The Complete Beginner's Guide to Hangul Consonants When many people first see Korean writing, they feel nervous. The letters look unfamiliar. They do not look like English. They do not look like French, Spanish, or German either. For many beginners, Korean seems like a language made of symbols. But Hangul is not random. Hangul, the Korean writing system, was designed to be logical. Once you understand how the letters work, Korean becomes much less frightening. As a native Korean speaker and educator, I always tell beginners the same thing: Do not try to memorize Korean letters as strange shapes. Try to understand how they are built. In this lesson, we will start with Korean consonants. These are the basic sounds you need before you can read Korean words naturally. What Are Hangul Consonants? Hangul is made of consonants and vowels. In Korean, letters are not written one after another in a straight line like English. Instead, consonants and vowels are combined into syllable blocks. ...