Author: Cross-Cultural Logophile

  • 무대를 뒤집어 놓으셨다

    “무대를 뒤집어 놓으셨다,” which directly translates as “turned the stage upside down” is a meme that originated from a music show called ‘나는 가수다(I am a Singer).’ ‘나는 가수다(I am a Singer)’ is a TV show that was first aired in 2011, where seven famous singers perform a song each and get ranked based on…

  • 덕질

    ‘덕질[deok-jil]’ is one of the words that show how dynamically Korean words can evolve. Let’s look at the etymology. The second syllable of the word, ‘질[jil]’ is a common Korean suffix. It is attached to nouns and makes the word mean an action related to the noun. For example, the word, ‘손가락질[son-ga-rak-jil],’ is a combination…

    man in black shirt with blue light
  • 움짤

    If you have been browsing the Korean internet for a while, you might have encountered the word, ‘움짤[oom-jjal].’ ‘움짤’ refers to a short video clip that is usually in the GIF format. It’s one of the internet slang words that originated in the early days of the internet in Korea. Let’s look at the etymology…

    clap board roadside Jakob and Ryan