Japanese amae-like behavior (childlike pleading and dependence) is common in Korea too, but Korean has no single word for it; a corpus analysis suggests the feeling underneath is jeong (정).
A Cognitive Study on Jeong in Korean and Amae in Japanese
한국의 ‘정(情)’과 일본의 ‘아마에(甘え)’에 대한 인지적 고찰
QUESTION
Does an amae-like phenomenon exist in Korean culture, how similar is it to Japanese amae, and can this be explained linguistically?
FINDINGS
There is no single Korean word matching Japanese amae; instead several related words — aegyo (애교), ayang (아양), eorigwang (어리광), eungseok (응석) — are used side by side.
‘아마에’에 해당하는 개념이 한국어에는 단일 용어로서 존재하는 것이 아니라…the concept corresponding to amae does not exist in Korean as a single term; rather…p7‘애교’, ‘아양’, ‘어리광’, ‘응석’의 대표적 한국어 표현을 살펴본 결과…having examined the representative Korean expressions aegyo, ayang, eorigwang, and eungseok…p7‘가족유사성(family resemblance) (Wittgenstein 1953)’의 특징을 가진 여러 개의 단어가 공존하는 듯하다…several words with the character of ‘family resemblance’ (Wittgenstein 1953) seem to coexist.p7In the same corpus, jeong (정) appeared 308 times — far more often than words like aegyo or eungseok.
현대 문어코퍼스를 검색한 결과, 308회의 ‘정(情)’을 발견하였다Searching the modern written corpus, 308 occurrences of jeong (情) were found.p9위의 다른 단어와의 빈도수의 격차는 놀라운 것이며The gap in frequency compared with the words above is striking…p9Taken together, the examples show jeong as a sticky, binding feeling that forms within relationships over a long time.
‘정’은 오랜 시간에 걸친 관계 속에서 형성되는 끈끈한 감정이다Jeong is a sticky feeling formed within relationships over a long period of time.p17Childlike dependent behaviors such as eorigwang and eungseok were portrayed negatively in every example — common, but not socially encouraged.
모든 예에서 이러한 어린아이와 같은 의존 행위가 부정적인 시각으로 비추어지고 있다는 것이다…in all the examples, such childlike dependent behavior is viewed in a negative light.p21즉, ‘정’ 때문에 생긴 흔한 행동 양상이긴 하나, 사회/문화적으로 권장되고 있지 않음을 알 수 있다That is, although it is a common behavior pattern arising from jeong, it is not socially/culturally encouraged.p21Amae has a verb form (amaeru) and covers both feeling and behavior, whereas jeong has no verb form and refers only to the feeling.
‘정’의 경우에는 ‘정다운’ ‘다정하게’와 같은 표현은 있으나 동사형은 없는 것으로 보아In the case of jeong, there are expressions such as jeongdaun (affectionate) and dajeonghage (warmly), but since there is no verb form…p22일본어의 ‘아마에’가 심리/행동체계를 모두 아우르는 개념이라면, 한국어의 ‘정’은 오히려 그 심리 상태만을 이르는 표현임을 알 수 있었다If Japanese amae is a concept covering both the psychological and behavioral systems, Korean jeong turned out to refer only to the psychological state.p22‘아마에’가 ‘아마에루(甘える)’, ‘아마야까수(甘やかす)’라는 동사형을 가지고 있는 반면Whereas amae has the verb forms amaeru (甘える) and amayakasu (甘やかす)…p22IN DAILY LIFE
Calling close elders hyeong, oppa, eonni, or nuna (older brother/sister), and seeing an ideal teacher or boss as a mother or father figure — family jeong extended beyond the family.
친한 손윗사람은 ‘형’ ‘오빠’ ‘언니’ ‘누나’가 되고, 이상적인 선생님과 회사 상사는 ‘어머니’ ‘아버지’와 같은 사람이다A close senior becomes hyeong, oppa, eonni, or nuna, and an ideal teacher or company boss is someone like a mother or father.p19가족 간의 관계를 규정짓는 ‘정’이라는 개념이 가족 밖으로도 확대 투영될 수 있음을 보여준다…shows that the concept of jeong, which defines family relationships, can be extended and projected beyond the family.p19Neighborly jeong: plates of steaming rice cakes passed over the wall between houses, exchanged with smiles (an example sentence from the corpus).
김이 모락모락 나는 떡접시가 담장을 넘으며 웃음을 교환하는 형태로…in the form of plates of steaming rice cakes passing over the wall and smiles being exchanged…p19우리 겨레의 이같은 뿌리 깊은 이웃간의 정은 김이 모락모락This deep-rooted jeong between neighbors among our people… steaming…p19In depth
This paper, more closely — every sentence carries an original quote and page number.
