Latest Korean Language News
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I Americas

United States

• University of Maryland Conducts Korean Summer Language Institute
From June 2 to August 1, the University of Maryland held the nine-week “Korean Summer Language Institute.” Participating students completed an intensive, immersive curriculum with about seven hours of daily instruction covering all areas—reading, writing, listening, and speaking. In the afternoons, they attended advanced classes in culture, politics, and media, as well as various cultural activities such as calligraphy, cooking, and music, broadening their understanding of Korea and Korean culture. This program provided students with an environment where they could continuously use Korean by directly communicating with advanced Korean speakers, thereby improving their Korean proficiency.
 
 

• Glendale Unified School District (GUSD) Implements Korean Dual Language Immersion (DLI) Program
On August 20, the Glendale Unified School District (GUSD) in California launched a Dual Language Immersion (DLI) program for the 2025–2026 academic year, offering seven languages: Korean, German, Spanish, Armenian, Italian, Japanese, and French. The Korean immersion program is provided throughout the U.S. K–12 system. At the elementary school level, a 50:50 program is operated in which 50% of the daily instruction is conducted in Korean and 50% in English. At the middle school level, students may take elective courses such as language arts taught in Korean, and at the high school level, students can select advanced Korean courses as electives.
 
 

I Europe

Luxembourg

Institut National des Langues Luxembourg (INLL) to Launch New Korean Language Course in September
The Institut National des Langues Luxembourg (INLL) will launch new Korean language courses starting this September. Operated under the Luxembourg Ministry of Education, INLL is a national public institution that provides professional language education for adults. With this addition, INLL’s adult foreign language curriculum will expand to 12 languages in total. In particular, the introduction of Korean marks the first time the language has been offered as a regular foreign language at an official educational institution in Luxembourg. The courses will be delivered in a blended learning format, consisting of two in-person classes per week combined with one self-study session.
* Languages offered: Korean, German, English, Chinese, Spanish, French, Italian, Luxembourgish, Portuguese, Dutch, Russian, Japanese
 
 

Poland

University of Silesia in Katowice to Introduce Korean Studies (Koreanistyka) Major in October
The University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland, plans to officially establish a Korean Studies (Koreanistyka) major (undergraduate program) in the Faculty of Humanities beginning with the Winter Semester this October. Through this major, students will acquire theoretical, practical, and professional knowledge of the Korean language to improve their Korean communication skills, while also developing understanding and analytical abilities in Korean language, culture, literature, history, politics, society, and economy.
 
 

France

Festival d’Avignon Names Korean as the Official Guest Language for 2026
On July 22, the Festival d’Avignon—one of the world’s largest performing arts festivals, held every July in Avignon, France—announced that Korean has been selected as the Official Guest Language for 2026. The “Official Guest Language Program” is a project that each year highlights the arts and culture of a specific language community: English in 2023, Spanish in 2024, Arabic in 2025, and now Korean in 2026. This marks the first time an Asian language has been chosen, as well as the first time a single national language has been designated, representing a meaningful achievement that reflects the growing international status of Korean performing arts.
 
 

I Sources

(United States) https://sllc.umd.edu/
(United States) https://gusd.net/dli
(Luxembourg) https://www.inll.lu/
(Poland) https://us.edu.pl/
(France) https://festival-avignon.com/