Ko, Bo-Ai. 2018. “Thematic Patterns in Formal Email Writing of Korean EFL College Learners”. The Sociolinguistic Journal of Korea 26(1). 31~59. This study explores the Theme types and the thematic progression in the formal email writings of Korean EFL college learners, based on the Theme-Rheme analytical framework of Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG). Data was collected from 99 college students, enrolled in an English Writing Composition course during the second semester of 2017 via a cyber university in Korea. Their main writing activity involved email writings in the form of requesting primarily based on the Genre Approach. Text analysis was conducted with the comparison of the high- scoring group (15), the medium-scoring group (15) and the low-scoring group (15), based on assessment of the course assignment. Employing the coding step of identifying the Theme and Rheme of each T-unit, the text analysis sought to figure out which Theme types were used for each T-unit and which thematic progression patterns were used for overall text flow and cohesion. The key finding was that there were certain discourse-specific thematic patterns of formal email writing. Among the range of thematic features, this study will highlight marked Themes, interpersonal Themes and thematic choices of nominalization for the purpose of formal email writing texts.

The present study attempted to investigate any changes in a group of Korean undergraduate EFL students' perceptions on L2-L2 communication. Email exchanges with two different EFL groups were carried out. Chinese and Turkish EFL students were recruited for a Freshmen English course at a university located in South Korea. The students' initial, as well as post-study, perspectives on L2-L2 email exchanges, students' email messages, and their paragraph writing samples were collected for analysis. The major findings of the present study were the positive changes in the participants' perspectives on L2-L2 communication and their awareness of the need for more authentic L2-L2 communication opportunities in L2 learning. Also, L2-L2 email exchanges coupled with contextualized grammar lessons using participants' own email messages were particularly found useful, and the analysis of two selected participants’ paragraph samples showed improvement in their L2 writing. Suggestions for future research were also provided.

Many researchers called for a need to expose L2 learners to diverse writing contexts, and L2-L2 interactions using English as a communication tool became more common than communication with native English speakers. The present study introduced two groups of Korean university students to a task, for which they were grouped differently: the first with a group of students at a Chinese university and the second with Chinese students as well as students of a different Korean university. These groups performed a task that they selected from among three choices. In the process of their e-mail exchanges, the students' pre- and post-task perspectives were explored through two surveys. In addition, the students expressed their reflections regarding this experience in writing. Overall, the students seemed to consider this experience of exchanging emails with L2 students speaking a different L1 useful and it helped some students gain confidence in their ability to use English as a communication tool. This study provided an opportunity to expand the writing context in EFL classrooms.