무슨 일 하세요? 직업 말하기 연습

What does “무슨 일 하세요?” mean in Korean?

무슨 일 하세요? is the everyday way to ask “what do you do?” — but literally it says “what work do you do?” There’s no word for “job” in it at all: 무슨 is “what kind of,” 일 is “work,” and 하세요 is the polite form of 하다, “to do.” It’s a high-frequency opener you’ll hear within minutes of meeting someone new in Korean.

Answers are built on the copula -이에요/-예요 (“it is”), which switches by sound: -이에요 after a consonant (선생님이에요 “I’m a teacher,” 경찰이에요 “I’m a police officer”), -예요 after a vowel (가수예요 “I’m a singer,” 요리사예요 “I’m a cook”). Worth knowing too: that little 일 is wider than “work” — it also means “matter” or “affair,” so 무슨 일이에요? means “what’s the matter?”