The Korean language courses are hot picks among Carleton students with over 200 signs up, which grabbed the third top spot in Carleton’s linguistic department, after Spanish and Japanese.

 

In 2020, “Parasite,” a movie directed by Bong Joon-ho, made history by becoming the first non-English language film to win the Best Picture at the 92nd Academy Awards. One year later, “Squid Game,” a Korean series created by Hwang Dong-hyuk, and released by Netflix became a top global trend.

 

The constant rise of Korean culture has motivated Hyoun-jeong Yoo, a Carleton’s Korean language Instructor with nearly two decades of teaching experience, to be the first person to bring a Korean language course to Ottawa.

​

Yoo’s inspiration to become a teacher came when she was doing her first master’s degree in Japanese language and history in Japan.

 

“When I was doing my master's thesis in Japan, my two supervisor professors inspired me a lot,” said Yoo. “They show me that teachers could change lives.”

 

After graduating, she returned to South Korea and began teaching the Japanese language to the Korean people for seven years.

​

When Yoo got a new job teaching the Korean language to foreigners, she realized promoting her culture through language was her true passion.

 

Her journey took her from China, Japan, Germany and finally to Canada.

 

In 2013, Yoo moved to Ottawa, where she completed her second Master's degree in Film Studies and is currently pursuing a PhD in Applied Linguistics at Carleton University.

 

However, to her great expectations of Canada’s diversity, no Korean language course was offered in the capital city.

 

“That is a shame because no one offers it,” said Yoo. “I felt the responsibility as a Korean, I have to contribute to spreading my own culture.”

 

Yoo’s determination drove her to reach out to universities in Ottawa. Within a few hours, she got a reply from Carleton University and started building a language course from scratch.

 

“There is no resource that I can access… nothing,” said Yoo. “Many people who work for our department are willing to help me, but they don’t know how to do it.

 

The linguistic department offers Korean language courses, from beginner to advanced level, every semester around the year, which is the same as other language courses being taught at the university, including Spanish, Russian, Chinese, and Japanese.

 

In the first three to four years, the course initially attracted Asian and linguistics department students, predominantly females, drawn by a deep interest in Korean cultural elements like K-Pop and K-Drama.

 

Laura Manoilescu, a history major student, shared how K-Pop introduced her to the Korean language, but the culture in general hooked her to learning the Korean language; and motivated her to move to South Korea, for a master’s degree.

 

“I want to do a master’s program somewhere overseas, and I thought that Korea has a really good education,” said Manoilescu. “Also watching K-Drama without the need of a subtitle is cool as well.”

 

Rachel Share, an English Literature major student, shared how she took Korean to fulfil her breadth requirement, but ended up making it a minor, as she fell in love with the language while taking Yoo’s first-year Korean class.

 

“I would say that she is very active, she likes to try a variety of things,” said Share. “It’s very easy to get engaged in her lesson and see where it applies in real life speaking a new language.”

 

With the increased demand of Korean first-year level registers, the course will be offered from the fall to summer semester and will be divided into different sections and time slots, to meet the high demand of students taking the course.

 

One instructor will oversee teaching in a small classroom, with a capacity of 20 to 30 students, to ensure the overall learning and teaching experience.

 

Despite students’ interest in K-Culture, Yoo emphasizes the need to anchor linguistic pursuits in long-term career aspirations rather than solely on popular cultural trends to sustain motivation.

 

"Learning and understanding another language is a great potential, a power to your future,” said Yoo. “It’s time to expand the desire to understand culture and to promote the Korean language to everybody.”