Korean Particle 에— 8 different usages
Korean sentences are made up with different components, and one very important component is particles. There are various particles, and their usages differ. Today, we are going to look at one of the most often used particles — 에.
에 comes after nouns. There is only one form, no matter the preceding noun ends with a vowel or a consonant. The most common usage of 에 divides into 2 categories, which is location-related and time-related usage.
Place-related usage — Place + 에
1) Static location “in, at, on” (Existence)
지민이 지금 집에 있어요 = 지민 is at home right now.
2) Goal of the action “to, at” (Destination)
학교에 가요. = I go to school.
집에 도착했어요. = I arrived at home.
Time-related usage — Time + 에
= Indicate the time at which an action takes place
Example: 오늘 아침에 샤워했어요 = I took a shower this morning.
*오늘 and 아침 are both time-related nouns, so you only need to add 에 to the last time noun
It follows time-related nouns such as 년 (year), 월 (month), 날 (day), 요일 (days of the week), 시간 (time), 계절 (season), 후 (after) and etc. If the preceding noun is a specific time noun such as 어제(yesterday), 오늘(today), 내일(tomorrow), 언제 (when), there’s no need to add 에.
Examples:
언제 갈 거예요? = When are you going?
→ We cannot put 에 here. → X 언제에 갈 거예요?
두시에 갈 거예요 = I will go at 2.
*If the preceding is 때 (time) 或 날 (day), you can choose to add 에 or not
Other usages:
1) “Among/between”
케이팝 그룹 중에 제일 유명해요 = … the most popular in K-pop groups
2) Quantity “for, per (day)”
일주일에 두 번씩 운동을 해요 = (I) workout twice a week.
3) The cause of a condition
감기에 학교 가지 못해요 = (I) got a cold, so I cannot go to school.
4) “In addition to…”
큰 집에 좋은 차도 있어요 = … have a nice house and a nice car
5) “Regarding on/for…”
한국어에 관심이 있어요 = I have an interest for the Korean language.
Examples that include both place-related and time-related usages:
작년 겨울에 집에만 있었어요. = Last winter, (I) only stayed at home.
오늘 아침에 도서관에 갔어요. = (I) went to the library this morning.