Background
The study began with a simple question: what exactly is Japanese amae? Amae is known as a key to understanding Japanese culture, but linguistic studies of it were scarce.
‘일본어의 아마에(甘え)란 과연 무엇인가?’하는 매우 단순한 질문에서 시작하였다It began from a very simple question: “What exactly is amae (甘え) in Japanese?”p1일본 문화 및 일본인을 이해하는 중요한 개념으로 알려져…has become known as an important concept for understanding Japanese culture and the Japanese…p1언어학적인 관점에서의 연구는 거의 없는 것으로 알려져 있다…there are known to be almost no studies from a linguistic perspective.p2Amae is often described as uniquely Japanese, yet some had pointed out that similar behavior is common in everyday Korean life.
‘아마에’는 흔히 일본이라는 나라를 특징지어 주는 개념(uniquely Japanese concept)으로 잘 알려져 있다Amae is well known as a concept that characterizes Japan (a uniquely Japanese concept).p3‘아마에’와 같은 현상은 한국의 일상생활에도 빈번히 일어나고 있는 듯하다Phenomena like amae seem to occur frequently in everyday Korean life as well.p3Method
A cognitive analysis that searched a corpus (a large collection of real written texts) for word frequencies and examples, then sorted uses of jeong by type of metaphor.
21세기 세종계획에서 제공하고 있는 7백만 어절의 현대 문어 코퍼스를 검색하였다…searched the modern written corpus of 7 million word units provided by the 21st Century Sejong Project.p4비교적 중립적 의미를 가지며 빈도가 높은 ‘애교’, ‘응석’, ‘어리광’, ‘아양’ 의 네 개의 표현을 선택하여 살펴보았다…selected and examined four expressions with relatively neutral meanings and high frequency: aegyo, eungseok, eorigwang, and ayang.p4‘정’의 의미체계를 코퍼스에 나타난 실제 언어 사용을 통한 인지적 분석을 통하여…through a cognitive analysis of actual language use found in the corpus, the meaning system of jeong…p9본 코퍼스에서도 그와 유사한 개념화의 예를 볼 수 있었다Similar examples of conceptualization could be seen in this corpus as well.p10Detailed findings
Frequencies were: aegyo 47, eungseok 46, eorigwang 30, ayang 9.
(1) ‘애교’ 47회, (2) ‘응석’ 46회, (3) ‘어리광’ 30회, (4) ‘아양’ 9회(1) aegyo 47 times, (2) eungseok 46 times, (3) eorigwang 30 times, (4) ayang 9 timesp4Aegyo referred to positive feminine charm or small, laughable mistakes, and was mostly positive.
‘애교’는 코퍼스에서 긍정적인 여성적 특징을 지칭하거나 웃어넘길 수 있는 작은 실수를 지칭하여In the corpus, aegyo refers to positive feminine traits or to small mistakes that can be laughed off…p532 of the 46 uses of eungseok came from a single book about Japanese culture, inflating its count.
‘응석’의 경우 46번 중 32번이 한 자료에서 나온 것이었다In the case of eungseok, 32 of the 46 came from a single source.p6코퍼스 자료 중의 하나인 김용운(1985)이 일본 문화에 관한 저서로 ‘아마에’와 유사한 개념으로 ‘응석’을 사용하였기에 ‘응석’의 빈도가 높아졌음은 유의할 점이다Note that the frequency of eungseok rose because one of the corpus sources, Kim Yong-un (1985), a book on Japanese culture, used eungseok as a concept similar to amae.p6Jeong appeared 308 times, far more than the other words, which the author takes as showing jeong is a defining concept of Korean culture.
현대 문어코퍼스를 검색한 결과, 308회의 ‘정(情)’을 발견하였다Searching the modern written corpus, 308 occurrences of jeong (情) were found.p9위의 다른 단어와의 빈도수의 격차는 놀라운 것이며, ‘정(情)’이야말로 실로 한국 문화를 대표하는 개념임을 알 수 있는 결과라 하겠다The frequency gap compared with the words above is striking, and this result shows that jeong is truly the concept representing Korean culture.p9As in “building up jeong” or “jeong growing thicker,” jeong is pictured as something that piles up, implying that relationships take time to form.
‘정’을 차곡차곡 쌓거나 두터워지는 것으로 개념화하여 그 관계의 형성을 위해서는 시간이 필요함을…conceptualizing jeong as something piled up layer by layer or growing thicker, showing that time is needed to form the relationship.p11Jeong is also pictured as a string tying people together, so relationships begin and end with jeong being attached, detached, cut, or falling away.
