South Korean Society - Foreign Influences

Foreign Influences

South Korea has been highly influenced in recent years by foreign countries; initially the primary influence was from the United States and Japan (mostly during and after the Japanese occupation). Many people enjoyed watching American films. The influence of foreign countries has changed peoples' eating habits as well; many people now enjoy Western and other Asian foods in addition to traditional Korean food. Pizza is one of the favorite foreign foods among South Koreans, though it tends to differ from the pizza served in the west, often featuring corn, sweet potato, mayonnaise, bulgogi and various other ingredients. Many Western hamburger, chicken, coffee, and ice cream chains are also very popular in South Korea. Coffeehouses operated by 12 major brands increased to over 2,000 locations in 2010, and the term "coffice" (커피스) was coined to describe using a cafe as an office.

South Korean dress is also being more heavily influenced by foreign styles.

Recently, the Korean language has had a huge influx of English words, sometimes expressed as Konglish. Examples of Konglish:

• Eye shopping (ai syopping 아이 쇼핑) refers to 'window shopping'.
• Service (seobisseu 서비스) usually means 'complimentary', such as a gift with purchase or warranty service.
• Hand phone (hendeu pon 핸드폰) refers to 'mobile phone'.
• Paiting or Hwaiting (a loanword from 'fighting', English) is a phrase used to 'cheer' someone during a difficult trial.
• One shot is a phrase used while drinking similar to bottoms up, suggesting to down your drink in one go.

Also because the English alphabet has letters that do not exist in the Korean alphabet other letters are usually substituted for others when referring to certain English words. The letter F is replaced with the letter P and the letter Z replaced with the letter J:

• Kopi (coffee)
• Pija (pizza)