Hankuk

Hankuk, romanized as Hanguk in the standard system, is the Korean name for Korea. It is written 한국 in Hangul and combines han (韩/韓) with guk (國) to mean “Korean country” or simply “Korea.” The term denotes the Korean nation, its people, and its culture from a Korean-language perspective.

In modern usage, Hanguk is the everyday self-designation of Korea among Korean speakers. It appears in media, education, and cultural contexts, and gives rise to related terms such as Hanguk-in (한국인), meaning a Korean person, and Hanguk-eo (한국어), meaning the Korean language. In English-language contexts, Hanguk is sometimes rendered as Hanguk or Hankuk; the latter spelling has appeared in some proper names and older texts.

Hanguk is distinct from the formal official name of the country, Republic of Korea (Daehan Minguk, 대한민국). Hanguk is a more general, cultural-national designation used by South Koreans and Korean communities to refer to the country as a whole. Historically, other terms such as Joseon (Choson) have referred to earlier Korean polities or different political contexts; Hanguk represents the contemporary self-designation of the Korean nation in the Korean-speaking world.

Notable uses include educational institutions such as Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, a major Seoul university whose English name incorporates the term Hankuk. The word also appears in branding and cultural discourse that identify Korea as a nation rather than only a political entity.