A Comparative Study on the Frequency of Allophones, Phonemes and Letters in Korean

국어의 이음.음소와 자모의 출현빈도수 조사 대비 및 분석

This study starts with an investigation of the frequency of allophones from the narrowly transcribed data of (1) most frequently used 2000 words and (2) some passages of standard Seoul Korean. Consequently this entails the investigation of the frequency of phonemes by adding the number of allophones. These two investigations are conducted for the first time in the study of Korean phonology. Previous studies on the reported 'frequency of phoneme' are in fact studies on the 'frequency of letters' and the critical difference between these two types of studies has yet to be clarified accurately. This paper also reveals the proportional distribution of natural classes among Korean phonemes and letters.