🇰🇷 Lesson 3: Reported Speech II: -대요, -래요 & Hearsay

Stand by any office water cooler in Seoul and you'll hear it: 박 대리님 결혼하신대요! 진짜요? 누구랑 한대요? 회사 그만두신다면서요? Gossip, news and "apparently…" in Korean come at speed, and almost none of it uses the full -다고 했어요 forms from Lesson 2. It uses contractions. In this lesson you'll learn to understand and produce them, confirm things you've heard, get 달라고 vs 주라고 right, and pick the right verb for saying, asking, requesting and passing on.

🧠 The Mental Model: Squeeze Out -고 하-

Every contraction in this lesson comes from one sound change. In fast speech, -고 해요 collapses: the 고 and the 하 disappear, and the vowel of 해 fuses onto the ending before it.

ㄹ-stems follow Lesson 2 exactly: 살다 → 산대요 ("they say she lives…"), 열다 → 연대요 ("they say it opens…"), 만들다 → 만들래요 ("they told me to make it"). And the honorific survives inside: 사장님이 곧 오신대요 ("The boss says he's coming soon").

👂 What -대요 Really Means: "They Say" / "Apparently"

-대요 is Korean's everyday hearsay marker. Sometimes a specific person said it. Just as often the source is vague: the news, a friend of a friend, "people". English uses "apparently", "I heard", "they say" or "supposedly".

Two small things. First, 뭐래(요)? is short for 뭐라고 해(요)?, "What did they say?" Between friends, 뭐래? with a certain tone also means "What nonsense is that?" Second, 그렇대요 ("so they say") is the all-purpose way to pass something on without committing to it.

🤔 Checking What You Heard: -다면서요?

When you've heard something and want the other person to confirm it, especially someone who would know, add -면서요? to the reported form: -다면서요?, -(이)라면서요?, -(으)라면서요?, -자면서요?. It means "I heard that…, is that right?" or "Didn't you say…?" In 반말 it's -다면서? or, even shorter, -다며?

The last example shows a second use: throwing someone's own words back at them, often as a complaint. And as a connector, -다면서 means "saying that…": 바쁘다면서 먼저 나갔어요 ("Saying he was busy, he left first"). For now, just recognise this.

🗞️ Which One? Ways to Pass On Information

The -다는 in the fifth row is itself a contraction: -다고 하는 → -다는. It works with all four types: 온다는 소식 ("the news that he's coming"), 오라는 연락 ("a message telling me to come"), 가자는 제안 ("a suggestion to go"), 뭐냐는 질문 ("the question of what it is"). It's common in writing and news, and you'll build on it at B2.

🎁 달라고 vs 주라고: Who Gets the Favour?

Lesson 2 left one puzzle open: requests with 주다 ("give" / "do for"). When someone says -아/어 주세요, the reported form depends on who receives the favour.

Why does Korean care? Because 주다 in a command always points away from the speaker, toward someone else. When you report "give me", the "me" is no longer the person talking. 달다 exists to say "give it back toward the one who asked". English hides this, since "she asked me to help her" and "she told me to help him" use the same verb, so learners must build the habit consciously. Before reporting any -아/어 주세요, ask yourself: for whom?

🗣️ Choosing the Reporting Verb

하다 works for everything, but choosing a more specific verb makes your Korean clearer and more precise. Here are the core verbs and the quote types they naturally take.

Remember that 묻다 is ㄷ-irregular: 물어요, 물었어요, 물으셨어요. And 전하다 gives you one of the most useful set phrases in Korean: 부모님께 안부 전해 주세요 ("Please say hello to your parents for me").

💬 Dialogue: Office Gossip

Two coworkers, 유진 and 도현, meet in the office pantry. They use 해요체 with each other.

Count the contractions: 결혼하신대요 (with honorific -시-), 한대요 (question about a report), 분이래요 / 소문이래요 (nouns), 넘었대요 (past), 아니래요, 하래요 (command), 사재요 (suggestion), 되냬요 (question). Then notice the last line switches to a full form with 전하다, because 도현 is sending a message, not reporting one. (여쭤보다 is the humble form of 물어보다. You'll meet it properly in Lesson 20.)

🇰🇷 Cultural note: 카더라. Koreans have a joke word for unverified gossip: 카더라 (from the Gyeongsang dialect for "they say"), as in 카더라 통신 ("the they-say news agency"). Piling on -대요 without a source can sound exactly like that. In the workplace, the more careful -다고 들었어요 and naming your source (팀장님 말씀으로는…) come across as more trustworthy. The grammar of hearsay is also the grammar of social responsibility.

📰 Reading: 동네 빵집 소식

A neighbourhood blog post in 해요체. Notice how the writer separates what people say from what the owner actually said.

⚠️ Common Mistakes

✏️ Practice

🧠 Check Your Understanding

❓ Common Questions

If contractions still make you freeze mid-sentence, fall back on the full -다고 해요 form. It's always correct, and the contractions will come with listening. Most learners understand -대요 months before they produce it smoothly.

🔮 Looking Ahead

Hearsay is one way to talk about things you're not sure of. The other is guessing from what you see. In Lesson 4: Guessing & Inferring you'll learn Korean's "how sure am I?" scale: -(으)ㄴ/는 것 같다, -나 보다, -(으)ㄹ지도 모르다, -는 모양이다 and -(으)ㄹ 테니까. Then you'll be able to say "it seems", "I guess", "maybe" and "must be", as well as "apparently".