[KS] littering streets of Moscow and Petersburg....

[Tatiana.Gabroussenko]

Dear List,
I would like to add one consideration to Dr. Lankov's precise explanations.
To my mind, a fluent command in Korean that Russian specialists on Korea
often demonstrate can be explained by the whole system of education in
Russia started from primary school level.
 Unlike students of most American/Australian schools, Russian children start
to study of their native language, Russian, with the learning by heart of
the heaps of strict linguistic terms and grammar rules. 7 years old in
Russia supposed to know already what 'adverbals', 'nouns', 'verbs' or
'particle' means. It does not make children's life easy, and in Russia you
can often hear parents' protests against this ossifyed learning system.
Indeed, it looks senseless. Yet when you start to learn foreign languages,
this system turns into a great helper.  Knowing how your own language works,
it is much easy to understands inner strings of foreign languages.
 To my mind, the understanding of the grammar is the strong side of
Russia-trained specialists on Korea. I started to learn Korean in 1980s in
Far Eastern State University in the USSR. All the study materials we had
those years was 'Nodong sinmun' newspaper articles, all started with the
expression: "As our Great Leader, the respectful comrade Kim Il-sOng, used
to say..." No texts on everyday life, no literature at all. Through these
stupid texts we just learned the basic Korean grammar--not knowing how to
say 'chopsticks' in Korean. After I graduated I considered myself to be a
complete failure in Korean.  Yet when I started my study in Seoul
University,with all the luxary of the perfect textbooks and dictionaries,  I
found out that I moved rather quickly--to catch useful phrases and everyday
lexicon proved to be much more easy than to understand how the language
works.
 Best regards,
Tatiana Gabroussenko
China and Korea Centre,
Faculty of Asian Studies,
Australian National University,
ACT, 0200, Australia

---- Original Message -----
From: "Andrei Lankov" <Andrei.Lankov at bigpond.com>
To: <Koreanstudies at koreaweb.ws>
Sent: Friday, April 18, 2003 1:31 PM
Subject: [KS] littering streets of Moscow and Petersburg....


> >Like Gari, I too have been impressed with the Korean ability of those who
> have been trained in language programs in Russia.  I'd be
> >interested in learning more about how to account for their success.
> Perhaps some of the native speakers of Russian on board have
> >some thoughts, here?  I'm not aware of anything structurally in the
Slavic
> group that would make its speakers more naturally able
> >with Korean than speakers of a Latinized Germanic tongue like English; I
> can't imagine that an elaborate case system would make
> >much difference.  Quality of textbooks?  Teachers?  A much fuller level
of
> immersion in Korean even while in Russia?  It occurs to me
> >that a possibility is simply that the Russian-trained scholars whom
> Anglophone/W. European academics come into contact with
> >represent the cream of the crop of the system, and that we just don't get
> to see the "failed Koreanists littering the streets" of
> >Moscow. Is this in fact the case? I appeal to Russian-born colleagues on
> the list for more info about their experience of learning
> >Korean. (A side issue: two years ago I did have a chance to meet some
> foreign students at Kim Il Sung University.  I'm sure there is
> >next to no information on this, but I'd be curious how learners of Korean
> do who are in North Korea vs. South Korea.)
>
> Dear Stephen, Gari and list members,
>
> Thank you for your kind words about us, Russia-trained Korean specialists.
I
> am not sure whether we deserve them. There are at least three reasons for
> the above mentioned phenomena. First of all, due to a number of cultural
and
> economic reasons (long story), from the 1960s onwards the study of foreign
> languages and, especially, of Asian languages has been very prestigious in
> USSR/Russia. It is still largely the case. This means that the Korean
> (Chinese, Japanese etc) departments chose only good students, whose high
> school academic records are impressive enough. This also means that
students
> tend to be highly motivated. Secondly, the entrance exam system in Russian
> universities effectively requires every aspiring Koreanist to demonstrate
> very good knowledge of English. In fact, they have to be nearly fluent in
> English - otherwise their chances to pass exam are zero. This means that
> future students begin to learn foreign languages at very early stage - at
> early teens, if not earlier. And, last but not least, the traditions of
> teaching Korean are quite old. In Petersburg, the unbroken tradition goes
> back to the 1930s, in Moscow - to the 1940s. Needless to say, the methods
of
> teaching were also devised not for heritage speakers of Korean who have
> always been a minority (even if active and highly motivated one), but for
> absolute beginners with no Korean or East Asian background.
>
> Best regards
>
> Dr. Andrei Lankov
> China & Korea Centre,
> Faculty of Asian Studies,
> Australian National University,
> ACT, 0200, Australia
> fax 61-2-6125-3144
>
>
>