Understanding Korean Hanja

In Korean, Hanja (한자) means Chinese characters. Before the creation of Hangeul (한글), Korean was written using Hanja. And while Hangeul was created in 1446 and we’ve used it for over 500 years to write Korean, Hanja still has an important role in the Korean language.

In this article, you’ll learn about Korean Hanja and why it’s important in the Korean language. You’ll also learn how to develop your vocabulary by developing a greater understanding of Hanja.

Before Hangeul

Spoken Korean existed for many years before the creation of Hangeul. Before Hangeul was developed, Koreans mainly used Hanja to write. However, learning to read Hanja was extremely difficult, and many people could not read and write, particularly commoners.

To solve this problem, King Sejong created Hangeul, a writing system made up of consonants and vowels. The new writing system was originally published in a document called 훈민정음 [Hun-min-jeong-eum] on October 9, 1446.

After Hangeul

Initially, Hangeul was not widely accepted as a writing system. Those in the upper class found it too simplistic, and many saw it as a threat to their status in society. Although Hangeul would gradually become accepted as the main form of writing, the use of Hanja in popular publications such as newspapers and magazines was common even into the 1970s and 1980s.

In the twenty-first century, however, Hangeul is now the main writing system, and you will rarely see any Hanja used in major publications. Nevertheless, the influence of Chinese characters in Korean is widespread, and it is estimated that around 60% of all Korean words originate from Chinese characters.

Hanja-eo

As mentioned above, over 60% of all Korean words come from Chinese characters. These words are called 한자어 [Hanja-eo]. Hanja-eo refers to Sino-Korean vocabulary, and while these words originate from Chinese characters, we always write them using Hangeul.

For example, the word for ‘library’ in Korean is 도서관 [do-seo-gwan], and this word is based on the characters 圖書館. But in everyday life, we always use 도서관 to write it and almost never use the Chinese characters.

Many Korean words have a Sino-Korean word and native Korean word, and in such pairs of words, the Sino-Korean word is usually the more formal word. This is because in the past, Hanja was mainly learned by those from the upper class. The word for ‘country’ is a good example:

Sino-Korean word for ‘country’: 국가 [guk-ga], 國家
Native Korean word for ‘country’: 나라 [na-ra]

In formal settings, such as in the Olympics where people talk about how many countries are participating in the games, they would use the word 국가, but in everyday life, such as when two friends talk about how many countries they have been to, they would use 나라.

Hanja vs Hanzi

Hanzi are the Chinese characters used in the Chinese language. In general there are many similarities between Hanja and Hanzi, but nowadays the characters used in China are simplified.

As an example, look at the words for ‘China’ below. The Korean word for China is 중국 [Jung-guk] – a Sino-Korean word.

‘China’ as written in Hanja: 中國
‘China’ as written in Hanzi: 中国

The characters in Hanzi are pronounced Zhōngguó, and in both Hanja and Hanzi, the first character is the same, but you can see the differences in the second character. The traditional character used in Hanja is more complicated, and the character used in Hanzi is simpler.

Below are a few more examples showing the differences and similarities between Hanja and Hanzi.

‘Library’ Hanja: 圖書館
Hanzi: 图书馆

‘Earth’ Hanja: 地球

Hanzi: 地球

‘Singer’ Hanja: 歌手
Hanzi: 歌手

As you can see, in the word ‘library’ there are differences between the more traditional characters used in Hanja and the simplified ones in Hanzi. However, in the words ‘earth’ and ‘singer,’ the characters used in Hanja and Hanzi are the same.

Pronunciation of Hanja

In general, Hanja are pronounced differently from how Chinese pronounce Hanzi, but there are also certain words that sound very similar.

As we have seen already, the Korean word for ‘China’ is 중국 [jung-guk]. In Chinese it’s pronounced Zhōngguó, so you can see that there are some similarities between the two.

‘Library’ in Korean is 도서관 [do-seo-gwan], and in Chinese, it’s túshūguǎn. Again, you can see some similarities between the Korean and Chinese pronunciation. Interestingly, the word ‘library’ in Japanese is written 図書館 and pronounced toshokan, which shows that there are some similarities in pronunciation between Korean, Chinese and Japanese when the word comes from Chinese characters.

