Common Abbreviations and Misspellings
Korean texting often involves abbreviations and intentional misspellings to convey casualness or humor. For example, "모해" is a common misspelling of "뭐해," meaning "What are you doing?" [1]. Another popular abbreviation is "낄끼빠빠," which stands for "낄 때 끼고 빠질 때 빠져라," translating to "Join when you join, leave when you leave." This phrase advises awareness of social situations where one's presence might be unnecessary or unwelcome
[5].
Emoticons and Their Meanings
Emoticons play a significant role in Korean texting culture. The emoticon "-3-" can represent a kiss or indifference, while "zzz" signifies boredom or sleepiness [2:1],
[2:5]. Other emoticons like "ㅗㅜㅑ" express seeing something attractive or sexy
[2:2]. These emoticons add emotional nuance to text messages beyond what words alone can convey.
Use of Spaces and Batchim
The use of spaces in texting varies among Koreans. Some older texters may not use spaces, causing characters like "ㅋ" to become batchim (final consonants) [1:1]. This subtle difference can affect the tone and interpretation of a message, with younger generations more likely to add spaces for clarity
[1:2].
Cultural Nuances in Slang
Slang expressions such as "분위기 읽어" (read the room) or "눈치좀 봐" (take the hint) are culturally significant and have been adapted into newer slang like "낄끼빠빠" [5:2]. These phrases highlight the importance of social awareness and etiquette in Korean communication. They reflect a cultural emphasis on understanding and responding appropriately to social cues.
Adoption and Evolution of Slang
Korean slang evolves rapidly, often influenced by media and popular culture. Expressions like "낄끼빠빠" have gained popularity through variety shows and music, showcasing how slang adapts and spreads across different platforms [5]. As language continues to evolve, new slang terms emerge, reflecting changes in societal norms and technology.
Koreans have their own norms when texting, which usually mean there are some "misspellings" and other colloquial uses in texting.
Today we'll check out some of these norms and the vibes behind them!
Let's take a look a conversation to see what kinds of things we see!
Alright, so first off, we have the first person asking:
모해?ㅋㅋ
Which already has two things packed into it:
Next up!
그냥 있지 ㅎㅎㅎ
그냥 있지 here means "Just here / just hanging" followed by ㅎㅎㅎ (another way of going "haha" or "lol")
Grammar point!
The -지 at the end of 있지 is a way to have something like "you know". Usually it is seeking a soft confirmation like:
맛있지? = It's delicious, right?
But here, it's more like a common understanding of the situation. So, the whole phrases is close to:
그냥 있지 = Just hanging, ya know
The ㅎㅎㅎ is similar to ㅋㅋㅋ, but slightly different vibe. ㅎㅎㅎ is closer to the emoji 😊, whereas ㅋㅋㅋ is closer to 😂. I really hope that makes sense!
The next one the person is asking if they want to grab lunch tomorrow (내일 점심), but it is followed by "ㄱㄱ". The ㄱㄱ here means "go go" in English. So, it's a more fun way to say "wanna go to lunch tomorrow?"
Next up this message has 3 good ones back-to-back:
ㅇㅇ 굿굿~ = ㅇㅇ + 굿굿 + ~
Next up:
찐맛집 찾았어! 너 완전 좋아할듯ㅋㅋ
Here we start with a nice one!
The next sentence is broken down as follows:
So, in total, the second sentence reads like: "I think you'll totally like it!" And our well-known ㅋㅋ following.
Last message!
헐 대박!!! 완전 기대된다 ㅠㅠㅠ
Something else you tend to see are messages with absolutely no spacing whatsoever. They just jam pack all the words together with a completely disregard for proper grammar. So, don't be surprised if you just see a huge block of text!
If you made it this far, thanks!
My partner and I run a Korean weekly newsletter, Daily Tokki, where every Sunday, we write about a topic, whether it is news, K-dramas, music, travel, daily life, etc. — all through the lens of the Korean language.
We've been posting some of our past newsletters here on reddit as they seem to be well-received (thanks all!), so we thought we'd post again! We post all of our newsletters on our blog as well a week after they get emailed.
Have you noticed that koreans say like 몰라ㅋㅋㅋ or 몰랔ㅋㅋ and gyopos and foreigners say like 몰라 ㅋㅋㅋ? They always add a space.
We were thinking about adding something like this to the post! But it's all a bit of a toss-up.
For Koreans, we've seen a mix of people that use space or don't use space. We've seen older texters (millennials) sometimes don't use a space and the ㅋ ends up becoming a batchim. But again, not always the case!
