여성

Korean

Etymology

Sino-Korean word from 女性, from 女 (“female”) + 性 (“sex”)

Pronunciation

• (SK Standard/Seoul) IPA^(key): [jʌ̹sʰʌ̹ŋ]

  • Audio:

    (file)

• Phonetic hangul: [여성]

Romanizations
Revised Romanization?	yeoseong
Revised Romanization (translit.)?	yeoseong
McCune–Reischauer?	yŏsŏng
Yale Romanization?	yeseng

South Korean Standard Language	여성(女性) (yeoseong)
North Korean Standard Language	녀성(女性) (nyeoseong)

Noun

여성 • (yeoseong) (hanja 女性)

1. female, woman, womenfolk, womankind

   Coordinate term: 남성(男性) (namseong, “man, male”)

Usage notes

Korean has a number of words equivalent to English "man" and "woman".

1. Sino-Korean 남자(男子) (namja, “boy; guy; man”) and 여자(女子) (yeoja, “girl; woman”) are the most common words, but can have a somewhat informal connotation.

   걔는 남자야? — 아니, 여자야.

   Gyae-neun namja-ya? - ani, yeoja-ya.

   Is he/she a guy? — No, she's a girl.

   남자친구 / 여자친구

   namja-chin'gu / yeoja-chin'gu

   boyfriend / girlfriend

2. Sino-Korean 남성(男性) (namseong, “male; men”) and 여성(女性) (yeoseong, “female; women”) refer to men and women as groups—though pluralized 남자들 (namja-deul, “the boys; the guys; the men”) and 여자들 (yeoja-deul, “the girls; the women”) is informally more common for this purpose—or to individual adult men and women in formal or polite contexts.

   여성 인권 운동 ― yeoseong in'gwon undong ― women's rights movement, feminism

   20대 남성이 실종되었습니다. (in a news report)

   20dae namseong-i siljongdoe-eot-seumnida.

   A man in his twenties has gone missing.

3. Sino-Korean 여인(女人) (yeoin, “woman”) is literary. There is no male counterpart.

   여인의 향기 (movie title) ― yeoin-ui hyanggi ― Scent of a Woman

4. The bare Sino-Korean morphemes 남(男) (nam, “male”) and 여(女) (yeo, “female”) is generally used in formal contexts, especially when referring to each gender as a collective but also for male or female individuals in more legalistic contexts. They are commonly written in hanja even when the rest of the text is in pure Hangul script.

   남과 여의 만남

   nam-gwa yeo-ui mannam

   the meeting of Man and Woman

5. Native 사내 (sanae, “man”) and 계집 (gyejip, “woman”) are not as commonly used. 사내 (sanae) often has a connotation of machismo or manliness, while 계집 (gyejip) has become offensive and derogatory.

Note that in Early Modern Korean (1600—c. 1900) and in contemporary Standard North Korean, Sino-Korean 여(女) (yeo, “female”) is written and pronounced 녀 (nyeo), hence 녀자(女子) (nyeoja), 녀성(女性) (nyeoseong), 녀인(女人) (nyeoin).