Finally, the words for ‘earth’ and ‘singer’ also share similarities in pronunciation. ‘Earth’ in Korean is 지구 [ji-gu] and in Chinese it’s pronounced dìqiú, and ‘singer’ is 가수 [ga-su] in Korean and gēshǒu in Chinese.

Nevertheless, in general, the pronunciation of Hanja is not the same as Chinese Hanzi pronunciation.

Important uses of Hanja in Korea

In addition to the fact that around 60% of Korean words come from Hanja, Hanja have many other uses in Korean.

The most important use is in Korean names. All Korean family names have a Hanja origin. Korean family names belong to specific clans, and these clan names are written in Hanja. Traditionally, people’s first names are also written Hanja, but recently, more and more people are using names that only use Hangeul.

Also, in many official documents and at official venues, Hanja is used together with Hangeul, and Hanja characters can indicate certain special meanings.

Learning Hanja

Because of the prevalence of Hanja-eo in Korean, many believe that having some knowledge and understanding of Hanja is necessary to have a greater understanding of the Korean language, even if you don’t need to know how to write Hanja. Therefore, learning Hanja has always been an important part of the Korean education system.

In the past, Hanja lessons were compulsory in elementary schools, but starting around 2009, Hanja lessons became optional. Elementary schools could decide whether to include Hanja lessons as part of their curriculum. However, in secondary schools, both in 중학교 (middle school) and 고등학교 (high school), learning Hanja is compulsory. The subject where you learn Hanja is called 한문 [Han-mun], which means ‘Chinese writing.’

Learning Hanja is not compulsory in universities, but in some universities, students are required to achieve a certain score on the Hanja exam in order to graduate, so there may be optional Hanja classes to help students pass the exam.

All in all, while you may never need to write Hanja in your everyday life, having some knowledge and understanding of how it is used in Hanja-eo is helpful, and perhaps necessary, in order to know how the Korean language works.

Should you learn Hanja?

In general, you do not need to know the Hanja characters themselves. but having some knowledge of how they are used in Hanja-eo will help you develop your vocabulary. Once you develop some understanding of different Hangeul syllables and their Chinese character origins, you can start to make connections between certain words that use the same syllables. Let’s take a look at some examples.

1) 국 (國) ‘country’

The syllable 국 (國) means ‘nation’ or ‘country,’ and it’s used in many words related to countries and country names. You can see some examples in the table below.

As you can see from the word 국가, the same word can have two different meanings. This can be because of the different Hanja origin of certain syllables. In the word for ‘country,’ 가 (家) means ‘home,’ and in the word for ‘national anthem,’ 가 (歌) means ‘song’ – for this reason, the word for ‘singer’ is 가수 (歌手).

2) 식 (食) ‘food’ or ‘meal’

The syllable 식 (食) means ‘food’ or ‘meal,’ and it’s used in many related words. (Check out our article on Korean food vocabulary!)

3) 학 (學) ‘learning’ or ‘knowledge’

The syllable 학 (學) means ‘learning’ or ‘knowledge,’ so it’s used in many words that relate to this meaning.

So as you can see from these examples, once you have an understanding of the Hanja origin of certain syllables, you can make connections with other words that use the same syllable.

Also, even among the words in the three tables above, you can see certain other syllables that share a similar meaning. For example, 식비 means ‘food expenses,’ while 학비 means ‘school tuition,’ so based on this we can work out that 비 is related to expenses and costs.

As you learn more Korean words, you will come across many other words related to cost. For instance, 생활비 means ‘living expenses,’ and the general word for ‘cost’ or ‘expenses’ is 비용. In short, having some basic understanding of how certain syllables can have Hanja origins is really important in vocabulary development.

If you’re interested in looking up the Hanja origin of words, you can type in the Korean words in online dictionaries like Naver Dictionary to find the Chinese characters for those words. You can then copy and paste the Chinese characters into online Chinese character dictionaries to find out the meaning of individual characters.

Wrapping up

While Hangeul has now become the main way of writing Korean, it’s hard to ignore the important role Hanja plays in the Korean language. With around 60% of Korean words having Hanja origins, it’s vital to have some understanding of the origin of certain words, as this will help you develop your vocabulary and understanding of formal and informal words in Korean.

And don’t worry – you won’t need to learn the actual Chinese characters themselves. But just learning to recognize how Hanja are used in different words will go a long way toward helping improve your Korean vocabulary.