TeacherJoy

Ever tried saying “I can’t hear it” in Korean? Maybe you thought it was “들을 수 없어요.” Well… no.

Here’s the problem. “들을 수 없어요” makes it sound like you don’t have the ability to hear. Like you were born without ears or are permanently deaf. That’s way too strong for everyday conversation.

So what do Koreans actually say? They use passive verbs where the subject is acted on or affected by the action.

In Korean, passive verbs show up when:

1. You don’t know or don’t care who the doer is, or
2. The doer has no will or control over the action

There’s something a little similar in English. Think about “I was told” versus “I heard.”

“I was told” means someone told me, while “I heard” emphasizes what reached my ears. In other words, “I was told” is about receiving information whether I wanted it or not, and “I heard” is more like picking it up myself.

But still, Korean works quite differently.

In English, you can say “I opened the door”, “The door opened”, or “The door is opened,” and they all imply that there’s a doer somewhere. In Korean, they aren’t interchangeable. They’re fixed depending on context.

Now let’s go back to “I can’t hear it.”

Take “hear.” The verb is 듣다. In the 요-form, that’s 들어요. But this is a transitive verb, which assumes you’re actively trying to listen. But if you want to listen and just… can’t, because the sound is too low or something?

That’s when you switch to the passive 들리다. So the natural way to say “I can’t hear it” is “안 들려요.”

Same with “see.” The transitive verb is 보다. The passive is 보이다. So you don’t say “볼 수 없어요.” Say “안 보여요.”

And one more example. Something’s stuck on your hand, and no matter how hard you wash, it just won’t come off. In English, you’d say “It doesn’t wash off.” In Korean, you say “안 씻겨요.”

Since I can’t cover every passive verb in this short video, I’ve shared a full list here. So check it out later.