Spoken by more than 75 million people on the Korean peninsula and around the world, Korean is an increasingly important Critical Language due to South Korea’s growing economic position in Asia and the highly impactful geopolitics of the Korean Peninsula. The Korean language also reaches global audiences through widespread interest in popular Korean film, television, and music. Korean classes prepare students to participate in international experiences such as MIT-Korea.
The Korean Studies curriculum promotes critical thinking skills, communicative and interpersonal abilities, and intercultural competence, as well as linguistic proficiency itself, through various resources. Korean Studies holds these five competences as vital skills for language learners and for any student to become an intellectual global citizen. The Korean language curriculum is carefully designed to integrate language and culture at all levels by adopting innovative pedagogical methods. Its special focus on functional proficiency, through interactions with various sources of Korean language media and native speaker usage, allows students to express themselves in a culturally natural manner. All instructional materials and assessments are developed based on the Communicative Language Teaching approach.
Korean Studies may be applied to the Korean Concentration, and the major, minor and Concentration in Asian and Asian Diaspora Studies. Learn more about the Korean Concentration at the Academic Programs page. Information on Asian and Asian Diaspora Studies programs are available through SHASS. Advisors for these programs are listed below. Students uncertain what level of Korean language to take should refer to placement information. Information on transfer credit is available here.
Korean Concentration: Hee-Jeong Jeong
Asian and Asian Diaspora Studies Minor/Major: Sana Aiyar
Global Languages Korean Studies group: Hee-Jeong Jeong | Cheol-Rin Park
Spring 2024
| 21G.902 | Korean II |
| 21G.904 | Korean IV |
| 21G.906 | Korean VI |
A note regarding the enrollment policy of the Global Languages: Enrollment limited to 16 for pedagogical reasons. Preference will be given to pre-registered students, including pre-registered undergraduates who were cut from the same class the previous semester due to the enrollment cap. Please note that you have to attend the first day of class to maintain your preference level. In case of over-enrollment, preference will be given in the following order: declared concentrators, first-years, sophomores, juniors, seniors and graduate students. No listeners.