정 (jeong)
JUNGnounColloquial
A Korean slang term. Browse all Korean slang.
What it means
The attachment that builds up between people, or to a place, simply through time spent together — not affection chosen but affection accumulated.
정이 들다 is for it to develop; 정 떨어지다, for it to break, is what happens when someone does something that makes you unable to feel it any more.
It explains behaviour foreigners find puzzling: the shopkeeper adding a free item, the colleague who will not let you pay. That is 정 being demonstrated.
Examples with translations
이 동네에 정이 많이 들었어.
I've grown really attached to this neighbourhood.
그 말 듣고 정 떨어졌어.
After he said that, whatever I felt for him was gone.
Where it comes from
From Sino-Korean 情, 'feeling'. Korean commentary treats it as a defining national emotion; the word itself is ordinary and its use is entirely everyday.
Other forms
- Romanised as:
- jeong