Elementary - Grade 1
Lesson 3: Sound Change - Liaison (연음)
Connecting the Blocks
You've mastered how to pronounce a syllable when it's by itself. But what happens when syllables are next to each other?
The most common and important sound change rule is called 연음 (yeon-eum), or liaison. It's a fancy word for a simple idea: a final consonant sound moves over to the next syllable if that syllable starts with a vowel (the silent placeholder ㅇ).
How It Works: The Sound Jumps Over
Think of the silent `ㅇ` as an empty parking spot. If the syllable before it has a final consonant (batchim), that consonant's sound will drive right into that empty spot.
Let's take the word for "music," 음악.
Written as: eum + ak
The ㅁ sound from 음 moves over...
Pronounced as: eu-mak
The Batchim Rule Breaker!
Remember in the last lesson how many batchim letters are pronounced as [t]? (e.g., 옷 is pronounced like 'ot').
Liaison changes this! When a batchim consonant moves to the next syllable, it keeps its original sound. The 7-sound rule is temporarily ignored.
Consider the word "clothes," 옷, combined with the subject particle 이.
Written as: ot + i
The ㅅ [s] sound moves over. It does NOT sound like [t].
Pronounced as: o-si
This Is the Key to Sounding Natural
Understanding 연음 is the difference between reading Korean like a robot and speaking it like a native. From now on, whenever you see a syllable ending in a consonant followed by a syllable starting with `ㅇ`, remember to connect the sound.