Subject Markers

This video is all about Korean subject markers. Let’s start by identifying parts of a sentence. Most of you probably already know this stuff but it’s useful background information.

Here is an example sentence:

“I hide”

 This sentence contains a Subject, and a verb.

The verb is the action word. The verb in our example is hide.

The subject is the noun which is doing the verb. A noun is a thing, person, or place. In the example the verb is hide. And I is the thing that is hiding. So, I is the subject of the sentence.

Subject markers are sufixes that you attach to the end of the word that is the subject of the sentence. Again, subject of the sentence is the thing in the which is doing the action. In this sentence, the subject is "I", or in Korean casual speech나(na). 나(na) is the thing that is doing the action, so "na" is the subject.

There are two types of subject markers the -neun/-eun 는/은 variety and the -ga/-i 가/이 variety.
가(ga) and 는(neun) subject markers go after words that end in vowels
이(i) and 은(eun) subject markers go after words that end in consonants.
Both varieties are used to identify the subject, but the difference is that
the 가/이(-ga/-i) variety puts extra emphasis on the subject,
and the 는/은(neun/eun) variety puts the emphasis on the action.

If you want to say "I hide" in a way that makes it clear that you are "hiding", not doing something else. Then use the 는/은(neun/eun) variety.
나는 숨어 (na-neon sum-eo).

If you want to say "I hide" in a way that makes it clear to everyone that it is "I " who is hiding, not anyone else: "I". Then you use the 가/이(ga/i) variety of subject marker.

Let me give you an example situation because subject markers can be tricky to understand.
If I ask "what do you do?"
You answer "나는 숨어 (na-neun sum-eo)"
(I hide. That's what I do.)

If I ask "who hides?"
You answer "내가 숨어(nae-ga sum-eo)"
(I hide. That's who.)

Do you see the difference? 가(ga) emphasizes the subject, and 는(neun) emphasizes the action.

Let's look at our example with the 는/은 (neun/eun) variety of subject marker first.

You label the subject of the sentence with the ending 는(-neun) if the subject ends in a vowel or an 은(-eun) if the subject ends in a consonant. In this case we have a vowel so we use 는(neun).
(na-neun sum-eo) 나는 숨어
now the polite form
(jeo-neun sum-eo-yo) 저는 숨어요
and in the formal form
(jeo-neun sum-seum-ni-da) 저는 숨습니다
The 는/은(neun / eun) is actually optional. When you have a very short sentence like this it is obvious which word is the subject, so subject markers aren't necessary. If you have a more complex sentence the subject markers are really helpful in avoiding confusion.
Also, there is a shorthand way of adding subject markers
instead of 나는(na-neun) you may just see 난 (nan)
instead of 저는 (jeo-neun) you may just see 전 (jeon)
the shorthand subject marker is just a ㄴ(n) instead of a full 는(-neun). You might see the shorthand spelling with any noun that ends in a vowel.
You will hear people talk like this and write like this in email and other un-official forms of communication. But you won't see these shorthand subject markers printed in a book or in the president's speech or anything official like that. It's just one of those lazy habits.

Now let's talk about the 가/이(-ga/-i) variety.
Like I said before, you use the 가/이 (ga/i) ending if you want to put extra emphasis on the subject. The 가(-ga) goes at the end of subjects that end in vowels and the 이(i) goes at the end of subjects that end in consonants. But something special happens with the pronouns 저, 나, & 너 (jeo, na, & neo). They end in vowels, so you would expect them to get the 가(ga) subject marker, but they actually get both -i and -ga. Like this

저+ㅣ+가
나+ㅣ+가
너+ㅣ+가
and now watch this magic!
the ㅣ joins theㅓ in 저 and 너 to make ㅔ
and the ㅣ joins the ㅏ in 나 to make ㅐ
so we have:
제가
내가
네가
Remember learning about the vowel (ae)ㅐ. It's meant to be pronounced "ay" but is often pronounced like "e".
Well, you really really don't want to get "I" 내가  and "you" 네가 mixed up. So, having two very similar sounding words is going to get confusing. So, here's what Koreans do
This one 내가 casual "I" with a (ga) subject marker is pronounced "neh" and "nay" Just like it's written.
and this one 네가 casual "you" with a (ga) subject marker is pronounced "ni". It's one of those words that is not pronounced the way it is written. It is Ni. Sometimes, in unofficial communication, like chatting on the internet, some people will even write it as 니. And yeah... a -ga subect marker after the ni. This is the word that makes English speakers a little uncomfortable. but we know what we mean.

So let's do our example with the i/ga subject marker
the casual form of "I hide" is
nae-ga sum-eo 내가 숨어
and the polite form of "I hide" is
je-ga sum-eo-yo 제가 숨어요
and in the formal form
제가 숨습니다 je-ga sum-seum-ni-da

And just to make it clear it is only these 3 pronouns that get both the I and ga subject markers. For all other pronouns, nouns, and names use only the I subject marker if the word ends in a consonant, or only a ga subject marker if the word ends in a vowel.

You may see ga/I called “subject marking particles”. You may also see neun/eun called “topic marking particles”

So, subject markers in sum:
Put them at the end of the subject (ie. noun that is doing the verb)
When emphasizing the action: use -eun if the subject ends in a consonant, or -neun if the subject ends in a vowel
neun is often shortened to just (n) in unofficial communication.
When emphasizing the subject: use  -i if the subject ends in a consonant, or -ga if the subject ends in a vowel
 You must add both -i and -ga to the pronouns 저 나 너 when emphasizing the subject to get 제가(je-ga) 내가(nae-ga) 네가("ni"-ga)
subject markers are optional and can be omitted if the subject of the sentence is already obvious and you don't want to draw extra attention to either the action or the subject.

It might seem unnecessary to have to mark the subject. But let’s think of a more complex sentence:

“I hide the dog” There are 2 nouns in this sentence.

“Mom, I hide the dog in Peter’s backpack so Ashley can’t see him” There are lots of nouns in this sentence.

And Korean puts words in a different order than English. So in English it might be obvious which noun is the subject. But when this sentence is translated into Korean and the word order is changed it might not be so clear.

Also, Korean uses implied subjects. Remember learning about how Korean is a pronoun drop language? We talked about that in the Korean Pronouns video, if you saw that one. So, what pro-drop means is that you can drop the pronouns from your sentence. When you speak Korean you can identify the subject by name in the first sentence of your paragraph and then just omit the subject in the following sentences.

So, in sum, because of the different word order and because of the practice of dropping the subject once it has been established subject markers become a necessary part of Korean language.

I hope that makes thinks clear for you. You can find this page and this page linked in the description, as well as a transcript of the lesson. ‘til next time Thanks for