매튜의 한국어 연습 블로그

An incredibly easy to hear verb ending, this one was hard for me to pick up at first because it sounded so close to the ~찮아 in 괜찮아. So, at first I thought it meant "it's okay" but like most things, I was totally wrong.

~잖아요 is used when the both the speaker and listener are well aware of the topic. As we looked at ~거든 earlier, the speaker informs the listener of the reason that he/she doesn't know. In ~잖아, it's the opposite. Both the speaker and the listener already know the reason or event and this is just to confirm that both already know. I would also like to emphasize that this can be incredibly rude when used improperly. Use 요 when needed and avoid using altogether when speaking to a much higher person. Using this with a slightly socially higher person is okay, just use with care. Also, the examples I'm going to use take a bit of background context to fully understand. Any dialogue assumes the other person is fully aware of the fact.

Examples:

A: 이번주말에 가까운 곳으로 놀러 가는 게 어때요?
This weekend, how does hanging out a place nearby sound?

B: 그것보다는 주말에 집에서 공부하는 게 좋겠어요. 다음 주가 시험이잖아요.
How about studying at home instead? Next week, you know I have a test.


A: 인터넷 쇼핑으로 부츠를 사줄까요?
Can I buy you some boots over the internet?

B: 흠...직접 옷가게에 가서 쇼핑하자. 인터넷으로 사면 품질을 확인할 수 없잖아.
Hmm...Let's buy it directly at the store. If we buy from it off the internet, you know that there's no way to check the quality.


A: 승기 씨, 이 자료를 영어부터 한국어까지로 번역 해주시겠어요? 저 영어 자신 없는데요..
Hey Seungki, could you please translate these documents from English to Korean? I'm not really confident...

B: 무슨 소리야. 민기야, 10년 정도 호주 살았잖아. 영어 잘 하잖아!
What're talking about? Minki, you lived in Australia for 10 years. You know you can speak English well!

The "you know that..." doesn't really fully translate. It's just something that must be understood.