‘정’의 관계가 시작하고 끝나는 것을 ‘붙이다, 떼다, 끊다, 떨어지다, 단절되다’ 등의 비유를 사용한다…metaphors such as attaching, detaching, cutting, falling off, and severing are used for the beginning and end of a jeong relationship.p14여기서의 ‘정’은 사람과 사람 사이를 이어주는 연결 끈에 비유된다…here jeong is likened to a string connecting person to person.p14As in “children starved for jeong,” jeong is pictured as nourishment — not an optional extra but something people need to live.
정은 있어도 되고 없어도 되는 부수적인 감정이 아니라, 사람이 살기 위해 반드시 필요한 것으로 비유되고 있다Jeong is likened not to an incidental feeling one can do with or without, but to something absolutely necessary for people to live.p16때때로 ‘정’은 사람이 먹고 마셔야 할 자양분으로 개념화되곤 한다At times jeong is conceptualized as nourishment that people must eat and drink.p16코퍼스에서는 다음과 같은 예를 볼 수 있었다. (33) ㄱ. 정에 굶주린 아이들이라The corpus showed examples such as: (33a) “being children starved for jeong…”p16Dependent behaviors like eorigwang and eungseok are common outgrowths of jeong, but are not socially or culturally encouraged.
사회/문화적으로 권장되고 있지 않음을 알 수 있다…it can be seen that they are not socially/culturally encouraged.p21모든 예에서 이러한 어린아이와 같은 의존 행위가 부정적인 시각으로 비추어지고 있다는 것이다. 즉, ‘정’ 때문에 생긴 흔한 행동 양상이긴 하나…in all the examples such childlike dependent behavior is viewed negatively. That is, although it is a common behavior pattern arising from jeong…p21Authors’ interpretation
The author argues Korean has no single word covering both feeling and behavior like amae; words for the behavior (aegyo, eungseok, etc.) and the word for the inner system (jeong) exist separately.
그러한 행동양식을 지칭하는 표현과 심리 체계를 표현하는 표현이 별개로 존재함을 주장하고자 한다…argues that expressions designating such behavior patterns and expressions designating the psychological system exist separately.p8본 연구는 한국어에는 ‘아마에’와 같이 심리와 행동양식 모두를 지칭하는 단일한 개념의 단어는 존재하지 않으며This study argues that Korean has no single concept word that, like amae, designates both the psychology and the behavior pattern…p8위의 ‘애교’, ‘아양’, ‘어리광’, ‘응석’ 등의 행동을 가능케 하는 한국적 개념으로서 ‘정(情)’을 제시하고자 한다…proposes jeong (情) as the Korean concept that makes behaviors such as aegyo, ayang, eorigwang, and eungseok possible.p8In communities built on jeong extended from the family, feeling and intuition carry more weight than law or social justice.
법이나 사회 정의보다는 감성과 직관이 더 힘을 발휘하게 된다…feeling and intuition come to wield more power than law or social justice.p20가족 관계에서 투사된 ‘정’을 바탕으로 한 사회 공동체 안에서는…within a social community based on jeong projected from family relationships…p20Limits the authors note
Key terms
Amae (甘え) Rooted in the infant–mother bond: an adult acting like a baby, leaning on others and expecting to be accepted.
어른이 마치 아기의 역할을 하여, 다른 사람에게 의존하며 받아들여지기를 기대할 수 있다는 것이다That is, an adult can take the role of a baby, depending on others and expecting to be accepted.p3도이(1973)에 따르면, ‘아마에’는 아기와 어머니와의 관계에서 시작되며According to Doi (1973), amae begins in the relationship between a baby and its mother…p3Amaeru and amayakasu The person who shows amae is said to amaeru; the person who indulges it is said to amayakasu.
‘아마에’를 하는 사람은 ‘아마에루(甘える)’ 한다고 하고, 이를 받아주는 상대방은 ‘아마야까수(甘やかす)’한다고 말한다The person doing amae is said to amaeru (甘える), and the other who accepts it is said to amayakasu (甘やかす).p3Metaphor A way of thinking that understands one area of ideas in terms of another, more familiar one (e.g., understanding jeong as an object that piles up).
은유란 한 개념 영역(‘목표영역’)의 측면에서 다른 한 개념 영역(‘근원영역’)을 이해하는 인지 과정이다Metaphor is a cognitive process of understanding one conceptual domain (the target domain) in terms of another conceptual domain (the source domain).p10우리에게 익숙한 우리의 신체, 사물 등으로 개념화하는 것이다…to conceptualize it in terms of things familiar to us, such as our bodies and objects.p10‘정’을 차곡차곡 쌓거나 두터워지는 것으로 개념화하여…conceptualizing jeong as something piled up layer by layer or growing thicker…p11