아/야
a/ya
Grammar · 1 sense
Informal address
Examples
야, 이 멍청아! 제대로 공부 안 해?
Hey, you idiot! Won't you study properly?
새야 새야 파랑새야.
Bird, bird, bluebird.
철수야, 어디 가니?
Cheolsu, where are you going?
When you'd hear it
아/야 is used in casual speech when calling someone by name or addressing them directly, especially among friends, to children, or in familiar songs and dialogue. It can sound rude or overly familiar toward strangers, elders, customers, or people of higher status.
What learners get wrong
This is a vocative particle, not the sentence-ending 야 that can make a statement sound casual or emphatic. Use 야 after a name ending in a vowel, such as 철수야, and 아 after a consonant-ending name, such as 민석아.
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