Getting the hangul of it: More countries embrace Korean as a second language

K-campus

Published: 02 May. 2024, 11:25

Getting the hangul of it: More countries embrace Korean as a second language

Students in Paraguay show Korean sentences they've written during Korean classes at school. [MINISTRY OF EDUCATION]

More countries abroad are teaching Korean as a second language, with many using the knowledge to then study and work in Korea.

Carmel Melosa Ardyapustha, a 15-year-old attending middle school in Indonesia, spoke in fluent Korean when she talked to the JoongAng Ilbo reporter via an online interview on April 19.

"There are karaoke bars in Indonesia, and I always sing Blackpink's 'Kill This Love' [2019] when I go there," said Yardaputsda. "Looking at K-pop stars, I've always wanted to learn Korean since I was in grade four."

She started to learn Korean in 2020 because her school taught Korean as one of the secondary languages. Now studying Korean for around two hours every day, she says "understanding Korean itself is a pleasure."

According to the Ministry of Education, there were 23 countries that taught Korean as a second language at their middle and high schools as of last year, compared to 11 in 2014.

Starting this year, schools in Paraguay have been teaching Korean as a second language at their middle and high schools.

There are also more countries adopting Korean as a university entrance examination subject.

There were 10 countries, such as Japan, France and Malaysia, that did so in 2023. In 2014, there were only four.

In Thailand, 20,309 students chose to take the secondary foreign language test for the 2023 college entrance exam. Among them, 4,009 students, or 19.8 percent, chose to take the Korean exam, according to Thailand's Korean Education Center.

Korean had the second-highest number of test-takers, although Chinese came first with 7,929 students, or 39 percent. Japanese came third with 3,833 students, or 18.9 percent.

Korean learners, invited by the King Sejong Institute from abroad, pose for a photo during a visit to the Gyeongbok Palace in Jung District, central Seoul, in October last year. The institute selected 167 outstanding students from 67 countries abroad, inviting them to Korea. [NEWS1]

Vietnam is another country with high demand to learn Korean.

In 2021, the Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training added Korean as one of its first foreign languages. This allows Korean, along with five other languages such as English, Chinese and Japanese, to be taught since elementary school.

"Vietnam is also a country with a strong fervor for education, and there are even people whose entire families will work to pay tuition," said a 28-year-old Korean living in Vietnam. "Vietnamese people's Korean skills have become very advanced these days, and it's an understatement to say that there's demand for people with such skills."

"It's now at a point where one could say there's a Korean language learning boom."
The popularity of Korean content, or Hallyu, is one of the reasons behind the rising interest.

"I started studying Korean because I wanted to watch Korean TV shows without reading subtitles," said a 27-year-old Indonesian student studying in Korea. "Recently, there have also been a lot of Korean academies opening in Indonesia."

Ahmet Kopar, a student from Turkey, first learned Korean in high school and now majors in Korean language and literature.

"I've only known that Korea and Turkey refer to each other as 'brother countries,' but I wanted to know more about Korean history through the drama 'Jumong' [2006-07]," said Ahmet Kopar, a student from Turkey.

Additional salary is another reason that encourages people to learn the language.

"In Vietnam, people can get more than twice the usual entry-level salary if they are fluent in Korean," said Jung Jong-kwon, head of the King Sejong Institute's business planning division. "Local companies have a high demand for people who are good at Korean, but there are not a lot of people who fall under that criteria compared to those with fluency in other languages like English."

According to a survey of 15,325 students who were learning Korean in 2023, conducted by the King Sejong Institute, 32.1 percent said they are learning it because they are interested in Korea and its culture.

Another 23.5 percent said they are simply interested in learning Korean, 20.6 percent said they are learning it to study in Korea and 12.9 percent said they are learning it to get a job in Korea.

Like the sizable portion of respondents saying they wish to either study or get a job in Korea, many also learn the language for their future endeavors.

A 22-year-old Japanese student, going by the name of Sakura, has been majoring in Korean language education at Sogang University's graduate school starting this year.

"My dream is to teach Korean in Japan," said Sakura. "Korean has a lot of room for freedom, and I've been using slang such as kkuljam and alsseu with my friends recently."

Kkuljaem is a portmanteau between the Korean words kkul, referring to honey, and jaemiitda, or fun and enjoyable. Alsseu refers to someone who can't drink alcohol well, combining the words alcohol and sseuregi, or trash in Korean.

Korean teachers and officials of King Sejong Institute attend the World Korea Educator Conference 2023 in August last year. [NEWS1]

"When we get requests from students and schools abroad about opening Korean classes, we take a bottom-up approach and send such requests to the government," said a spokesperson for the Ministry of Education. "We then discuss offering Korean language education as a means of strengthening international relationships with those countries."

Despite demand, getting enough Korean teachers to teach abroad is one of the obstacles.

"There has been increasing demand for Korean language education, but many overseas universities say they are struggling to hire native-speaking teachers," said Lee Hee-young, a professor teaching Korean language and culture at Sangmyung University's Global and Area Studies Department.

To ensure there are enough teachers to meet the demand, government institutions have been offering benefits to those who go to teach abroad.

One is the National Institute of International Education, which offers funding to Korean teachers who go abroad to teach in countries such as Thailand.

BY LEE TAE-HEE [lee.taehee2@joongang.co.kr]