North–South differences in the Korean language

The Korean language has diverged between North and South Korea due to the length of time that the two states have been separated.

Researching language differences between North and South Korea has been challenging, and there have been reports of inaccurate results.

[3] North Korean propaganda has characterized its language as being "pure", contrary to South Korea's.

However, South Korean scholars have claimed it is more similar to the pre-divided Seoul dialect than the pre-divided Pyongyang dialect, and suggested that its pronunciation[5] and grammar are based on the Seoul area rather than the Pyongyang area.

In the 1960s, under the influence of the Juche ideology, came a big change in linguistic policies in North Korea.

On 3 January 1964, Kim Il Sung issued his teachings on "A Number of Issues on the Development of the Korean language" (조선어를 발전시키기 위한 몇 가지 문제; Chosŏnŏrŭl Palchŏnsik'igi Wihan Myŏt Kaji Munje), and on 14 May 1966 on the topic "In Rightly Advancing the National Characteristics of the Korean language" (조선어의 민족적 특성을 옳게 살려 나갈 데 대하여; Chosŏnŏŭi Minjokchŏk T'ŭksŏngŭl Olk'e Sallyŏ Nagal Te Taehayŏ), from which the "Standard Korean Language" (조선말규범집; Chosŏnmalgyubŏmchip) rules followed in the same year, issued by the National Language Revision Committee that was directly under the control of the cabinet.

However, in the North, the stroke that distinguishes ㅌ |tʰ| from ㄷ |t| is written above rather than inside the letter, as is done in the South.

In the South, the vowel digraphs and trigraphs ㅐ |ɛ|, ㅒ |jɛ|, ㅔ |e|, ㅖ |je|, ㅘ |wa|, ㅙ |wɛ|, ㅚ |ø|, ㅝ |wʌ|, ㅞ |we|, ㅟ |y|, ㅢ |ɰi|, and the consonant digraphs ㄲ |k͈|, ㄸ |t͈|, ㅃ |p͈|, ㅆ |s͈|, ㅉ |tɕ͈|, are not treated as separate letters, whereas in the North they are.

The standard languages in the North and the South share the same types and the same number of phonemes, but there are some differences in the actual pronunciations.

In the Seoul dialect, ㅈ, ㅊ and ㅉ are typically pronounced with alveolo-palatal affricates [tɕ], [tɕʰ], [tɕ͈].

For instance, the common last name 이 [i] (often written out in English as Lee, staying true to the more conservative typography and pronunciation), and the word 여자 [jʌdʑa] are written and pronounced as 리 [ɾi] and 녀자 [njɔdʑa] in North Korean.

Furthermore, the South Korean word 내일 [nɛiɭ], which means "tomorrow", is written and pronounced as 래일 [ɾɛiɭ] in North Korea.

But in North Korea, ㄹ before vowels ㅑ, ㅕ, ㅛ, and ㅠ can remain [ɾ] in this context (or assimilate to [n]).

Additionally, the difference between the vowels ㅐ /ɛ/ and ㅔ /e/ is slowly diminishing amongst the younger speakers of the Seoul dialect.

However, whether a compound word is seen to have its etymological origin forgotten or not is seen differently by different people: In the first example, in the South, the 올 |ol| part shows that the etymological origin is forgotten, and the word is written as pronounced as 올바르다 [olbaɾɯda] olbareuda, but in the North, the first part is seen to come from 옳다 olt'a |olh.ta| and thus the whole word is written 옳바르다 olbarŭda (pronounced the same as in the South).

One likely explanation is that the North remains closer to the Sinitic orthographical heritage, where spacing is less of an issue than with a syllabary or alphabet such as Hangul.

Besides the deferential second person pronoun 당신 tangsin, which is a noun in origin, there is the pronoun 동무 tongmu (plural 동무들 tongmudŭl), from a noun meaning "friend, comrade", in North Korea that may be used when speaking to peers.

The third person feminine pronoun is South Korea is 그녀 geu-nyeo (plural 그녀들 geu-nyeodeul) while in North Korea it is 그 녀자 kŭ nyŏja (plural 그 녀자들 kŭ nyŏjadŭl), both literally meaning "that woman".

When conjugated to the polite speech level, the ㅂ-irregular stem resyllabifies with the 어요 -eoyo conjugation to form 워요 -woyo (as in 고맙다 gomapda → 고마우 gomau → 고마워요 gomaweoyo), appearing to ignore vowel harmony.

The verb 마스다 masŭda (to break) and its passive form 마사지다 masajida (to be broken) have no exactly corresponding words in the South.

[15] During the 2018 Winter Olympics, the two Korean countries decided to play jointly for the Korea women's national ice hockey team.

[16] The language differences also pose challenges for researchers and for the tens of thousands of people who have defected from one side to the other since the Korean War.

At the 2014 National Conference of the Korean Language and Literature Association, Yonsei University professor Hong Yun-pyo argued that language differences between North and South Korea were exaggerated in the context of the Cold War.

[18] According to Hong, after the Korean War, words like dongmu (동무; comrade, friend) and inmin (인민; people), that had been in common use in South Korea before, had disappeared.

"[19] Hong had numerous meetings with North Korean scholars for academic conferences and dictionary compilations, but he rarely encountered communication difficulties; rather, he was more likely to encounter communication difficulties with speakers of the Gyeongsang or Jeolla dialects.

[22] North Korean officials[4] and propaganda place emphasis on purity of its language and claims to have reduced the use of foreign loan words.

North Korean defectors say they knew that the language spoken by South Koreans contained foreign words, but they did not realize that the language they used in North Korea also contained many foreign words.

[23] For example, North Korean defectors who have fled the country tend to have more direct communication habits that reveal their true feelings compared to South Korean language etiquette, which is prominent in defectors' hometowns but rare in other areas where defection is rare, such as Pyongyang.

The word oppa (오빠, originally used by a woman who was the younger sibling in a sibling relationship to refer to a man who was older than her, but in South Korea, also became a way for a younger woman to refer to her male lover in a romantic relationship) was a prime example of this.