In this paper analyzed the features of how native Korean speakers (K) and native Vietnamese Korean learners (VKL) organize the Apology conversation, focusing on the functional phase. Based on the discourse analysis, a role play was conducted to collect data. In order to investigate the influence of social variables (social status, intimacy), learners' mother tongues and learners' Korean proficiency, different social variables were given in role-play situations, and learners' Korean proficiency was limited to intermediate and advanced levels. The results of analyzing conversations focusing on ‘Error Checking–Apology-Apology Acceptance’, which is the intermediate phase of Apology conversation, are as follows. First, in the Error Checking Phase, K tended to make indirect or preliminary remarks. In contrast, VKL immediately presented communication purposes, and advanced VKL tended to use indirect speech and additional statement. Second, in the Apology phase, the higher social status the other party has and the lower intimacy the two speakers has, the more passive K were. Interestingly, VKL showed the same pattern. For intermediate-level VKL, it was observed that the dialogue sequences were not completed. Third, in the Apology Acceptance phase, K repeatedly expressed apologies through complex dialogue sequences. However, VKL performed a concise conversation by simple dialogue sequences, and the intermediate-level VKL expressed ‘relief’ and ‘gratitude’.

Este estudio aborda el aprendizaje de la pronunciación en español como una tercera lengua por parte de los hablantes nativos de coreano en los EEUU. Específicamente, profundiza en las características de sus pronunciaciones, las perspectivas desde las que se pueden entender las pronunciaciones y los puntos que los investigadores de L3 deben tener en cuenta para examinar sus pronunciaciones. Para ello, primero este estudio presenta modelos sobre la percepción y producción de L2, así como modelos sobre la morfosintaxis de L3. Luego, aplica los principios principales de los modelos a las situaciones y características del aprendizaje que muestran los estudiantes coreanos de español en los EEUU. Por último, con base en los fundamentos teóricos y sus características del aprendizaje, hace sugerencias para estudios empíricos que examinen la pronunciación de español como L3. Este estudio puede ser útil para los estudiantes coreanos de español como L3 y sus padres, profesores de español e investigadores de L3. Además, algunas sugerencias de este estudio se pueden aplicar a los estudiantes coreanos de español como L3 que viven en Corea y países angloparlantes que no sean los EEUU.

Since the Korean pronoun system does not specify gender indication, Korean speakers of English tend to have difficulties when they use English pronouns. This paper explores how absence of obligatory gender marking in Korean affects gender errors in the production of English. Gender pronoun errors made by Korean learners of English were analyzed using recordings of English conversations of seven Korean subjects. Findings of this study revealed that Korean English learners struggled with the use of gender pronouns due to differences in gender pronoun systems between Korean and English. Both gender-neutrality and pro-drop practices do not require Korean speakers to pay close attention to gender factors when using pronouns in their native language, resulting in native language interference. Considering that the Korean language lacks specific gender orientation in its usage of pronouns whereas English requires clear gender specification, findings of this study imply that native language gender concept can influence second language use.

This study investigates phonological variations of the Gyeongsang dialect speakers in dialect contact situations in Seoul. This study also examines what factors have significant effects on these phonological variations. It focuses on social factors: ‘gender’, ‘language attitude’, ‘length of residency in Seoul’ and in particular, ‘age group’ that is classified based on whether the participants received compulsory education where standard Korean is used. The tendency of the phonological variation is disproportionate for each phonological variable. In direct dialect contact situations in Seoul, Gyeongsang dialect speakers undergo phonological variation almost all the phoneme and phonological rule but the relatively low toneme. But this quantitative loffwness of the variation degree on toneme variant is not absent in the knowledge of the phonological pattern of Seoul Korean, but rather is hard to adapt or habituate it. In other words, the achievement of toneme variation requires a certain amount of acquisition period compared to the other variants. This study shows that it may take about 20 years to adapt to the phonological patterns of Seoul Korean. The statistical analysis of phonetic data suggests that all social factors investigated in this study influence a speaker's frequency of use of the Seoul Korean variants. Especially, each age group shows different tendency of influence of social factors. Old speaker group influences by social factors in the following order: ‘gender’, ‘length of residency’ and ‘language attitude’. In the case of young, on the other hand, the order is ‘language attitude’, ‘length of residency’ and ‘gender’.

