Hamgyŏng dialect is a dialect of the Korean language

Korean language

Korean is the official language of the country Korea, in both South and North. It is also one of the two official languages in the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture in People's Republic of China. There are about 78 million Korean speakers worldwide. In the 15th century, a national writing...

 used in the North Hamgyŏng, South Hamgyŏng, and Ryanggang Provinces of North Korea

North Korea

The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea , , is a country in East Asia, occupying the northern half of the Korean Peninsula. Its capital and largest city is Pyongyang. The Korean Demilitarized Zone serves as the buffer zone between North Korea and South Korea...

, as well as the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture

Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture

Yanbian is a Korean Autonomous Prefecture in Jilin Province, in Northeastern China, above the border with North Korea. Yanbian is bordered to the north by Heilongjiang, on the west by Baishan City and Jilin City, on the south by North Hamgyong Province of North Korea, and on the east by Primorsky...

 of northeast China

Northeast China

Northeast China, historically known in English as Manchuria, is a geographical region of China, consisting of the three provinces of Liaoning, Jilin and Heilongjiang. The region is sometimes called the Three Northeast Provinces...

. It is one of the more divergent dialects of Korean, and contains intonation, vocabulary, and grammatical differences that distinguish it from the standard Korean of the north or south

Korean language North-South differences

There are a small number of differences in the standard forms of the Korean language used in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and the Republic of Korea , due to the length of time Korea has been divided.-Overview:Korean orthography, as defined by the Korean Language Society in 1933 in the...

.

Specific vocabulary differences include kinship terminology

Kinship terminology

Kinship terminology refers to the various systems used in languages to refer to the persons to whom an individual is related through kinship. Different societies classify kinship relations differently and therefore use different systems of kinship terminology - for example some languages...

. For example, "father", in standard Korean abŏji , becomes abai or aebi .

It is closely related to Koryo-mar

Koryo-mar

Koryo-mar, Goryeomal or Koryŏmal is the dialect of the Korean language spoken by the Koryo-saram, ethnic Koreans in the former USSR. It is descended from the Hamgyŏng dialect...

, the dialect of Korean spoken by ethnic Koreans in the former USSR

Koryo-saram

Koryo-saram is the name which ethnic Koreans in the post-Soviet states use to refer to themselves. Approximately 500,000 ethnic Koreans reside in the former Soviet Union, primarily in the now-independent states of Central Asia. There are also large Korean communities in southern Russia , the...

, as most of them are descendants of late 19th-century emigrants from Hamgyŏng

Hamgyong

Hamgyŏng was one of the Eight Provinces of Korea during the Joseon Dynasty. Hamgyŏng was located in the northeast of Korea. The provincial capital was Hamhŭng.-History:...

 province to the Russian Far East

Russian Far East

Russian Far East is a term that refers to the Russian part of the Far East, i.e., extreme east parts of Russia, between Lake Baikal in Eastern Siberia and the Pacific Ocean...

. The first dictionary of Korean in a European language, , was based largely on the Hamgyŏng dialect; the author lived in Vladivostok

Vladivostok

The city is located in the southern extremity of Muravyov-Amursky Peninsula, which is about 30 km long and approximately 12 km wide.The highest point is Mount Kholodilnik, the height of which is 257 m...

while composing it.