Should Long Time Foreigners In Korea Learn Korean?
I saw this question posted on to Reddit and figure I would comment on it:
I’m wondering why the foreigners who re-sign year after year until they’re past the 5+ years in Korea mark and don’t learn Korean stay in Korea? If you, after more than five years in a country you are choosing to live in, can’t have a conversation in Korean, isn’t that racist/Eurocentric? What reason would you have for not bothering to learn your host country’s language? The Bangladeshi worked in the factory has learned it, why haven’t you?
I get the “I thought I’d just be here for a year but then I re-signed,” I really do, but after five, six, seven years you’re a long-termer. [Reddit]
I don’t think it is racist to not become proficient in Korean. From the US military perspective I knew servicemembers who had many years of service in Korea and could not speak Korean. A lot of it has to do with working in an English work environment plus Korea is so English friendly as well especially around US military bases that knowing Korean is not mandatory. Getting fluent in Korean takes a lot of time and work that most people don’t have. However, many folks who have served many years in Korea do know enough Korean to get around and communicate simple things.
If you actually live and work in Korea, yes you should get a working knowledge of Korean.
For the military, before I retired and was asked “why don’t you speak our language..” I always asked, how many languages do you want me to learn? Did time (worked longer than a month) in Korea, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Afghanistan. Lucky enough to go to DLI for Korean; Korean basic language course was 63 weeks long. If you did that for all the languages –Arabic – 52 weeks, Pashtun – 52 weeks, Spanish 24 weeks, the time adds up; and that doesn’t count language maintenance on top regular duty….So I excuse the military not knowing the language of every country they show up in.
@Flyingsword, I would have loved to do a 63 week language course, but for the vast majority of soldiers this is not a possibility. For most people though this is the kind of time that would need to be dedicated to really become proficient in Korean.
I did DLI and then lived in Korea for three years afterwards (including a year and half as an exchange student at the ROKAF Staff College), have a Korean, and I’m still not “fluent” in Korean. It is, afterall, the hardest language for an English speaker to learn. I still try to study Korean vocab every day but still feel like I have a long, long way to go to get to an acceptable level. I can get by day-to-day speaking it just fine but I can only understand about 75-80% of typical Korean drama or movie.
The people I really don’t get is the retired guys you run into who are married to a Korean and have lived in Korea for 15-20 years yet still can’t speak it hardly at all. That’s just laziness right there.
haven a Korean wife*
It depends on when and where you met your Korean wife, and when you moved to Korea.
I married my wife in 1991, in Hawaii. She was a resident alien, had lived there for 10 years or so. She spoke fluent Korean and fluent, if somewhat accented with “Local Girl” English. We didn’t live in Korea until around our 20th Anniversary. Before that, it was Hawaii, California, Florida and Colorado.
I never bothered to learn Korean because I wasn’t really into K-Dramas that weren’t subtitled, and have always been a part of the Military Expat community. When I hang out with the Teacher Expats for bicycling, most of them can handle what Korean I can’t. If push really came to shove, my wife was always just a phone call away.
@PBAR, if you are able to understand 75-80% of a Korean drama that is still pretty impressive.