This study aims to investigate how L1 Chinese speakers of Korean acquire Korean embedded clauses with wh-expressions. Korean embedding verbs tutta ‘listen’ (Propositional-selecting predicate class) and kwungkumhata ‘wonder’ (Question-selecting predicate class) subcategorize for different types of complements which are defined by declarative complementizer ta or interrogative complementizer nunci. Tutta takes declarative or interrogative clauses and kwungkumhata can take only interrogatives. Experimental stimuli consisted of 12 embedding clauses by tutta (6 ta complementizer items and nunci complementizer items) and 12 embedding clauses by kwungkumhata(6 ta complementizer items and nunci complementizer items). Sixty three intermediate and advanced Chinese speakers of Korean(CK) participated in the study and 40 Korean native speakers(NK) participated as a control group. CK subjects were divided into 31 CK high group and 32 CK low group according to the participants’ Korean proficiency. The acceptability judgment among 3 groups were significantly different in the tutta-nunci condition and kwungkumhata-ta condition. The result showed that different learning principles were applied depending on the proficiency of learners. CK high group accepted the wh-embedding sentences in accordance with the semantic meaning of matrix verbs and type of wh-embedding clauses. However CK low group were not sensitive enough to discern the different linguistic context of wh-embedding sentences and rather accepted most of the given sentences.

This study aims to understand the foreign language learner’s internal process while they are translating. To figure out invisible internal process of the learner, Key logging during translation process, short interview after translating and behavioral observation were used. For considering behavioral characteristics for internal process, Pause, Deletion, Moving and Mistranslation were chosen. In particular, Pause was chosen to work as criterion when analyzing other behaviors. By analyzing those behaviors, three internal processes were found: (1)Deliberatiing on words or phrases following the pauses, (2)Considering ill-matched words or phrases between source text and target text, (3)Continuous checks on what writers had written down. Deliberations were generally found before the long-term pause. Learners were deliberating what to write on next phrases, due to their scarce knowledge of grammatical collocation of the target language. Considering ill-matched words or phrases between source text and target text shows variety of behaviors such as moving, deletion after the long-term pauses. According to the learners’ interview and researcher’s observation, it was arisen when the learners are fail to find the acceptable expressions in target language. Continuous checks on what learners had written down were generally found after the translation was finished. Entire part of target text was examined in this type of process. Thus, long period of pause was required for reading source text and target text, also deletion and moving was required for correcting mistranslated words or phrases. It infers that learners’ behaviors are combined to suggest certain meanings of internal process. Thus, these behaviors do not suggest solid internal process. With more elaborated analysis, this

Okamura, Kana. 2017. “Korean Native Speakers’ Perception of and Responses to Interrogative Greetings”. The Sociolinguistic Journal of Korea 25(1). 143~165. This research examines (1) if native speakers of Korean perceive phrases such as “어디 가 (Where are you going)?” and “밥 먹었어 (Have you eaten)?” as questions or as greetings, and (2) how speakers respond to these phrases. Various expressions are used as greetings in Korean, but interrogative greetings in particular are considered to be widely favored because they express personal interest in the interlocutor. Previous studies claim that because the phrases function more as greetings than questions, it is enough to respond with a general answer rather than an honest or detailed answer. To verify this claim, a questionnaire was distributed to 144 native Korean speakers in their 20s. The degree of intimacy between the speakers and the circumstances of the interaction were used to investigate the perception of and responses to interrogative greetings. The statistical analysis of the questionnaire results found that while the phrases do function as greetings, they still retain their interrogative function, and as such, many native speakers give honest answers such as “응, 먹었어 (Yes, I ate).” Additionally, interlocutor intimacy and situation did indeed influence how the phrases are perceived and answered.

