LEARN KOREAN (한국어) [GRAMMAR] #1

아무

Anybody/Nobody

아무 is a pronoun that refers to "any" person. When using it in a sentence, the speaker is indicating the person he/she is referring to is not a specific "set" person, but could actually be "anybody."

It is most commonly used with ~나 attached to it. This particle (when attached to other nouns) often indicates the same indifference meaning that "아무" itself has.

When used together, it can almost be seen as one unit that means "anybody." As ~나 is actually a particle in itself, when used as the subject or object of a sentence, particles ~는 or ~가 are not usually doubled up on top of ~나. For example:

아무나 그 책을 좋아할 거예요 - Anybody will/would like that book
이렇게 좋은 학교에서는 아무나 공부를 잘 할 거예요 - Anybody can study well at this school

However, particles can be added before ~나 if the word being used has other functions within a sentence (other than the subject or object). Because 아무 refers to a person in this case, the most common particles you would see here are particles meaning "to" (~에게/한테) and "with" (~와/하고). For example:

나는 아무와나 사귀고 싶어 - I want to go out with anybody
저는 이 선물을 아무에게나 주고 싶어요 - I want to give this present to anybody
저는 아무하고나 축구를 하고 싶어요 - I want to play soccer with anybody

When ~도 replaces ~나 in these cases, we get the opposite meaning. 아무도 can be used as the subject or object of a sentence to mean "nobody." Just like 아무나, particles are not usually attached to 아무도 as "~도" is actually the particle being used.

When using 아무도, the sentence must be conjugated in a negative way or end with some negative word like 없다. This is counter intuitive for English speakers – because it makes us think we are saying a double negative. For example, the following sentence:

집에 아무도 있어요 looks like it should mean "there is nobody at home." However, as I said, a sentence with "아무도" should end in a negative way. Therefore, this is correct:

집에 아무도 없어요 - There is nobody at home/There isn't anybody at home

Because of the double negative in the Korean version, this creates a confusing translation for the English version. In the English version, we can usually say either "anybody" with a negative conjugation, or "nobody" with a positive conjugation.

For example:
저는 아무도 못 봤어요 - I didn't see anybody/I saw nobody
저는 아무도 만나고 싶지 않아요 - I don't want to meet anybody/I want to meet nobody
아무도 집에 가지 않았어요 - Nobody went home

Particles can be added before ~도 if the word being used has other functions within a sentence (other than the subject or object). Because 아무 refers to a person in this case, the most common particles you would see here are particles meaning "to" (~에게/한테) and "with" (~와/하고). For example:

저는 그 말을 아무에게도 안 했어요 - I didn't say that to anybody/I said that to nobody
저는 아무하고도 얘기하고 싶지 않아요 - I don't want to talk with anybody/I want to talk with nobody

It is very easy to be confused with these double negatives at first. To make it simple at the beginning, just tell your brain to use "아무나" when you want to say something that ends positively, and to use "아무도" when you want to say something that ends negatively. In theory, 아무나 and 아무도 are the same word in Korean (with different particles attached). One just happens to be used with positive sentences, and the other happens to be used in negative sentences.