Oxford English Dictionary Adds 26 Korean Words

They include a term for the world's growing interest in South Korean culture
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Oct 5, 2021 5:14 PM CDT
English Dictionary Adds 26 Korean Words
K-Pop band BTS is among the Korean exports taking the world by storm.   (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man, File)

The Korean wave has swept over the Oxford English Dictionary, which included more than two dozen new entries for words of Korean origin in its latest edition. The dictionary, which describes itself as the "definitive record of the English language," says the growing global popularity of Korean culture has affected the language as well as film, music, food, and fashion, the BBC reports. The 26 words it added include hallyu, defined as "the increase in international interest in South Korea and its popular culture." A full list of the new entries can be found here.

Many of the newly added words relate to food, including kimbap, "a Korean dish consisting of cooked rice and other ingredients wrapped in a sheet of seaweed and cut into bite-sized slices," and bulgogi, "a dish of thin slices of beef or pork which are marinated then grilled or stir-fried." The OED says kimchi, Korea's most iconic dish, was first added to the dictionary in 1976 and the entry was revised for the new version. Another new entry is mukbang, for livestreams featuring a person eating large amounts of food and talking to the audience, the Guardian reports.

The surge in South Korean cultural exports includes Squid Game, which Netflix says could be its biggest show ever, CNN reports. The OED says the new entries include Korean adaptations of existing English words, including the interjection fighting, meaning "Go for it!" The dictionary says the development of Korean words in English shows how "lexical innovations" in English are happening outside the UK and other countries where English is the dominant language. "They show how Asians in different parts of the continent invent and exchange words within their own local contexts, then introduce these words to the rest of the English-speaking world, thus allowing the Korean wave to continue to ripple on the sea of English words," the OED says. (More Oxford English Dictionary stories.)

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