This article aims to suggest a model of critical literacy in English as a Foreign Language (hereafter EFL) contexts. The paper will introduce previous critical literacy models in first or second language teaching and learning and those in EFL contexts. Then, several empirical studies based on the models are introduced suggesting important issues to consider in implementing critical literacy in EFL contexts. A model of critical literacy in EFL contexts is, consequently, suggested with the three key elements for successful critical literacy implementation in EFL contexts, language for criticality development, affects and criticality development and citizenship and criticality development. The model pursues balancing conventional literacy education, critical literacy education and citizenship education. The researchers suggest balancing conventional skill-based literacy, affective pedagogy, and citizenship education with the development of critical literacies. Teacher-initiated practice and guidance, incorporation of community-sensitive topics and materials, and students’ active participation are key elements practitioners should consider in their adaptation of critical literacy instruction in EFL contexts.

This study analyzes the results of ten foreign language anxiety (FLA) research papers from the Korean post-secondary EFL context. Its aim is to identify some of the methodological limitations that persist in such research in an effort to influence the epistemological perspectives and methodological approaches of future studies. A comprehensive summary of the FLA-associated factors, variables, and pedagogical implications reported in the respective research papers is presented. Discussions include a critical analysis of the traditional cognitivist approach to FLA research, addressing issues associated with attempts to isolate and objectively quantify the cognitive states of the students. Highlighted is the argument that, when the socio-cultural dimension of language learning is adequately accounted for, many of the underlying assumptions inherent to traditional FLA research become inescapably problematic. The study concludes by emphasizing the need to adopt holistic, interpretive, and social constructivist research perspectives through which the dynamic and ever-changing nature of human activity can be more fully accounted for, and by which the pedagogical implications remain deeply entwined with, rather than detached from, the context in which the language learning activity takes place.

최근 국제경쟁력에 대한 연구와 토론이 매우 활발함에도 불구하고 아직까지 국제경쟁력과 관련된 각종 논의들이 체계화되지 못하고 있다. 본 연구에서는 무역이론, 해외직접투자이론, 글로벌 전략이론, Porter(1990)의 Diamond 모델 등 기존의 국제경쟁력 연구를 패러다임 차원에서 분석하였다. 기존 연구들은 국제경쟁력을 창출하는 주체(subject), 연구의 분석단위(unit of analysis), 국제경쟁력의 원천(sources)과 결과(outcomes) 개념들을 혼동하고 있거나 본국 (home base)과 다국적 기업의 역할에 대해 서로 다른 가정을 하고 있었다. 앞으로의 국제경쟁력 연구는 개발 기업이나 산업이 아닌 산업 군집(cluster)을 연구대상으로 하여 그동안 각기 별도로 논의되었던 기업, 산업, 국가 차원의 경쟁력 요인을 통합하는 노력을 기울여야 할 것이다. 이때 통합 모델의 이론적 근거로 제도론적 접근법을 들 수 있다. 제도론적 접근법에서는 기업의 행동이 영향을 미치는 특정 국가에 내재하는 제도들간의 관계(arrangements) 혹은 연결 메카니즘(mechanism)에서 국제경쟁력의 원천을 탐구하는 것이다. 다만, 한가지 주의할 점은 국가간경쟁력 모델을 기업에 적용시키거나 기업경쟁력 모델을 국가 차원으로 확장시켜 통합 모델을 만들어서는 안된다는 것이다.

This paper is an attempt to search for a meta-theoretical foundation to an integrated Korean studies. Without its own target and methodology, it will be difficult for Korean studies to be established as an independent academic discipline. In particular, the antagonism of the ‘Two Cultures,’ referring to the juxtaposition between humanities and the sciences, has been reproduced into a humanities-based ‘National studies’ (‘國學’) and a social science-based ‘Korean studies’ (‘韓國學’), and is acting as a factor preventing a more holistic perspective of Korean society. Such division originated from the modern academic disciplinary structure systemized at the end of the 19th century but was then deepened by the path dependency of the division system and the external dependency of the Korean academia. Under this context, this paper seeks to graft critical naturalism of Marx and Durkheim, who envisioned unified sciences at the end of the 19th century, before separation into modern academic disciplines took place, to the attempts to alleviate the ‘Two Cultures’ and thereby project an integrated Korean studies. Critical naturalism of the two thinkers – in particular, their relational social paradigm and theory of explanatory critique – proposes a third way that resolves the dichotomies between society and people, science and philosophy, nomothetic and idiographic methods, and facts and values, thus positioning itself as a paradigmatic basis for unified knowledge that overcomes the antagonism between hyper-naturalist positivism and anti-naturalist humanities. Moreover, the critical naturalism of the two provides the possibility of depth-explanatory human sciences that integrates the historicity and the scientificity of a divided society as well as abundant philosophy of science resources to promote a more complete Korean studies that encompasses both the South and the North.