Linguistic purism in Korean

Linguistic purism in the Korean language is the belief that words of native Korean origin should be used in place of foreign-derived "loanwords". This belief has been the focus of movements in both North and South Korea, where adherents have sought to deter the use of loanwords, regardless of whether they have been formally adopted into the Korean language. Of primary interest has been the replacement of Japanese-influenced loanwords (especially from the period of Japanese forced occupation) when the Korean language faced multiple hardships and was discouraged in favor of Japanese, although the specific policies differ between the North and South.Differences in linguistic purism in the North and the South
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North Korea

North Korea is known for eliminating most loanwords, which comprise most of the language differences between North and South. Unlike South Korea, where hanja has been intermittently used in texts, North Korea abolished the usage of Chinese characters in 1949. Many loanwords with hanja, especially academic words that were introduced during the Japanese occupation, were refined into native Korean. Some examples include:

* (''kwanjŏl'')(, joint/articular surface) → (''madi'')
* (''myŏlgyun'') (, sterilization) → (''kyunkkanggŭrijugigi'')
* (''hohŭp'') (, breathing) → (''sumswigi'')
* (''yongryang'') (, amount) → (''tŭri'')
* (''kwangwŏn'') (, light source) → (''pissaem'')
* (''yŏmsaekch'e'') (, chromosome) → (''muldŭlch'e'')

South Korea

In South Korea, the National Institute of the Korean Language maintains an exhaustive dictionary of refined (purified) language. A refined version is created and decided on by online voting.

Japanese colonialism

Notably, loanwords from Japanese that were introduced to Korea during the Japanese forced occupation are considered to have a political subtext of colonization and are often subject to refinement. Some words that were transliterations of Japanese words were refined in 1948:
* (''sirotto'') (, amateur/novice) → (''maengmuni''), (''nalmuji'')
* (''bunppai'') (, distribution) → (''nunumaegi'')

Some critics of the movement argue that, instead of forcefully finding an equivalent translation for every loanword, the movement must promote the usage of widespread loanwords.Obituary: Lee O-Deok, Children's writer and champion of spoken writing
26 Aug 2003 ''Dong-A Ilbo]''

A recent example is the Korean spicy chicken dish ''dak-dori-tang'' (), where the etymology of the middle word ''dori'' () is not definitively known, although suggested as a Japanese-Korean hybrid. In South Korea, the National Institute of the Korean Language claims that the word came from Japanese ''tori'' (; "bird"), and suggests that the word should be refined into ''dak-bokkeum-tang'' (). However, the status of ''dori'' as a loanword has been subject to debate. This is because the institute has not presented the grounds for the argument besides the phonetic similarity of ''dori'' to the Japanese word ''tori''. The word ''dori-tang'' appears in ''Haedong jukji'', a 1925 collection of poems by the Joseon literatus Choe Yeongnyeon. In the book, Chinese characters ''do'' () ''ri'' () ''tang'' () were used to transliterate the Korean dish name. A food columnist argued that, had the word been Japanese, the character ''jo'' (; pronounced ''tori'' in Japanese) would have been used instead of the hanja transliteration of the Korean pronunciation. Alternative theories on the origin of ''dori'' include the assertions that it came from ''dyori'' (), the archaic form of Sino-Korean word ''jori'' (; "to cook"), and that it came from the native Korean verb ''dorida'' (; "to cut out"). None of the theories mentioned before has been widely accepted as the established etymology.

References

{{Korean language

History of the Korean language
Linguistic purism