#topic particle

I’m sorry I haven’t responded to this before (and for not posting anything new) I’ve had some personal business to attend to, and I’ll probably be busy for a while - but I am here. 

I had to read up on some rules because this is super hard for anyone who isn’t native.  A lot of the time the two particles are interchangeable, but there can be a difference in meaning that sometimes means you can’t interchange them. Here are some of those things: 은/는 are topic particles/ topic marker  이/가 are subject particles/ subject marker  The topic is the person or thing which is the main focus of your sentence. The subject of the sentence is not always the topic. Furthermore, when you use 은/는 it can work as an “emphasiser”. So in your sentence :선생님은 교실에 없습니다 the emphasis is on the teacher being absent, if anyone else isn’t there, that’s not important to the speaker, it’s only the teacher who’s important here.   

Now, I found some rules, that I haven’t heard of before… or maybe I just forgot, I honestly don’t remember. But they seem plausible soooo: If your sentence contains two nouns and a descriptive verb, you should generally use the topic marker on the first noun and the subject marker on the second noun.If your sentence contains 있다/없다 you should always use the subject marker on the noun in front of it same goes for 아니다 (but not 이다). 

Like I said, I’m not sure about these last rules, so if any of you smarties know anything remember sharing is caring! 

The memrise continues :D It was mostly review again (I’m still not done with that but I haven’t really been trying that hard) but I did do a bit of new stuff so that was fun. As for Korean Grammar in Use, I moved on to the next chapter today so it’ll be all about particles for a while ^^ Today I looked at the subject and topic particles which was good because they seem pretty similar at first so I was a bit confused but the book seems to have explained it pretty well ^^

A frequently mentioned question is what is the difference between 이/가 and 은/는. A partial answer came to me once I realized the striking resemblance to the issue of indefinite and definite articles (something Koreans struggle with).

Here is what I came up with:

The Nonspecific 은/는

은/는 is in a certain way akin to the indefinite article, but not really. You cannot 100% of the time use 은/는 when you use a/an in English. However, the main idea, that you use it when stating a generalized fact about something is the same. So I think it is better to say it is nonspecific. When you want to say a general fact about the sea, you will use 은/는 instead of the sun.

For example you wanted to let someone know that the sea is blue. In Korean you will say the following using 은/는:

Example: 바다는 파래요.

The Specific 이/가

In contrast to that you have 이/가. 이/가 is used when you want to say something about a specific thing, rather than say a generalizing fact about a whole entity. The best example is that you imagine yourself standing in front of a sea and that sea is so beautiful and you want to tell what you think to someone. In that case you will use 이/가 rather than 은/는:

Example: 바다가 아름답네요.

So you need to realize that the particles bring a different nuance to a sentence. you can write the exact same sentence using 은/는 and 이/가, but the sentences will have a nuance difference.

Example #1: 꽃의 냄새가 좋아요. – A flower’s scent is nice. (Flowers in general have a nice scent.)

Example #2: 꽃의 냄새는 좋아요. – The flower’s scent is nice. (This one flower has a nice scent.)

Aw thank you! That’s a pretty good example actually! 

In the first sentence you’re talking about today “today is…” in the second sentence you’re talking about what someone did today “you did…today”. 

You see how the two are different? The topic in the first sentence is 오늘 and that’s why you use the topic marker here. In the second sentence “오늘 뭐했어요?” the topic is hidden/implied, the topic would be you/he/she/it/the pony/whatever that did something today and that’s where you’d use your topic marker. So if 오늘 did/does something you could put an 은 on it. 

여기는 추워요 (burası soğuk derken diğer sıcak olan yer ile bir karşılaştırma yapmış olursun)

여기는 더워요 (burası sıcak derken, diğer soğuk yer ile bir karşılaşma yapıyorsun)