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A Study on the Comparative Analysis of the Korean ‘nop-ta’ and Chinese ‘gao’

  • Korean Language & Literature
  • 2013, (87), pp.35-63
  • Publisher : Korean Language & Literature
  • Research Area : Humanities > Korean Language and Literature

Kim, Jin Soo 1 오금희 2

1충남대학교
2우송대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

This paper has a purpose to analyze the common and the difference between the Korean ‘nop-ta(高)’ and the Chinese ‘gao’ with cognitive theory. ‘nop-ta(高)’ and ‘gao(高)’ which are ones of the spatial adjectives are both Korean and Chinese as a basic vocabulary and are used very often. The words have a basic meaning such as ‘the length from top to bottom is long’, but those have many extended meaning. The extended meaning shows the process ‘spatial> temporal >abstract’ and this process is not the individual phenomena of language but it is cross linguistic phenomena. ‘nop-ta(高)’ and ‘gao(高)’ both have the same meaning in Korean and Chinese. Also extended meanings of the words have many similarities. However, in Chinese, when expressing the height of human body Chinese use the word ‘gao(高)’, but in Korean, ‘khɨda(大)’ is used instead of ‘nop-ta(高)’. The main objective of this research is to clearly show the different reason and situation between ‘nop-ta(高)’ and ‘gao(高)’ with cognitive approach. This kind of research can help people who is Chinese learning Korean and Korean who is learning Chinese. It can also help the actual teachers to give explanation to their students when teaching the difference between ‘nop-ta(高)’ and ‘gao(高)’. Korean ‘nop-ta(高)’ and Chinese ‘gao(高)’ have many similarities. This is due to the cognition of spatial ‘nop-ta(高)’ is very similar in both countries. The main difference is the cognition in ‘height’. Koreans realize ‘height’ in three dimension but Chinese realize ‘height’ in two dimension. Humans recognize and experience the spatial in one dimension, two dimension and three dimension at the same time. This experience is also applied in language. Even when describing in one dimension adjective it not only expresses in one dimension adjective but with other dimension adjectives it express varieties of meanings. This paper discusses the process of expansion meaning from ‘nop-ta(高)’ to ‘khɨda(大)’ and in Korean and ‘gao(高)’ and ‘ta(大)’ in Chinese. And it shows the similarity and the difference recognition during the expansion process. This paper could be helpful to explain the common and the difference ‘nop-ta’ and ‘gao’.

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