Our interview with the well known Korean language learning website was originally to be published with our last e-mag – as shown on th cover – but through a glitch in the file, the interview never appeared. So here it is, our interview with TalkToMeInKorean.
Firstly, please introduce yourselves and tell us what you do.
Our website is called “TalkToMeInKorean.com” and we publish Korean lessons and fun videos to help Korean learners around the world. We have audio and video lessons published daily on our site and we interactive with our listeners very actively through various social media channels.
How long have you been running the site for?
We’ve been happily running the site for about three years now!
What do you like best about running the site, is there any particular experience that’s made it worth while?
Every comment and every message we get from people studying with our site telling us how much they are learning makes everything we do worthwhile!
What is the best way to study Korean? (Flashcards etc)
In fact, there is no best way to study any language. The key is to stay motivated to learn and the rest will follow. That’s why we believe it is important to have fun while learning.
Can you give any tips to beginners?
First of all, don’t worry too much if you find Korean grammar a little difficult at first. Millions of Korean people find English very tough to learn, too! So don’t give up and keep learning little by little. Learning what you really want to say in a real life situation is also a good way to stay motivated.
What would you say is the hardest aspect of Korean?
The hardest part would be the lack of resources to use for learning, but we are working hard to provide more and the popularity of K-Pop and Korean dramas is helping other publishers invest more time and resources in creating more content for learning Korean. So I’d say Korean will continue to become easier and easier to learn as a foreign language.
Tell us about your new site, HablameEnCoreano.
It’s a friend site of TalkToMeInKorean. We have many listeners from Spanish-speaking countries that would find it easier to learn Korean in Spanish. So together with Javi Maldonado from TodoCorea.com, who teaches Spanish in Korea, we created a website in Spanish.
So, do you have any further plans on expanding your site, and are there any exciting projects for users to look forward to?
We are not currently planning to expand to other languages in the near future, but we have recently launched a new site called HaruKorean.com, where we connect learners with native speakers and provide corrections as well as exclusive lessons. We are also going to release more interesting video content this year.
Next, what are your thoughts on the current successes of the Hallyu Wave?
We are very happy to see it happening, and as a team that teaches the language, we are also happy to see that more and more Hallyu fans are becoming interested in learning to speak Korean too. We believe this Hallyu Wave is also contributing to the further development of the domestic K-Pop scenes in Korea.
Do you think there’s a bright future for K-pop in the west?
I think the start of K-Pop’s popularity might have been somewhat conincidental, but the Korean K-Pop agencies are working very cleverly now to provide the global audience with what they want and can enjoy, so I am sure the future is very bright for K-Pop.
If you had to pick anyone, which act do you think will achieve the most success in the West?
Actor? Hard to tell! I think Korea has a lot of really talented actors, but to really succeed in the West, I think they need to speak some English, so I think both 이병헌 and 김윤진 have great chances of becoming more successful in the West.
And finally, thanks so much for this interview, myself and the team at UnitedKpop are huge fans of you guys and wish you all the best!
Thank you so much for interviewing us and we will continue doing our best to help everybody enjoy learning Korean!
You can check out their site here.
