Translating lyrics confusion

hajima
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Translating lyrics confusion

Postby hajima » 2016-10-06, 12:14

Hi, I was viewing the lyrics (Hangul and romanised) for Stop Stop It by GOT7 when I saw that there are differences in the displayed Hangul on this website and what I thought the romanised lyrics should display was different.

The difference lies in this line: 니가 그럴 때마다 미칠 것 같아
The romanisation is displayed as this: niga geureol ttaemada michil geot gata
(Some lyric website show niga geureol ttaemada michilgeot gata; I'm interested also to see which is correct)

My question is this: is the 것 character correct for the 'geot' sound? Isn't ㅅ the 's' sound? Should the character be displayed as ㅌ, and so 겉 would be the correct character?

I ask because I only have a limited knowledge of Hangul and my skills extend barely beyond reading/speaking the alphabet. Any help would be greatly appreciated. 감사!

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linguoboy
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Re: Translating lyrics confusion

Postby linguoboy » 2016-10-06, 16:21

Korean doesn't allow /s/ at the end of a syllable, only at the beginning. At the end of a word, it sounds like 't' or 'n' depending on the next word and most romanizations reflect this.

ETA: Incidentally, 것 is one of the most common nouns in Korean. It's generally translated as "thing" but it plays a part in a lot of constructions which would be translated differently into English. This is a good example. The meaning of the verb 같아 is "be like" so 미칠 것 같아 is roughly "being like a going crazy thing" but in context this is best translated as "(it's like) I'm going crazy".

Should the character be displayed as ㅌ, and so 겉 would be the correct character?

겉 is a completely different word in Korean which means "outer side" or "surface". In some contexts, they would both be pronounced geot. But in others, they would be different. For instance, when followed by the subject particle 이, 것이 sounds like "geoshi" (sometimes contracted to 게 "gey") and 겉이 sounds like "geochi".

Any help would be greatly appreciated. 감사!

The literal meaning of 감사 is "thanks", but you can't use it by itself the way you can "thanks" in English. You need to have a verbal ending, e.g. "감사합니다!"
"Richmond is a real scholar; Owen just learns languages because he can't bear not to know what other people are saying."--Margaret Lattimore on her two sons

hajima
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Joined:2016-10-06, 11:53
Real Name:Ray Hun
Gender:male

Re: Translating lyrics confusion

Postby hajima » 2016-10-07, 11:25

linguoboy wrote:Korean doesn't allow /s/ at the end of a syllable, only at the beginning. At the end of a word, it sounds like 't' or 'n' depending on the next word and most romanizations reflect this.

ETA: Incidentally, 것 is one of the most common nouns in Korean. It's generally translated as "thing" but it plays a part in a lot of constructions which would be translated differently into English. This is a good example. The meaning of the verb 같아 is "be like" so 미칠 것 같아 is roughly "being like a going crazy thing" but in context this is best translated as "(it's like) I'm going crazy".

Should the character be displayed as ㅌ, and so 겉 would be the correct character?

겉 is a completely different word in Korean which means "outer side" or "surface". In some contexts, they would both be pronounced geot. But in others, they would be different. For instance, when followed by the subject particle 이, 것이 sounds like "geoshi" (sometimes contracted to 게 "gey") and 겉이 sounds like "geochi".

Any help would be greatly appreciated. 감사!

The literal meaning of 감사 is "thanks", but you can't use it by itself the way you can "thanks" in English. You need to have a verbal ending, e.g. "감사합니다!"


Thank you very much for all of your help! I'll have to do a lot of grammar work to help me with future problems :) thank you for the clarification and also the help with the thankyou. I have learnt 고마 워요 but wanted to use something different - should have looked properly at that one.

Again, thank you (or 고마 워요! hoping this one is correct :wink: )


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