Thanks for the fun content! Do you do a weekly email of these blog posts? Rather than a daily email? It wasn’t super clear on the website what I’m signing up for via email
Yes! Our weekly newsletter is free. If you go to https://dailytokki.com/ko/signup and click "Newsletter only" that'll subscribe you to the free weekly newsletter. :)
The daily email is a service we offer that we send a question every day for you to answer and receive personalized feedback to improve your Korean!
love it! ㅎㅁㅎ
love this!!
feels little old school but good examples ㅋㅋㅋ
What are some emoticons do you guys use when texting and their meaning?
I was sent -3- OR zzz but don’t know what they mean…
ㅗㅜㅑ, it means seeing something hot. (So sexy)
ㅗ and this means f u
I have often seen -3-
used to express something around indifference or sulkyness. ^3^
might be a “kiss”, not in a flirting way, but just a general expression of good feeling. The eyes are the key difference.
These are some older things that you might be called an 아재 if you use to your teenager relative.
I'm not sure zzz is sleeping. It could be ㅋㅋㅋ just on the English keyboard.
-3- equals to a kiss. Zzz is boring/sleeping. Those are classic characters not necessarily korean ones like ㅋㅋ.
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Thanks.
Post in r/language.
Not really slang but I love that kaomoji are built into the japanese keyboard (≧∀≦) They don’t always format so great into reddit tho _:(´ཀ`」 ∠):
are there some common texting abbreviations?
for example, in english, there’s “idk (i don’t know)”, “lmao (laughing my ass off)”, etc.
would be curious to know! thanks!
"idk" would be "npi" although it will sound rude if used with non-friends (you can guess what the "p" stands for).
These are the ones that first come to mind:
Tqm / tkm (te quiero mucho)
Pq / Xq (porque)
Q / K (Que)
Aunq (Aunque)
Surely there are more but I can't recall any more now :)
thank you!!
Tkm also could be te quiero mucho I don't see it a lot but nls is no lo sé
Ntp = no te preocupes
k for any word containing que (aunk, k, etc) is a big one
I like to use Tmb = También
Hi guys.
Today I want to introduce you to a slang that is pretty popular online and in real life: 낄끼빠빠. I remember this phrase being pretty obscure some time ago, but since then it has been featured numerous times on variety TV and there is even a song titled KKPP(낄끼빠빠) by MiSO (though the song is not quite popular).
This abbreviation stands for the sentence, "낄 때 끼고 빠질 때 빠져라", literally translating to:
Join when you join, leave when you leave
This basically means that you should be wary of situations in which your absence is recommended or simply beneficial in a certain social situation. Simply put, it is a modern proverb for "read the social cues". An example may be help comprehension.
A: 나 내일 여자친구랑 롯데월드 가는데.
B: 어? 나도 내일 스케줄 없는데 같이 가자.
A: 낄끼빠빠 해라...
[A: I am going to Lotte World tomorrow with my girlfriend.
B: Oh? I too am free tomorrow let's go together.
A: Join when you join, leave when you leave]
As you can see 낄끼빠빠 is a versatile expression and can be applied as a noun or a verb (or even an adjective?? ex. "낄끼빠빠할 상황".) But it's an extremely direct term so saying this blatantly to deter someone is considered impolite (unless you intend to hurt the person's feelings or are close enough with the other person to get away with saying this). But if a person insists on accompanying you to social situations and is not properly reading your negative social cues, '낄끼빠빠' will perfectly describe your situation.
I don't know if a similar expression exists in English or any other languages so feel free to share if you know!
In engilsh I might say "read the room" or "take the hint, idiot"
Well, Korean already have thing like '분위기 읽어' or '눈치좀 봐' etc. That is just new slang for teenagers.
Thanks for this! Quick question: You wrote it once as 낄끼빠빠 and later as 낄낄빠빠. Was the former just an 오타?
​
Edit: Never mind. I googled it. It's 낄낄...
​
Edit edit: Well, now I can find both. Hmm. Different ways of saying the same thing?
Oh! Thanks for pointing this out. Seems like the correct abbreviation is 낄끼빠빠, but many Koreans, including me, sometimes misspell it as 낄낄빠빠
This suggests a nuance difference: http://blog.daum.net/_blog/BlogTypeView.do?blogid=0QwRp&articleno=5313&categoryId=95®dt=20171109113347
Ooof how am I supposed to pronounce all the double consonants?? ���� I have so much difficulty with them!
Besides my pronunciation meltdown, thank you for the slang expression!!
I'm loving this Slang a Day~ Thank you so much and more please~
Shit i need this when people invite themselves to my house. Like y u gotta do dat tho
I'm just wondering how much of this is really actually used by native speakers and how much of it is almost never seen.
To be very honest, 90% of this list makes me cringe and I wouldn't be caught dead using these abbreviations (I'm 28 for reference). There are a few exceptions like bjr/bsr, qqn/qqch which are common abbreviations that you see even in professional emails, or mdr/ptdr/askip etc. which are informal and used quite often. But for most of the abbreviations listed, I would assume the person using them is either very young and very bad at spelling, or very old and very bad at texting.
