한국어의 음절구조에 대한 연구 경향과 전망

Issues on the syllable structure in Korean

  This paper surveys some issues related to the syllable structure of Korean. In the previous literature, it has been considered that the internal structure of syllable in Korean is right-branching following English syllable structure(Fudge 1987 and many others). However, researchers claim that syllable structure of Korean is left-branching, in which the onset and the nucleus form a unit. Apart from left or right branching argument, there is another view for Korean, in which language has flat syllable structure. Three different types of argument has made in the previous research. Thus, I shall try to examine research papers as well as phonology textbooks for student to find out what is the major issue and problem for syllable structure in Korean among them. Finally, I shall introduce the current trend for analysing syllable structure.