A Juicy Lesson in Korean: #4 - Untranslatable Insults

First, I have to rant a little.

On Tuesday, I had my second French class for students in health sciences and I just have to point this out. Once you have a general understanding of a language, you have to give up trying to translate you thoughts word-for-word for the following reasons:

1) Every language has it quirks and phrases that just cannot be translated literally.
2) Trying to tranlsate everything takes up time and energy.
3) Native speakers will understand you even if your grammar isn't perfect.
4) It's fucking annoying for the other students in the class.

I am one of the annoyed students in the class. Good god, man, you may think English and French are very similar, but they don't even have the same origins. English is a West Germanic language and French is Latin based. They don't have the same conjugations and tenses, so for heaven's sake, don't try to find an exact equivalent. And if you don't know a word, then get yourself a bloody dictionary. You can even have mine.

This week's lesson is on insults. Don't get it confused with swearing. I reuse to teach swear words in Korean, because it's inappropriate and also, it just doesn't have the same flavour if you don't say it just right.

A) _____ is/are disrespectful. - _______ 싸가지 없어.

Ssa-ga-ji up-suh.

Ssa = Say "sa" with an exhaled breath behind it.

You can add a name/pronoun to the blank or omit it altogether if the listener already knows who you're talking about. (This rule applies for all Korean sentences.) The translation is very inadequate. If I read "Tony 싸가지 없어", in a novel and had to translate it, it would be "Tony is a disrespectful asshole who thinks he's all that." All that is implied in one phrase. This is one of the phrases I miss the most.


B) You're making a spectacle of yourself. - 쌩쇼를 해라.

Sseng-sho-rul heh-rah.

Literally, it translates to "Do a live show." As you can see, it's an imperative and if the person is already doing something inappropriate, then why encourage them even more? Perhaps a better way to put it is, "You're being ridiculous. Why don't you do a live show while you're at it, you spaz?"


C) Mind your own business. - 너나 잘 하세요.

Nuh-nah jal hah-se-yo.

jal = almost a soft "chal"

This is meant to be very insulting to the listener. First, there's the meaning, "Mind your own business" which is disconcerting for anyone to hear. For the second layer of insult, we must examine the literal meaning. "너나" is "you" in the most informal speech level with an emphasis as if to say, "Don't worry about me. Worry about yourself." "잘 하세요" is "Please do well" in the imperative on the formal speech level that you would use in polite everyday conversation. They're innocuous enough on their own, but together, it implies that the speaker should show respect for the listener but is deliberately choosing not to. It's even more insulting than if the whole phrase had been in the informal speech level. All this is in 6 syllables.

You can hear this where there are 34 seconds left.



Bonus: You can hear "Good-bye" (안녕히 가세요) when there are 30 seconds left.

There are many more. Even phrases that aren't insults. There are still moments when I wish there was an English version equal in eloquence to its Korean counterpart. I tell these to Brenda and we laugh together and wish that there was someone else to share in our amusement.