The purpose of this study is to investigate university students’ perceptions on their English conversation classes taught by native English speakers. Its focus is on finding out how well the students understand and how actively they participate in class, what causes difficulty in their understanding or participation in class, and whether their class helps them in terms of affective aspects and English skills. A survey was conducted on a total of 465 university students in Korea, and the collected data were analyzed to compute basic descriptive and inferential statistics. Some of the important findings are 1) over 50% of the students understand their classes well; 2) a little over 30% actively participate in class; 3) about 30~50% of the students perceive their class help them affectively; and 4) about 50% of the students perceive their class help them improve their English skills in general. These results are discussed along with other findings related to the causes of the difficulties that the students experienced. Suggestions are provided on the basis of the results and their implications.

This study uses a sentence recall task to investigate syntactic priming effects in English prepositional object dative (PO) or double-object dative (DO) structures by Korean speakers of L2 English. The purposes were (1) to determine whether syntactic priming occurs during L2 production, and if it does, then to determine how it affects the subsequent utterance of target structures; and (2) to determine whether syntactic priming during production is lexically specific or independent. Thirty-two sets of target-prime sentences were developed using 12 dative alternating verbs, creating DO-DO, DO-PO, PO-DO, PO-PO target-prime pairs. Syntactic priming effects occurred with the PO priming irrespective of targets (whether DO or PO) but only when the verb used in the prime was the same as the verb used in the target. The results suggest that lexical dependency of syntactic knowledge during L2 production does not accord with the lemma stratum model. A pedagogical implication of successful learning of lexical entries is discussed.

By using the methodological framework of conversation analysis, this study combines a grounded study of interactional linguistics focusing on L2 speakers' interactional competence in the use of Korean sentence-ending suffix -ketun. Based on the previous studies which examined the use of -ketun in L1 Korean speakers’ conversation, this study analyzes data taken from different levels of Korean language classroom interactions, with close attention to the learner's usage of the target suffix in formulating a dispreferred response. The findings of the study demonstrate that the L2 advanced students' use of -ketun is much closer to that for L1 speakers in constituting a dispreferred response while claiming epistemic primacy. On the other hand, extremely low frequency in the use of -ketun is a distinctive linguistic-pragmatic features that characterizes use of -ketun by L2 speakers at lower levels of competence. The advanced students' diversification may be an indicator of their more adaptive, context-sensitive conduct, suggesting an increased interactional competence. Close scrutiny of the use of -ketun in this study aids to reveal whether and to what extent its interactional use by L2 speakers of different proficiency levels approaches that of L1 speakers.

We investigated the possibility of whether there is a post-vocalic ‘r’ in phonological representations of Korean L2 English speakers and the extent to which they exploit their knowledge of mapping graphemes onto phonemes within each correspondence between orthography and phonemes. First, the results obtained in the pseudohomophone task showed that R-items were responded to with higher accuracy and shorter RT than Non-R items. It suggests that there is no post-vocalic ‘r’ in phonological representations of Korean L2 speakers unlike Australian native English speakers and that Korean L2 learners are truly non-rhotic speakers. Another striking finding is that accuracy and RT for visual lexical access varied depending on the transparency between orthography and its corresponding phonemes. This indicates that Korean L2 speakers’ knowledge about the association of graphemes and phonemes varies depending on each type of correspondence between spellings and phonemes. Finally, it was found that the frequency of the base words also affected the retrieval of words along with the orthographic depth in grapheme-to-phoneme correspondences.

This study explores cross-linguistic differences in online sentence production, working on the theory that the grammatical characteristics of a language customize the speakers’ usual manner of sentence construction and utterance. It is reasoned that a contrast between English and Korean syntax has a direct bearing on that process: The sentential subject is licensed by a tensed verb in English, while it is by an overt morpheme in Korean. This gives rise to a substantial difference in the speakers’ speech patterns: English speakers’ message formation and linguistic encoding center on a verb, while Korean speakers elect or utter a subject first and then draw a predicate. An experiment is conducted on the hypotheses that (a) English L1 speakers are disposed to make sentences based on verbal information, so they would choose a subject that is conceptually more intimate with a given verb; (b) In contrast, Korean L1 speakers’ sentence construction is topic-oriented, so they would first consider the contextual properties of each referent such as shared familiarity and previous topicality; (c) Korean speakers’ L1 patterns would be persistent in their L2 English processing. The results and some implications for English teaching are discussed.

