ABSTRACT
One unique characteristic of Korean is that nouns are typically marked by particles. There is no corresponding equivalent in English. Korean has two types of particles: case particles and special particles. Korean also includes “special particles.” Although particles are tightly bound to the noun and are an integral part of it, they are often omitted in everyday speech. The omission of particles in colloquial conversation is possible because the context of the conversation is often sufficient to indicate the syntactic roles of the nouns being used. In double-subject constructions, choosing which noun should be understood as the emphasized subject can be confusing. Because of this Koreans use context and other linguistic cues such as intonation to figure out where the emphasis lies. The importance of contextual understanding is even more evident in everyday speech, where particles are often omitted altogether.
