How to Add Expressions to Verbs
How to Handle Verbs, Part 1: Changing Their Form
How to Handle Verbs, Part 2: Irregular Verbs
Basic Particles
Helping Verbs
Passives and Causatives
PART TWO GRAMMAR POINTS
Agreement
Disagreement/Negatives
Asking Questions
And: Basic Forms
And (So On, and So On)
Linking Sentences: And
And: Putting Things Together
Linking Sentences: Or
Linking Sentences—Cause and Effect: The Big Three
Linking Sentences—Cause and Effect: More Ways to Say “So”
Linking Sentences—Cause and Effect: Through, Because Of, For the Sake Of
Cause and Effect: Origins
Cause and Effect, or Lack Thereof
Cause and Effect: Multiple Causes
Linking Sentences: Basic Comparisons
Linking Sentences—Contrast: Although/But
Linking Sentences—Contrast: Not A, But B
Linking Sentences—Comparisons: As
Linking Sentences—Comparisons: Equals (or Not)
Thinking: Making Guesses
Thinking: Knowing
Thinking: Making Decisions
Emotions: Surprise
Emotions: Regret
Emotions: Thanks
Emotions: Desires
Emotions: Personal Experiences
Obligations, Orders and Permission
Warnings
Plans
Accidents
Progression: Review of Past and Future Tenses
Progression: While
Progression: Continuing States
Progression: Almost, But Not Quite
Progression: Putting Things in Temporal Order
If: If
If: Possibility and The Lack Thereof
Talking about What Others Have Said: Review of Reported Speech
Talking about What Others Have Said: Combinations
Talking about What Others Have Said: Spreading Rumors
Talking about What Others Have Said: According to
Giving Explanations
Location
Limits and Excess
Habits
Faking it
PART THREE FREQUENTLY SEEN WORD PARTS
Talking about People
Prefixes
Appendix 1: How to Sound Like a Native
Adverbs of Time
Adverbs of Frequency
Adverbs of Degree
Giving Your Opinion and Sounding Smart
How to Deal with 그렇다
Appendix 2: Useful Korean Language Resources
Index
How to Use This Book
When I first started studying Korean, I found there were any number of books, blogs, podcasts, classes, etc., available for beginners, and I rejoiced. However, as my studies progressed, the quantity of appropriate materials dropped sharply and while there were still many textbooks, very few of them explained the material in a useful way: for instance, though they would happily explain that 어서 eoseo and 으니까 eunikka both roughly meant “so,” there was little guidance as to when it was appropriate to use each form. These books also tended to be poorly organized, with ㄴ다고 해서 dago haeseo in one chapter, ㄴ다고 하니까 dago hanikka several chapters later and ㄴ다고 하는데 n dago haneunde a few chapters again after, even though these are all very similar expressions.
In this book, I have attempted to synthesize all the information gained from my studies into a format that’s useful and convenient for others to follow. I am not planning to teach you these expressions for the first time but rather to provide a useful guide to help you make sense of what you’ve already partially learned and to help you use these expressions more fluently, much like a toolbox to help you form correct and natural-sounding Korean sentences rather than ending every single sentence with the same old 아/어/여요 a/eo/yeoyo.
To this end, I have mainly focused on verbs and adverbs. Constructing Korean sentences is really all about what you do with the verbs, and a whole lot of implications are packed into different verb endings. There’s a little about pronouns because contractions are used all the time (just like in English) but rarely taught, and then some information about adverbs at the end because a good adverb can really spice up a sentence (and because I myself find them confusing at times and so I suspect others might as well).
I really haven’t focused on vocabulary since you can probably use a dictionary just as well as I can. There are some good vocabulary books listed in the Appendix if you want a little more direction.
There are only a few different ways to attach verbs and endings in Korean and I have summarized these on page 19,
