KOREAN LANGUAGE TUTORIAL

LESSON 72

Korean Lesson: Lessons 72

Only: 유일하다
First and foremost, the word “유일하다” is an adjective that means “the only/the sole.” Whereas the particle “~만” gets added on to nouns to indicate that something is the only one:
바나나만 = only bananas
돈만 = only money
나만 = only me
… 유일하다 describes nouns:
유일한 바나나 = the only banana
유일한 돈 = the only money (doesn’t make sense in English or Korean)
유일한 것 = the only thing
etc…
유일하다 can be put in sentences to describe when something is the only thing. The difficult thing is that 유일하다 is usually used when there is another descriptive word (usually a verb in ~는 것 form) in the sentence.
Let’s go back to the ~는 것 principle for just a second. Remember that you can describe a noun using verbs with ~는 것:
저는 먹는 사람이에요 = I am the person who is eating
저는 공부하는 사람이에요 = I am the person who is studying
You also learned that you can also add an adjective to these sentences to describe the noun even further. Remember, these adjectives are placed after the ~는 것 construction:
저는 먹는 행복한 사람이에요 = I am the happy person who is eating
저는 공부하는 똑똑한 사람이에요 = I am the smart person who is studying
Now, I don’t know exactly when you would use those specific sentences, but the grammar within them is very important. Using the word “유일하다” is most commonly used like this – as an adjective to describe a noun when there is also a verb describing that noun as well.
If we break it down:
먹는 사람 = the person who is eating
먹는 행복한 사람 = the happy person who is eating
먹는 유일한 사람 = the only person who is eating
공부하는 사람 = the person who is studying
공부하는 똑똑한 사람 = the smart person who is studying
공부하는 유일한 사람 = the only person who is studying
These can then create sentences:
저는 아직 먹고 있는 유일한 사람이라서 부끄러워요 = I am shy because I am the only person who is still eating
선생님의 말씀을 듣고 있는 유일한 사람은 저에요 = I am the only person who is listening to the teacher
Many more sentences:
제가 결혼하고 싶은 유일한 사람은 저의 여자 친구입니다 = The only person I want to marry is my girlfriend
제가 먹고 싶은 유일한 음식은 삼겹살 입니다 = The only thing I want to eat is 삼겹살
제가 하고 싶은 유일한 것은 밥을 먹는 것이에요 = The only thing I want to do right now is eat
The weird thing about these sentence constructions with 유일하다, is that in most cases, you can use 유일하다 as an adverb instead of an adjective. For example:
제가 유일하게 결혼하고 싶은 사람은 저의 여자 친구입니다
제가 유일하게 먹고 싶은 음식은 삼겹살입니다
제가 유일하게 하고 싶은 것은 밥을 먹는 것이에요
In addition, 유일하게 usually must be used in cases when there is already another adjective in the sentence describing the noun:
저는 행복한 사람이에요 = I am a happy person
저는 유일하게 행복한 사람이에요 = I am the only happy person
맛있는 한식 = delicious Korean food
유일하게 맛있는 한식 = the only delicious Korean food
예쁜 여자 = pretty girl
유일하게 예쁜 여자 = the only pretty girl
These as well can then be used to create sentences:
나는 우리 가족들 중에 유일하게 행복한 사람이야 = I am the only happy person in my family
김치는 유일하게 맛있는 한식이에요 = KimChi is the only delicious Korean food
이 방에서 유일하게 예쁜 여자는 저 여자에요 = The only pretty girl in this room is that girl