# Pronunciation: 물갈이, 물검



## goophy

Hi,

I bumped into these two words 물갈이[물가리] and 물감  [물깜]. My question is: the final consonant of the first word ㄹ and the following consonant of the second word ㄱ of both vocabularies are the same, why do they pronounce differently? Are there any rules to explain this? Does it have something to do with Hanzi (한자) vocabulary?

I've found a few examples of my question. For example: 문법[문뻡] and 문벌[문벌]???

Much appreciated!!

goophy


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## JY RO

First of all, your question is not easy to be answered at all because most Korean don't know why.  I gotta try to explain it. 
 Usage of '된소리' (ex: ㄲ, ㄸ, ㅃ, ㅆ etc.) is the way people speak. It is kind of custom. And pronunciation and sound is more important than grammar, which mean Korean Grammar should (or try to) be as same as the sound. We pronounce "물깜" (colors) and "물가리" and the writing should be the same (물깜, 물가리). However, the grammar has some (many?) exceptions in some cases and that's why we write "물감", "물갈이" rather "물깜", "물가리"
 Let me say about '된소리'. The Korean Grammar ruled: "다만, ‘ㄱ, ㅂ’ 받침 뒤에서 나는 된소리는, 같은 음절이나 비슷한 음절이 겹쳐 나는 경우가 아니면 된소리로 적지 아니한다.", roughly translated "된소리 after ㄱ받침 and ㅂ받침 shall not be written with 된소리 unless same syllables or similar syllables are consecutive."

So you should understand like this:
 (1) Sound and pronunciation is just custom and has noting to do with grammar. (we just pronounce "문뻡")
 (2) In some cases, we write 예사소리 (not 된소리 like ㄱ, ㄷ, ㅂ, ㅅ) instead of 된소리

And if you have further interest in Korean Grammar, visiting "Korean Grammar Institute" would be helpful for you. Search "국립국어원" on Google.


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## goophy

Thank you so much, JY RO, for elaborating on my question. However, I didn't focus on grammar; I wanted to know the rules of pronunciation. I just listed words with [phonetic symbols]. Thank you for telling me how to google, but to be honest, I’m only a newbie to have begun learning Korean, so that'll be a difficult challenge for me to read all Korean webpage. 



> However, the grammar has some (many?) exceptions in some cases and that's why we write "물감", "물갈이" rather "물깜", "물가리"



That's why I wanted to know. [물깜] is the sound for 물감; [물가리] for 물갈이. When a beginner encounters Korean, in this case, s/he will be puzzled by why 물감 sounds [물깜] instead of [물감] and 물갈이 sounds [물가리] instead of [물까리]. That's why I'd like to know if there's a way to distinguish the differences. What are the exceptions out of rules? I'd like to know the exceptions.

Thank you for your effort to help me. Really appreciated!!

goophy


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## JY RO

goophy said:


> Thank you so much, JY RO, for elaborating on my question. However, I didn't focus on grammar; I wanted to know the rules of pronunciation. I just listed words with [phonetic symbols]. Thank you for telling me how to google, but to be honest, I’m only a newbie to have begun learning Korean, so that'll be a difficult challenge for me to read all Korean webpage.
> 
> 
> 
> That's why I wanted to know. [물깜] is the sound for 물감; [물가리] for 물갈이. When a beginner encounters Korean, in this case, s/he will be puzzled by why 물감 sounds [물깜] instead of [물감] and 물갈이 sounds [물가리] instead of [물까리]. That's why I'd like to know if there's a way to distinguish the differences. What are the exceptions out of rules? I'd like to know the exceptions.
> 
> Thank you for your effort to help me. Really appreciated!!
> 
> goophy


 I know you are confused (as we try to learn something new!). As I told you, pronunciation is more important than grammar (or writing). So, let me tell you there is no way to distinct how to pronounce from the writing.
 For example, when I, a native Korean speaker, front a certain word, "숩감" (I just made it up, no meaning), there is no way to know how to pronounce (whether it is "숩감" or "숩깜"). Also, distinguishing the difference is not that important because... no body cares and, sometimes, most people pronounce it wrong way!

 Anyway, one sentence to answer: There's no way to distinguish the difference unless you've already known the pronunciation of the word.


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## mink-shin

JY RO said:


> However, the grammar has some (many?) exceptions in some cases



This is very true. But I believe there should be reason why we pronounce them differently.

Let me try to distinguish them.

Pronounced strongly
i) 물감[물깜], 문법[문뻡]

or normally
ii) 물갈이[물가리], 문벌[문벌]

i-1) 물감 is composed of two words, which are 물 and 감.
Generally, 물 means water but in this case it means dye and 감 means material.
So, 물감 means material _*of* _dye.
i-2) 문법 is composed of two words, which are 문(文) and 법.
문(文) means writing and 법 means rule.
So, 문법 means rule *of* writing, which could be translated as _grammar_ into English.

Note that I've just made two '_*of*_' red.
In 물감, 물 has a prenominal function of 감.
In 문법, 문 has a prenominal function of 법.

We tend to do very short pause* after pronouncing such prenominal function words, and, I guess, which* makes the next word pronounced strongly.

ii-1) 물갈이 is composed of two words, which are 물 and 갈다.
물 means water and 갈이 means to replace.
So, 물갈이 means to replace water. In this case, to me, it seems 물 is the object of the verb, "갈다". Hence it isn't necessary to have a pause before pronouncing "갈이".
ii-2) 문벌 is composed of two words, which are 문(門) and 벌(閥).
문(門) has many meanings including pedigree and 벌 means pedigree.
So the single word "문(門)" has many meanings and "문벌(門閥)" narrows them. Hence it isn't necessary to have a pause before pronouncing "벌". With this reason, I don't think we need to pronounce strongly.


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## goophy

Thank you very much, mink-shin. I haven't digested all that you've written yet. I'll peruse it later. Thank you so much for going extra miles for me. Really really appreciated!!!


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## mink-shin

goophy said:


> Thank you very much, mink-shin. I haven't digested all that you've written yet. I'll peruse it later. Thank you so much for going extra miles for me. Really really appreciated!!!


I admire your curiosity, Goophy.

I think what I explained as "prenominal" should has been introduced as "adnominal".


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