Studying Korean on Instagram

It’s hard to believe that just a decade ago we were limited to learning languages from instructors, textbooks, and the occasional audio recording.

Social media and the Internet as a whole has been such a central part of my own self-studying process that I can’t imagine getting to the level that I’m at with just textbooks. It all started with Twitter and Me2day (remember Me2day?!) about 5 years ago and since then, I think I’ve found useful Korean resources on all types of social media.

Back in December, I added Instagram to that repertoire. I can’t remember how I found @hangulove, but it’s now by far one of my favorite Instagram accounts.

Hangulove is an account for native Korean speakers looking to correct some bad habits they might’ve picked up while growing up with their language. The account covers correct grammar, spelling, spacing of words (띄어쓰기), and examples of pure Korean words (순우리말, as opposed to Sino-Korean words).

The admin posts once a day, with a simple image (like below) and an extended explanation of the lesson in the comments. All the explanations are in Korean, so you have to be at least an intermediate/upper intermediate level to get the most value out of it.

It’s interesting to find out what constitutes “common mistakes” for native Korean speakers. I’m a stickler for spelling – both in English and Korean, so it always shocks me when I see misspelled words in webtoons or on Twitter. I used to think it was done on purpose, like some kind of text-speak (like writing ‘u’ instead of ‘you’ online), but now I have to wonder.

This account reminds me a lot of 국립국어원’s offical Twitter account (@urimal365) which I wrote about a long time ago here. I actually thought @urimal365 was dead because I never saw them on my Twitter feed… but they’re apparently still alive and posting frequently! (My feed has become overrun with non-Korean related Tweets over the years).

It’s a lot less overwhelming though. The “lessons” are simple enough to digest, but still provide the detail you’d want to learn something. Plus it’s just one post a day, stuck in the middle of all the #catsofinstagram posts running down your feed. I do wish they would post more vocabulary in the future – 순우리말 has always fascinated me. And I could always do with a vocabulary boost.

Does anyone else use specific social media accounts to learn/study Korean (or any other language?). Share your thoughts below!