Korean Girl Names

Korean naming is structured quite differently from most of what surrounds it in this library, and the differences are systematic rather than incidental.

A traditional Korean given name is two syllables, each usually written with a hanja — a Chinese character — chosen for its meaning. As in Japanese, the characters carry meaning the romanised form does not show, so an English gloss of a Korean name is always partial.

Many families observe a generational name element: one syllable is shared by all siblings and cousins of the same generation in the male line, fixed by a genealogical record, with only the other syllable chosen freely. This means a Korean name can locate its bearer in a family tree with some precision.

Recent naming has moved noticeably toward native Korean words rather than hanja compounds — names like Haneul, sky, or Sarang, love, which have no Chinese characters at all and are written only in hangul. That shift is a deliberate cultural turn and quite recent.

Romanisation is inconsistent in English-language sources. The same name may appear as Ji-woo, Jiwoo, Ji-Woo or Jee-woo; these are one name, and this library treats them as such.