sharp and there is no puff at all. The third kind of p. Also what plain ㅂ becomes after an obstruent (입구 ipk͈u).
Your /p/ is the one in pen (pen).
the move: close, but not identical
Korean: strawberry · written "ㄸ"
Tense t. 달 tal 'moon', 탈 tʰal 'mask', 딸 t͈al 'daughter' — one triplet to hear the three-way contrast on.
Your /t/ is the one in tea (tea).
the move: close, but not identical
Korean: flower · written "ㄲ"
Tense k. Also what plain ㄱ becomes after an obstruent: 학교 hakk͈jo.
Your /k/ is the one in cat (cat).
the move: close, but not identical
Korean: uncooked rice · written "ㅆ"
Tense s: longer, harder, no breath. 살 sal 'flesh; to live' against 쌀 s͈al 'rice'.
Your /s/ is the one in sun (sun).
the move: near-close → close-mid
Korean: today · written "ㅗ"
Rounded, closed. Keep it apart from ㅓ: 손 son 'hand' against 선 sʌn 'line'.
Your /ʊ/ is the one in book (book).
the move: near-close → close-mid
Korean: yes · written "ㅔ", "ㅐ"
Two letters, one sound: ㅐ was the more open of the pair and Seoul has merged them. 개 'dog' and 게 'crab' are now homophones, and the spelling is memorised.
Your /ɪ/ is the one in sit (sit).
the move: postalveolar → alveolo-palatal, aspirated
Korean: tea; car · written "ㅊ"
Your /t͡ʃ/ is the one in church (church).
the move: postalveolar → alveolo-palatal
Korean: to be salty · written "ㅉ"
Tense ㅈ.
Your /t͡ʃ/ is the one in church (church).
the move: near-close → close, unrounded
Korean: that; he · written "ㅡ"
Say /u/ and spread the lips. Romanised eu. The same vowel as Japanese u and Vietnamese ư.
Your /ʊ/ is the one in book (book).
Words you may say identically
Two or more Korean sounds landing on one sound of yours. Until the ear separates them, the mouth cannot — which is what the ear trainer is for.
- p = pʰ = p͈ → your p vs vs train this pair →
- t = tʰ = t͈ → your t vs vs train this pair →
- k = kʰ = k͈ → your k vs vs train this pair →
- t͡ɕ = t͡ɕʰ = t͡ɕ͈ → your t͡ʃ vs vs
- o = u = ɯ → your ʊ vs vs train this pair →
- s = s͈ → your s vs train this pair →
- i = e → your ɪ vs
Rhythm and pitch
The layer spelling never records, and the one that makes a correct sentence still sound foreign.
| English | Korean | |
|---|---|---|
| Rhythm | Stress-timed | Syllable-timed, phrase melody |
| Stress | Contrastive, and unmarked in writing — the single most common cause of not being understood. Dozens of noun/verb pairs differ only in where the stress goes, and every unstressed vowel collapses to /ə/. | None at word level. No syllable is reduced and no vowel becomes a schwa; every syllable is said in full. What an English ear hears as stress is the phrase-initial rise. |
What you have that Korean doesn't
28 sounds with no job in Korean. They are not mistakes — but they are where an accent leaks in, because a sound you own is easy to use when a hard one is due.
The honest caveat
This is a prediction from the shape of two sound systems, not a recording of you. It says what your inventory makes likely — it cannot know that your English has a regional variety that already owns one of these, or that you learned Korean from someone whose accent you copied. A teacher listening to you beats it. Use it to know what to listen for.
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