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What does the Korean word "Arirang" ( 아리랑 ) mean?
Posted in the Korean ethnicity and culture section in Quora. I had wondered about the precise meaning of "Arirang" for years, although the sense of longing conveyed by the song was intuitively understood. Pleasantly suprised to find this interpretation in English. Only posted the first two paragraphs so the author can get the credit for her work on quora. Looks like this was updated yesterday. If you are interested please go to the link for her discussion:
What does the Korean word "Arirang" mean?
Andi Roselund, Studied Traditional Korean Music Theory @ SNU (1999 - 2004)
The etymology of the syllables that make up the word 아리랑 / arirang has actually been studied at great depth, including the choice of hanja in (substitutionally) naming the song as found in various historic documents and records. One might think that it’s just a matter of deconstructing an obsolete word to understand the meaning, but in reality, things aren’t that clear. The word’s meaning is quite obscure.
What we can all agree upon is that despite the regional differences in lyrics and melody/mode, a very similar theme is memorialized in various local versions of the folk song: the overarching theme of longing and being “brokenhearted”, and (in nearly all versions of the folk song) the idea of a loved one passing over a mountain ridge, to be gone forever.
What we can all agree upon is that despite the regional differences in lyrics and melody/mode, a very similar theme is memorialized in various local versions of the folk song: the overarching theme of longing and being “brokenhearted”, and (in nearly all versions of the folk song) the idea of a loved one passing over a mountain ridge, to be gone forever.
https://www.quora.com/What-does-the-Korean-word-Arirang-mean
I wish the author had depicted the hanja transcriptions of the word arirang that she mentioned. That is something I would like to see. The way I understand the author's interpretation is that arirang refers to an aching, burning or stinging in the heart from the verb a ri da ( 가슴이 아리다 ). She explores other interpretations and clues to its meaning. There are many regional versions of the traditional folk song.