This study is a follow-up of Lee (2018) providing a quantitative variationist analysis on the variation of English loanword expressions for ‘smartphone application’ in Korean: ayp, ephul, ayphullikheyisyen, and ephullikheyisyen. Two different data sets including search term frequency ratio from Naver Data Lab and sociolinguistic survey responses from 335 participants regarding the usage of the four loanword variants were examined to identify the usage pattern of the lexical variable. Both search term frequency data and survey responses confirmed that the usage of clipped variants, ayp and ephul, were clearly preferred to their full-formed variants. Logistic regression analyses on the survey data reported that survey takers with higher educational background and more experience in English speaking countries favored using ayp and ayphullikheyisyen. This study argues that Korean speakers with higher education background and more exposure to English favored ay- variants because they considered those variants as more appropriately generated loanwords than evariants.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the term ‘agassi’ by analyzing the pattern of actual language use of it in the aspect of sociolinguistic perspective. Through this work, it will be possible to figure out the change of meaning of the ‘agassi’, and the causes of conflict situations of using it in modern society. In chapter 2, the difference between ‘agassi’ as an address term and as a reference term is represented. Chapter 3 shows the chronicle change in the use of ‘agassi’ being originated from its etymology, ‘agissi’. It turns out that the use of ‘agassi’ has evolved for in the order of Honorific form, kinship and Non-Honorific form. Chapter 4 investigates the tendency and its cause of the negative interpretation of ‘agassi’ in modern society. The reason why the address term ‘agassi’ causes social displeasure is because it is regarded as ‘sexual objectification’. It can be subdivided into three categories: ‘agassi’ is (1) the expression that emphasis sex in social life, (2) associated with specific occupational groups which is socially unacceptable, and (3) used often in the situation of sexual harassment.

Kang, Hyeon-Seok. 2016. “Current Research Trends in Overseas Sociolinguistics: An Analysis Based on Recent Sociolinguistic Journal Articles and Conferences”. The Sociolinguistic Journal of Korea 24(3). 1~35. This paper is an attempt to analyze the current trends in sociolinguistic research overseas, focusing on sociolinguistic studies in the US and Britain. Three main analyses are performed in this research, i.e., analyses of the Journal of Sociolinguistics articles published in 2010~2015 years, of the sociolinguistic conferences held in 2015, and of the sociolinguistic session titles of the LSA meetings held in 2010~2015 years. The results of the analyses suggest that anthropological linguistics, language variation, discourse analysis, and language contact still remain as the most influential subfields of sociolinguistics, while research fields of sociophonetics, social media studies, language landscape, and documentary linguistics have been establishing themselves as new research areas since 1990s.

Park Eun-hee & Yang Jin-suk. 2015. “A Sociolinguistic Analysis of a Commercial District in Seoul: A Linguistic Landscape Approach”. The Sociolinguistic Journal of Korea 23(2). 37~63. This paper investigates current sociolinguistic status of English and Korean by analyzing public signs at a shopping-centered district in Seoul, Korea. It is grounded on the idea that looking into a linguistic landscape (LL) of shopping districts in Seoul can address differential social values and meanings upon which the languages hinge in contemporary Korean society. For this study, a total of 140 public signs were analyzed according to language choice, linguistic features of English signs, and the relationship between language choice and commercial domain. The results indicate that 1) English signs outnumbered those of Korean, Chinese, and French, 2) English signs were mainly produced through juxtaposition, meaning that English (or Anglicized) words were displayed in parallel, and 3) while youth-populated domains such as coffee shops and cosmetic stores mobilized English to index a sense of modernity, language choice diverged in the food industry diverged depending on the types of food. This study shows how public signs on the street can be a useful analytical tool to investigate contemporary language ideologies in the society. (174)