An event celebrating Hangeul Proclamation Day in Washington, D.C. … ‘Hangeul’s internationalization is a political problem’
Prof. Ramsey who give a special lecture celebrating Hangeul Proclamation Day
Robert Ramsey who is a professor in the University of Maryland gave a special lecture on the subject of ‘Why we celebrate Hangeul Proclamation Day’ in KORUS house in Embassy of the Republic of Korea in the United States of America on October 6, 2009.
Robert Ramsey who is a professor in the University of Maryland gave a special lecture on the subject of ‘Why we celebrate Hangeul Proclamation Day’ in KORUS house in Embassy of the Republic of Korea in the United States of America on October 6, 2009.
‘Hangeul is better than any other letters in the world’. Robert Ramsey who is a professor in the University of Maryland emphasized over and over again Hangeul’s superiority and a hidden meaning of Hangeul invention, that is to say significant humanism through special lecture celebrating Hangeul Proclamation Day – ‘Why we celebrate Hangeul Proclamation Day’ in KORUS house in Embassy of the Republic of Korea in the United States of America on October 6, 2009.
A linguist Ramsey said that Hangeul is a scientific letter connecting voice and letter systematically. He valued Hangeul as great achievement not discovered any other letters and a commemorative event. He also said that Hangeul is a world alphabet and a symbol showing Korea’s high cultural level as well as a world present having important meaning being prominent in any other countries. Related to this, He explained that some consonants like ‘ㄱ’, ‘ㄴ’, ‘ㄷ’ are modeled on a vocal organ, so that they are systematically linked voice with letter but in alphabet, ‘t’ and ‘d’ have no clue to be connected with pronunciation.
He also took note of humanism showing through the Korean script made by Sejong, one of the great kings in The Joseon Dynasty of Korea, and general belief about education. He said that Sejong had a general opinion that anyone has to read and write sentences and even women must understand texts. However at that time, he said, it is bad and dangerous for the governing classes although it is deserved right now.
He was deeply interested in Hangeul’s internationalization but he indicated that it is complicated problem because it is involved in political meaning.
For example, in Jungjong of Joseon, Choi Se Jin working on a calendar made Koreans learn other languages like Manchu, Japanese, and Chinese using Hangeul’s sound system. In this situation, a possibility of Hangeul’s internationalization is big but it is political and complicated problem in reality.
He indicated political meaning of Hangeul’s internationalization saying that Hangeul is most efficient in spelling Chinese and if Hangeul were introduced in China the Chinese could have learned and written Chinese easily. However he said that the Chinese would oppose that suggestion because it is related to political reasons like a national pride. He also said that most of holidays in the world are related to political event, a change of season and religion but Hangeul Proclamation Day has a special meaning because it is a commemoration Day thinking about development of human’s mind, idea and accomplishment.
Prof. Ramsey studied Gyeongsang-do(경상도) and Hamgyeong-do(함경도) dialects in the 15th and 16th century at a Yonsei University and a graduate school of Seoul National University and lectured in the Korean language at Columbia University. He has taught the Korean language over twenty years at the University of Maryland and he is famous as holding a special ceremony annually Hangeul Proclamation Day.
A linguist Ramsey said that Hangeul is a scientific letter connecting voice and letter systematically. He valued Hangeul as great achievement not discovered any other letters and a commemorative event. He also said that Hangeul is a world alphabet and a symbol showing Korea’s high cultural level as well as a world present having important meaning being prominent in any other countries. Related to this, He explained that some consonants like ‘ㄱ’, ‘ㄴ’, ‘ㄷ’ are modeled on a vocal organ, so that they are systematically linked voice with letter but in alphabet, ‘t’ and ‘d’ have no clue to be connected with pronunciation.
He also took note of humanism showing through the Korean script made by Sejong, one of the great kings in The Joseon Dynasty of Korea, and general belief about education. He said that Sejong had a general opinion that anyone has to read and write sentences and even women must understand texts. However at that time, he said, it is bad and dangerous for the governing classes although it is deserved right now.
He was deeply interested in Hangeul’s internationalization but he indicated that it is complicated problem because it is involved in political meaning.
For example, in Jungjong of Joseon, Choi Se Jin working on a calendar made Koreans learn other languages like Manchu, Japanese, and Chinese using Hangeul’s sound system. In this situation, a possibility of Hangeul’s internationalization is big but it is political and complicated problem in reality.
He indicated political meaning of Hangeul’s internationalization saying that Hangeul is most efficient in spelling Chinese and if Hangeul were introduced in China the Chinese could have learned and written Chinese easily. However he said that the Chinese would oppose that suggestion because it is related to political reasons like a national pride. He also said that most of holidays in the world are related to political event, a change of season and religion but Hangeul Proclamation Day has a special meaning because it is a commemoration Day thinking about development of human’s mind, idea and accomplishment.
Prof. Ramsey studied Gyeongsang-do(경상도) and Hamgyeong-do(함경도) dialects in the 15th and 16th century at a Yonsei University and a graduate school of Seoul National University and lectured in the Korean language at Columbia University. He has taught the Korean language over twenty years at the University of Maryland and he is famous as holding a special ceremony annually Hangeul Proclamation Day.
Meanwhile Kwon Myung Won who is exhibiting calligraphy works celebrating Hangeul Proclamation Day showed people writing letters using a writing brush. In addition about 70 students who taking lectures about the Korean language at the University of Maryland recited Korea poems like ‘엄마야 누나야’ and ‘진달래꽃’ by Kim So Wol(김소월), ‘꽃’ by Kim Chun Su(김춘수) and ‘국화 옆에서’ by Seo Jung Ju(서정주). They are applauded by audiences.
reference article
http://news.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2009/10/09/2009100900069.html
There's no doubt, language is political. The use and death of language is dependent not just on a country's power, but also the power of regions, business, money, scholarship, and so forth.
ReplyDeleteCan you imagine Korean being used to represent English like the Latin alphabet is used to represent Korean?
"other letters in the world" = I think this should be alphabets.