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Korean · Pronunciation Guide
How do you pronounce "곰" in Korean?
gom. One syllable: a quiet plain ㄱ, a rounded ㅗ, and a lip-shut ㅁ.
gom
One beat. The vowel is the only thing carrying information beyond the two consonants, so keeping it genuinely rounded is what separates this from the flatter syllables nearby.
Listen: 곰
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Sound it out
Hear it in a sentence
곰은 겨울에 잠을 자요.
Gomeun gyeoure jameul jayo.
The bear sleeps in winter.
Listen: 곰은 겨울에 잠을 자요.
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곰은 겨울에 잠을 자요 attaches 은, so the ㅁ moves forward and the noun becomes go-meun. Then 겨울에 gives you two vowels meeting in the middle and a ㄹ tapping into the particle.
Where English speakers slip
A hard English g is the first overshoot and flattening the ㅗ toward the vowel of 'gum' is the second, and both are easy to slip into. The third is releasing the final ㅁ into a small vowel, which adds a beat to a word that has only one.