| Korean | |
|---|---|
|
한국어, 조선말 Hangugeo, Chosŏnmal | |
| Native to |
South Korea North Korea Jilin·Liaoning·Heilongjiang, China Japan (Koreans in Japan) |
| Native speakers | 75 million (2007) |
| Language family |
Altaic (disputed)
|
| Early forms: |
Old Korean
|
| Dialects |
Jeju
mainland Korean dialects
|
| Writing system |
Hangul (primary) Hanja (mixed script) Korean Braille Cyrillic |
| Official status | |
| Official language in |
|
| Recognised minority language in |
|
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-1 | ko |
| ISO 639-2 | kor |
| ISO 639-3 |
Variously: kor – Modern Korean okm – Middle Korean oko – Old Korean |
| Linguasphere | 45-AAA-a |
Korean (한국어/조선말) is the official language of South Korea and North Korea as well as one of the two official languages in China's Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture. Approximately 78 million people speak Korean worldwide. For over a millennium, Korean was written with adapted Chinese characters called hanja, complemented by phonetic systems like hyangchal, gugyeol, and idu. In the 15th century, a national writing system called hangul was commissioned by Sejong the Great, but it only came into widespread use in the 20th century, because of the yangban aristocracy's preference for hanja.
Most historical linguists classify Korean as a language isolate while a few consider it to be in the controversial Altaic language family.The Korean language is agglutinative in its morphology and SOV in its syntax.