Check Out Asadal

A very friendly and well-informed K-Blogger, who runs the blog 'Asadal Thought,' added some comments to my post about the decrease in honorific word usage. He allowed me to pick out some of his comments to post on here as a follow-up. Instead of picking random things out, however, I'll be posting most of it.

So here's what he had to say:

As for the judge example, I think they were wrong to translate “beoreuteopda (버릇없다)” as "rude," because it's actually stronger than that. A "beoreut" is actually a habit, or a manner, which makes it more similar to saying "you've got no manners," which I think is more a comment on a person's character than simply a comment on someone's actions at a certain point in time.

That said, I agree with you that a certain level of manners and politeness should be required in court. It's interesting the article never actually mentions who the guy was. When I read it first I got the impression he was the defendant, but looking back over it it never actually says this. Surely the actual defendant would have better sense than to be rude to a judge. But still, rude is rude, and I also agree that the judge seemed to be well within his rights to reprimand him. Perhaps there would have been a better way of doing it though, as it's not very becoming of someone in such an official position as a judge to be telling people they have no manners. Maybe a good old "such behaviour is not acceptable in court. I will have to ask you to refrain," would have been better.

It's true that recently officials have got a bit of a reputation for unnecessary rudeness, and as an outsider I might be inclined to put that down to an abuse of the authority and respect bestowed upon them by their position in a Confucian context. I've written about the altered nature of Confucianism in the Korean education system before in this post, and I think a lot of it's relevant in a wider Korean context as well.

As for judges, I think they should really use the most formal, neutral words. After all, the principle requirement for their job is to be impartial, and it's hard to do so if you're speaking to people in a way in which you know can be considered rude.

He followed that up, as well, with a better explanation of "imnida" (입니다) an "yo" (요):

Neither is more polite than the other. Therefore, a student using the "yo" form to a teacher is not being rude. They are being informal but polite, and this is considered appropriate. The other form you mentioned, that drops the "yo," is known as the impolite informal, but it's important to note that if it's used in the appropriate situation - such as to a friend or someone close but younger - it is also not rude or improper. Then you have the honourific forms, which involve using the honourific infix, shi (시), which is irregular in the "yo" form. This means that the verb to do (하다), becomes in the honourific forms of each form: 하십니다 (honourific polite formal), 하세요 (honourific polite informal), 하셔 (honourific impolite informal).

Use of the first set of forms depends on the situation - who you are talking to, where you are, etc. Use of the second set, the ones with the honourific infix, is determined by who is doing the action as well as the situation. So, if I was talking to a close friend, asking them when their parents are coming, I could say "언제 오셔?" I've dropped the "yo" because I'm talking to my friend - the situation doesn't require it, but because it's their parents who are doing the action I'm inquiring about, I also include the honourific infix.
So as you can see, he knows what he's talking about. His blog has a lot of really great cultural posts that are definitely worth checking out. I've added him to my blogroll, on the left, so you can get in on his thoughts, as well.