Ledyard Gari K. The Korean language reform of 1446

UMI Dissertation Services, 1999. — 483 p.The origin, background, and early history of the Korean alphabet.The origin of the Korean alphabet, and the nature of its affinity, if any, with other Asian scripts has long been a matter on which Western scholarship has been hopelessly confused. This confusion results mainly from Western ignorance of the Korean materials bearing on the origin and early history of this alphabet. Many of these materials have become known only within the last twenty or thirty years even in Korea; westerners who wrote before 1945 could not have known of their existence, and more recent scholars have not yet been attracted to them. The present study seeks to investigate these materials and to interpret them, in some cases differently than Korean scholars do, in order to come to some conclusions on how this remarkable alphabet was conceived and brought into existence.The sources used in this study are of two kinds: traditional Korean and Chinese works, and modem scholarly studies, mostly by Koreans.Writing in Korea Prior to the Invention of the Alphabet
The Chinese Script
Pre-Alphabetic Transcriptions of Korean Words
Pre-Alphabetic Transcription of Korean Texts:
Type I (Hyangch’al)
Pre-Alphabetic Transcription of Korean Texts:
Type II (Idu)
The Meaning of the Term Idu:
Traditions on the Origin of Idu
Conclusions
The Cultural Background for the Invention of the Alphabet
The Intellectual Climate of the Early Choson Dynasty
The Need for an Alphabet: The Study of Chinese
Phonology
The Need for an Alphabet: Consciousness of the
National Language
Korean Experience with Other Languages and Scripts
Chinese
Mongolian
Jurcen
Japanese and Ryukyuan
Sejong, Inventer of the Korean Alphabet
The Announcement and Early Progress of the Korean Alphabet
The Period of Sejong’s Work on the Alphabet
The Announcement of 1443/4
The Anti-alphabet Memorial of Ch’oe Malli
The Correct Sounds for the Instruction of the PeopleThe Korean versions are all alike in that they contain the text of HC only
Chinese versions
The Preface of Sejong and the Postface of Chong Inji
The Correct Sounds: Linguistic Background
General Concepts: Sheng and Yin
Consonant Classes: “The Five Innunciants”
Manner of Articulation: Ch’ing and Cho
Vowel Theory
Syllabic Theory
The Correct Sounds: Philosophical Background
The Correct Sounds: Consonants
The Correct Sounds: The Vowels
The Correct Sounds: Letter Shapes
The Correct Sounds: Tone and Pitch
The Correct Sounds: Orthographical Principles
Appendix
The Correct Sounds for the Instruction of the People
Explanations and Examples of the Correct Sounds for the Instruction of the People
Explanation of the Design of the Letters
Explanation of the initial phonemes
Explanation of the medial phonemes
Explanation of the terminal phonemes
Explanation of the Combining of the Letters
Examples of the Use of the Letters
Early History of the Korean AlphabetThe Yongbi och’on ka
Buddhist Compilations
Non-Lexical Confucian and Secular Works
Lexical Works and Phonological Research
The Yun hui project
The Tongguk chong’un
The Sasong t’onggo
The Hongmu chong’un yokhun
Other activities of Sejong’s commission
Overall View of the Phonological Projects
Opposition to the Alphabet After the Death of Sejong
Other Official and Un-Official Uses of the Alphabet
The Works of Ch’oe S ejin
A New Explanation of the Origin of the Korean AlphabetThe 'phags-pa-Korean Relationship: Graphic Considerations
The 'phags-pa-Korean Relationship: Historical Considerations
Traditional Korean Theories on the Origin of Their Alphabet
The “Old Seal”