"The man speaks English well."
Translation:남자가 영어를 잘합니다.
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The infinitive verb 하다 means to do and if you add the adjective 잘 to the front of it, it means: to do X를 well. In Korean, their adjectives can actuallybe verbs. For example a direct translation of this sentence is: Man goods English. But because in English we can't use an adjective as a verb, its hard to understand for native English speakers. Another example might be: 개가 나쁘다 (The dog is bad), but the direct translation in English would be "Dog bads."
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That is an astute question ... I will venture an answer. I think 韓 is ambiguous ... only one of several meanings for that character maps to Korea, according to a few references I looked at. Like so many Chinese-derived words, it is the combination of two or more characters that gets you from general concept to specific denotation. And in this case, it's 'close to home' ... in other words, 한 could reference a lot of familiar things (like, isn't there a Han Dynasty, and a Han ethnic group in China, and a Han surname?). So I'm guessing the foreign country references are less ambiguous?
A corollary question I would pose is: You hear 한국말 a lot, but I don't recall Koreans using 미국말 or 영국말. Are these forms correct?
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Let's take this one step further:
이야기 하다 - story + to do
말 하다 - word/speech + to do
대화 하다 - conversation + to do
So, next you get:
[ ]어 하다 - [country] language + to do
And here, 영국 is the Korean name for England, contracted to just 영 (as 국 means country).
So this sentence really is "The man does England language well."
So, to answer B. StarGirl's question directly, the reference to talking in this sentence is 어 (language).
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Wouldn't it be better if i say "남자가 영어를 잘해요" ? And would it be alright if I say "남자가 영어로 잘해요" ? Please answer me tnx. ◇◇◇