The Hunminjeongeum Society, sometimes called the "Hunminjeongeum Research Institute" in English-language newspaper accounts, is a private organization in

Seoul Seoul (; ; ), officially known as the Seoul Special City, is the Capital city, capital and largest metropolis of South Korea.Before 1972, Seoul was the ''de jure'' capital of the North Korea, Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea ...

dedicated to the propagation of

Hangul The Korean alphabet, known as Hangul, . Hangul may also be written as following South Korea's standard Romanization. ( ) in South Korea and Chosŏn'gŭl in North Korea, is the modern official writing system for the Korean language. The l ...

to all the unwritten languages of the world.South Korea's Latest Export: Its Alphabet
, ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

,'' 2009 Sept. 11 (''

Hunminjeongeum ''Hunminjeong'eum'' () is a document describing an entirely new and native script for the Korean language. The script was initially named after the publication but later came to be known as hangul. Originally containing 28 characters, it was c ...

'' was the original name of hangul.) The society was founded by Lee Ki-nam, a retired real-estate agent, in 2007, after she had failed to bring hangul to the Tungusic Oroqen of

Heilongjiang Heilongjiang () Postal romanization, formerly romanized as Heilungkiang, is a Provinces of China, province in northeast China. The standard one-character abbreviation for the province is (). It was formerly romanized as "Heilungkiang". It is th ...

, China; the Chepang of Nepal; and the Lahu of

Chiang Mai Chiang Mai (, from th, เชียงใหม่ , nod, , เจียงใหม่ ), sometimes written as Chiengmai or Chiangmai, is the largest city in northern Thailand, the capital of Chiang Mai province and the second largest city in ...

, Thailand; she attributed these failures to a reliance on Korean Christian missionaries in those countries, whose primary focus was not linguistics or literacy. As of 2015, the society is chaired by linguistics professor Kim Ju-won of

Seoul National University Seoul National University (SNU; ) is a national public research university located in Seoul, South Korea. Founded in 1946, Seoul National University is largely considered the most prestigious university in South Korea; it is one of the three " ...

, and its current focus is on countries that send large numbers of people to work in Korea. In 2009 it succeeded in getting the city of Baubau, on

Buton Island Buton (also Butung, Boeton or Button) is an island in Indonesia located off the southeast peninsula of Sulawesi. It covers roughly 4,727 square kilometers in area, or about the size of Madura; it is the 129th largest island in the world and ...

Southeast Sulawesi Southeast Sulawesi ( id, Sulawesi Tenggara) is a province on the island of Sulawesi, forming the southeastern peninsula of that island, together with a number of substantial offshore islands such as Buton, Muna, Kabaena and Wawonii (formerl ...

, Indonesia, to adopt hangul for the

Cia-Cia language Cia-Cia (''Bahasa Ciacia'', ''바하사 찌아찌아'', ''بهاس چيا-چيا''), also known as Buton or Butonese, is an Austronesian language spoken principally around the city of Baubau on the southern tip of Buton Island off the southeas ...

. The society has published a series of hangul Cia-Cia textbooks for use in schools, using an orthography designed by Kim,Teachers to spread the word about Hangul
, ''JoongAng Ilbo,'' 2009 Sept. 19 but in 2012 it was reported that adoption ultimately failed and has been abandoned.
''The chosunibo''

References

''The Korea Herald''

Daum

Southeast Sulawesi Tribe Using Korean Alphabet to Preserve Native Tongue

(LEAD) Indonesian tribe picks Korean alphabet as official writing system

Indonesian tribe to use Korean alphabet: scholar

External links

official site
Hangul Spelling reform Language advocacy organizations {{Asia-org-stub

See also

References

External links