The present study aims to examine the realization of English reduced vowels by Korean learners. Little seems to be known about the acquisition of reduced vowels by L2 learners in spite of the importance of their correct use in avoiding a foreign accent. Three groups of Korean subjects and native American-English subjects participated in the study, and five types of test materials were created considering phonological position, morphological structure, and English orthography. The frequencies of F1 and F2 were measured and their scatter plots were drawn for the analysis. The findings of the present study are summarized as follows. First, L1 influence was identified in the realization of English reduced vowels by Korean learners. The characteristic of the syllable-timed language of Korean was represented and L1 transfer of the Korean vowel [ ] was shown in the results. Second, English proficiency of Korean learners was reflected in the production of the reduced vowels. Third, the early experience of staying in English-speaking countries helped Korean learners acquire English reduced vowels.

As English has been rapidly spreading to non-Western communities, we have had numerous varieties of English. In the Outer Circle, English gained an official status, which resulted in nonnative varieties of English. In the Expanding Circle, English achieved the status of the first foreign language. With a range of English varieties, educators and administrators have been faced with controversial questions such as: (1) how to define native speakers of English? and (2) which varieties to teach? This qualitative study investigates four Korean EFL teachers’ perception of speakers of English and the issue of target varieties. Using data from semi-structured interviews and personal conversations collected for one academic semester, the researcher found that the participants considered various features when identifying an individual as a native or nonnative speaker of English. They used to consider ethnicity and nationality important in the past, which have been replaced by language precedence, cultural attachment, native speaker’s intuition, and mutual intelligibility. The findings of this study also demonstrate that American English is regarded as the most preferred variety as an educational target in Korean ELT because of the power that its speakers have.

The purpose of this research is to demonstrate the acquisition process of the ellipsis at the end of sentences for Koreans who learn Japanese through the contrast of Chinese and English native speakers. The sample of analysis comes from OPI data. The two results below are described in detail: First, Koreans who learn Japanese use more frequently the ellipsis at the end of sentences under the “Existing-Verb-Clauses” than Chinese and English native speakers. However, the acquisition level goes up, the frequency of usage is getting higher to the point where the acquisition process is inclined to be equal at both side (Koreans who learn Japanese vs Chinese and English native speaker). Second, the formality varies more than Chinese and English native speakers, as well as it appears at the beginning level. The formality includes “「けど」,「から」,「て」,「ので」”.The formality of Chinese and English native speakers is similar to Koreans who learn Japanese at the end of the learning stage.

A foreign accent in a second language (L2) may be caused by nonnative-like pronunciation of suprasegmental elements such as stress as well as segmental elements of the L2 phonological system. In the literature of L2 phonological acquisition, however, most studies have focused on the segmental features and only a few studies have investigated the L2 acquisition of suprasegmental elements. This study examines the acquisition of English word stress by adult speakers of Korean in an attempt to see how they learn English stress patterns, particularly if they treat nouns and verbs differently and show sensitivity to the internal syllable structure with respect to stress assignment or if they treat English word stress entirely as a lexical phenomenon. For this, 51 Korean university students were assigned the production and perception tasks in which they were instructed to produce 35 monomorphemic nouns and verbs classified into 7 classes according to stress patterns and listen to them to mark on which syllable they perceived stress to be. It was revealed in this study that although they had no knowledge of stress placement associated with lexical category, vowel weight and the extramatricality of word-final consonants in English, they showed sensitivity to the effect of coda consonants, treating open and closed syllables differently. Based on the results of this research, pedagogical implications are suggested for the teaching of English word stress.