Irregular verb (Korean)

While Korean is fairly regular compared to other languages, there are still some oddities. Luckily, these exceptions do not arise as one-off words, but rather entire classes of altnerative behaviour, whose members are called irregular verbs. That is, an exceptional word does not exist on its own; it belongs to a class of exceptional verbs which are all conjugated the same way, albiet in a way different to most verbs.

You cannot always identify whether or not a verb is irregular from spelling alone. For example, the ㅂ-irregularity class applies only to verbs whose stems end in ㅂ, but not to all stems which end in ㅂ.

Irregularity classes only come into effect when the verb stem needs to be followed by a vowel. The sole exception to this rule is the feared ㄹ irregularity class.

Definition

There is some disagreement on which inflection rules correspond to irregularity classes and which are rules of regular conjugation, but ultimately two alternative approaches dominate.

Language teachers

Language teachers prefer to begin with a simplified set of rules, then gradually introduce additional logic in further sets of simplified rules. Since the students will find the further rules surprising. the initial rules are called regular and everything else irregular.

Linguists

However, linguists define regular verbs to be any that don't follow predictable, derivable rules, however complex. So, linguists might consider the conjugation

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to be regular, while language teachers will describe this as an instance of "으-irregularity."

Korean Grammar for International Learners

Korean Grammar for International Learners defines regular verbs as those which attach stems to endings without any changes in either the base or the ending, and lists five irregularity classes:[cite:@ihm2011korean]

This is the preferred definition within my notes, since it follows the linguist's approach of irregular verbs being unpredictable rather than merely non-trivial. Unlike other definitions, there are both examples and non-examples of stems corresponding to each of the listed irregularity classes; i.e., for each class, you can never be certain whther or not it applies.

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Compare with definitions like Wiktionary's or 90 Day Korean, who acknowledge classes such as "하-irregularity" and "ㅡ-irregularity," which apply predictably to all 하-final and ㅡ-final stems.

90 Day Korean

90 Day Korean defines an irregular verb as a verb whose stem may change or add extra letters when conjugated, and defines the following six irregularity classes:[cite:@armstrong2024korean]

Wiktionary

Wiktionary takes it to an extreme, acknowledging thirteen classes:See Category:Korean irregular verbs.

  • ㄷ-irregularity

  • 어-irregularity

  • 가-irregularity

  • 하-irregularity

  • ㄹ-irregularity

  • 놓-irregularity

  • 오-irregularity

  • ㅂ-irregularity

  • 러-irregularity

  • 르-irregularity

  • ㅅ-irregularity

  • 시-irregularity

  • 우-irregularity

Motivation

The purpose of introducing irregular verbs is, supposedly, to keep the stem easily identifiable in spoken Korean.Per HowToStudyKorean. i don't have zotero set up on my laptop so i can't cite them LOL.

Irregularity classes