Koreans began writing on Korean grammer in the west European style as one of Occidental sciences in the late nineteenth century as Western civilization began flowing into this country.
The first such grammar book to appear in Korea was the hand-written copies of Choson Munjon 조선문전 by Yu Kil-chun 유길준 in 1890. The first such book printed was the Taehan Munjon대한문전 written by Ch'oe Kwang-ok최광옥(actually by Yu Kil-Chun) and published in 1908.
Korean grammar has been studied in various models on the basis of west European grammar for some seven decades thereafter. However, it is not clear how Korean grammar has been influenced in particular by the Euro-American philological theories.
Prof. Harold B. Allen of Minnesota University before 1964 clssified Euro-American grammar into four groups - Grammar A that is Graeco-Latinate Grammar, Grammar B that is scholarly traditional grammar, Grammar C that is structural grammar, and Grammar D that is transformational grammar. He termed Grammar A and Grammar B as traditional grammar.
In 1964, Prof. Charles F. Hockett of the Cornell University divided the development course of modern grammar into four phases with four "major breakthroughs" - the Genetic Hypothesis of Sir William Jones in 1786, the Regularity Hypothesis of Karl Verner in 1875, the Quantitative Hypothesis of Ferdinand de Saussure in 1916, and the Accountablility Hypothesis of Noam Chomsky in 1957.
The evolution patterns in the Euro-American region may be further elucidated as follows:
1. Latinate grammar, or latinate traditional grammar, derived its origin from Greek philosophy. This traditional grammar is similar in nature to normative grammar or school grammar in that it emphasizes observation of grammatical rules above all.
2. Scholarly grammar, or scholarly traditional grammar, can be divided into historical-comparative grammar of the earlier era and explanatory theoretical grammar of the latter era. Both of these two patterns are based on modern linguistics, and are of the same nature to explanatory grammar or scientific grammar in that it intensively inquires into reasons for grammaticalruleds.
3. Structural grammar, or structural descriptive grammar, is based on structural linguistics. This is a reductive analysis and a descriptive method of the item - and - arrangement fomula, and is of the nature of data-oriented grammar, in that it concentrates on collection and analysis of linguistic data.
4. Transformational grammar, or transformational - generative grammar, is based on the generative theory. This is an expansive analysis and an item-and process descriptive method, and is of the nature of fact-oriented grammar, in that it aims at generating right and correct languages
The division of these four patterns is a diachronic and synchronic classification of evolution at the same time, and also a classificaiton of heterogeneous patterns presently co-existing.
The following appear to have been the theoretical foundation of Korean grammar as a consequence of minute analysis and deduction made on it in the light of such an evolution course in Europe and America:
1. Early Korean grammar between 1890 and 1900 was studied on the general basis of Latinate normative grammar but historical comparative grammar of the nineteenth century was partially added to or reflected on it. This means that the phase of historical (comparative) grammar failed to be created in co-existence and parallelism. Korean linguistics of this era falls under the category of recent linguistics based on the speculative Greek philosophy, and very closely resembled that of the era between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries when self-consciousness first rose in west European nations.
2. Korean grammar between 1910 and 1950 was generally based on both Latinate normative grammar and explanatory theoretical grammar, but was little influenced bu structural grammar. Korean linguistics during this era was based on modern linguistics (historical comparative linguistics) of west Europe in general, but Korea being under the Japanese colonial domination, peculiar circumstances gave conspicuous incentives to the study of recent linguistics. The fact that such a trend continued through the era of 1940 to 1950 indicates that the recent age and the modern age of west Europe existed in parallel in Korean linguistics.
3. An active study on the Chu Si-gyong 주시경 during the 1910's led to the creation of highly outstanding traditional grammar, narrowing the gap the Korea to 10 years behind west Europe, and resulted in independent exploration of the area of structural grammar, even pushing it 10 to 20 years ahead of Europe and America.
4. During the period 1950 to 1960, study of Korean grammar on the basis of structural grammar appeared, but this seemed to be merely a historical stage falling short of maturity. Korean language during this era was studied on the basis of structural linguistics, but its modern linguistic foundation was much too firmer than its results were big.
5. Since 1965, efforts have been exerted in the field of transformational - generative grammar, giving rise to an anticipation that it might go in parallel with structural grammar or outpace it. In the light of such a course of evolution, Korean linguistics seems to be still in the stage of groping for its direction.