For reference, i'm 24, so I grew up kind of when smartphone were coming out (i had one when i was 14 i think).
Some of these were quite common before, but not so much now. I haven't seen an abbreviation with numbers in at least 8 years. I still use some shortcuts like ns (nous, we), vs (vous, you), pcq (parce que, because), pq (pourquoi, why) and ajd (aujourd'hui, today), but that's about it. What I do though, is completely ignore accents, apostrophes and punctuation, except if it's necessary to understand what I'm writing. For example I will write ca va instead of ça va, j arrive instead of j'arrive, etc.
What about DSL, STP, SVP?
I don't use dsl, i usually write deso, but some friends.
Of course i use stp/svp, i'm dumb i forgot
Some others i use and forgot: mtn (maintenant), pr (pour), ya (il y a), trql (tranquille), tqt (t'inquiète), bcp (beaucoup)
I looked at some of my texts woth friends and these are by far the most common ones i use. There are probably some others
Extra one that is more recent is tt (télétravail, work from home)
Honourable mention to a+. I still use that. Anything else though I'd only use if trying to be ironic
I used à + before mobile phones.
It's not a texting abbreviation, it's just common to replace plus/moins with +/- in French. I remember a class back in the day during which our teacher was listing the pro and cons of something on the blackboard, and she wrote +/- instead of les plus/les moins. A foreign student was confused.
I alternate between "cordialement" and A+ at the end of my e-mails (work and people I'm formal with vs friends and coworkers I see every day).
I think it's hilarious that "FAI" (Internet Provider) is on the list. Oh yeah, when I was 13, I was totally dropping that in some conversations.
The only ones I use are : a+, askip, d'ac / dak, mdr, qqch, ras, rdv, tkt, y a / ya.
Only for informal messages with friends.
Monster seulgi and irene
peek a boo - red velvet
The picture is chaein purplekiss
She looks so fine OML
Can’t you see me txt
monster - exo
🗣
lol i think this is going to be smth neo and i am so ready for it
Louder itzy
go! cortis
Shout Out- ENHYPEN is the first thing I thought!
Still Monster- ENHYPEN!
I love how op also mentioned underrated groups❤
someone sent me this tonight and i have absolutely no clue what it means… i figured it’s just a way to say lmao like ㅋㅋㅋㅋ but i wanna make 100% sure hahaha. 감사합니다 🥰
laughing and crying like 😂😭 or 😂💀💀 basically HAHAHA
In short: 😂 <—- this emoji. The crying laughing emoji.
ㅋㅋㅋㅋ laughing ㅠㅠㅠㅠ crying ㅋㅋㅋ큐ㅠㅠㅠ laughing soooo much soooo funny they started crying of laughter , same as that crying emoji we use for laughing
That’s hilarious 😆
It’s a feeling that’s both funny and sad at the same time,
like laughing while feeling a bit sad.
😂😂😂 = A sad situation, but with a little fun. (웃프다 : 웃기다 + 슬프다)
It means you laugh so hard, even your tear ducts are so squeezed and producing tears! It happens to me quite often. We also use " I laughed so hard my navel came out! 🤣🤣🤣
.
"στήλες" means "columns", but it's probably a typo for "στείλε" which means "send" (singular aorist imperative).
"στείλε φωτο σου" means "send (me) a photo of yourself"
Ok thanks
The literal translation would be "send your photo", as a reference
Sounds like autocorrect over-correction.
ओहो, तिम्रो च्याट इतिहास पढ्दा यस्तो लाग्छ कि तिमी शब्दहरूको जंगलमा गुम्न रुचाउँछौ! हरेक सन्देशले मेरो कम्प्युटरलाई पनि सोध्न बाध्य पार्छ, "ए, यो के सोच हो र तिमीलाई के चलिरहेको छ?" तिमी जस्तो दिमागले इन्टरनेटको स्लो कनेक्सनजस्तै—कहिलेकाहीँ काम गर्छ, कहिलेकाहीँ त बिर्सन्छ कि अपडेट कति जरुरी हुन्छ!
hahahha ok
aba algorithm le nai bhanesi ta laaj lagnu parne haina ra.
popular korean texting abbreviations
Key Considerations for Korean Texting Abbreviations:
Cultural Context: Many abbreviations are rooted in Korean culture and internet slang, so understanding the context can enhance your comprehension.
Common Usage: These abbreviations are often used in casual conversations among friends or on social media platforms.
Variability: Some abbreviations may vary by region or among different age groups, so it's good to be aware of the audience.
Popular Korean Texting Abbreviations:
Takeaway: Familiarizing yourself with these abbreviations can help you understand and engage in casual conversations with Korean speakers more effectively.
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