In Chapters 2 and 3, general aspects of sound systems were discussed. In Chapter 4, consonants in Korean will be discussed, and in particular, what consonants exist in Korean and what their phonetic and phonological characteristics are. With this aim, in 4.1, the inventory of Korean consonants will be discussed; in 4.2, the phonetic and phonological characteristics of obstruents; and in 4.3, the phonetic and phonological characteristics of sonorants. In 4.4, we will discuss phonological features needed to discuss consonants in Korean, and in 4.5 we conclude.

Consonant chart

Table 4.1 shows the consonants of Korean classified according to the place (across the top of the table) and manner (down the left side of the table) of their articulation. The nineteen consonants of Korean can be classified as either (i) bilabial, (ii) alveolar, (iii) alveolo-palatal, (iv) velar or (v) glottal according to the place of their articulation. They can also be classified as (i) stop, (ii) fricative, (iii) affricate, (iv) nasal or (v) liquid (lateral approximant) according to the manner of their articulation. Furthermore, each consonant class has two or three sub-classifications. For instance, stop sounds have lax, tense or aspirated sounds, and fricative sounds can be classified as either lax or tense.