my-korean1-2nd-ed

90
Negative Question Usage
UNIT 3 피자 좋아하세요?
When asking questions in Korean, people use the negative form very often.
For example, in Situation Dialogue 2, “배 안 고파?” (Are you not hungry?) is
used where in English we would ask Are you hungry? (“배 고파?”). When
this is used, you should think of the question as if it were not in the negative
form. Negative questions are used often because they are indirect and
therefore less intimidating. Using the negative form often will make your
Korean sound more natural.
Another aspect of negative questions that can be very confusing to non-native
speakers of Korean is that when answering, the opposite occurs from what
happens in English. If in English someone asks you Aren’t you hungry? you
can respond by saying No, I’m not hungry but in Korean you would have to
reply with Yes, I’m not hungry (어, 배 안 고파) because you are agreeing
with the negation, i.e. agreeing that you are indeed not hungry. On the other
hand, if you are hungry then you can reply with No, I’m hungry (아니, 배
고파) which may sound very strange in English, but it is a correct and natural
way to respond in Korean.
A good strategy for avoiding the “yes/no” problem is to just answer the
question with a straight statement. For example, 배 안 고파 (I’m hungry).