Skip to main content

Korean English Teachers’ Conflicts and Struggles Over Local, Global, and ‘Legitimate’ Englishes in School

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
  • 598 Accesses

Abstract

This chapter focuses on Korean English teachers’ conflicts and struggles over the legitimacy of their own English versus other varieties of English. It discusses in particular how the existence of English study abroad returnees in the classroom escalates this struggle, bringing to the surface teachers’ conflicts about being Korean English speakers, and how they contest and at the same time pass on the language ideologies prevalent in Korean society. Teachers’ discourse, as evident in the interview data, shows their conflicting attitudes toward returnees’ English. Teachers’ discourse also reveals their divergent attitudes toward returnees’ different varieties of English acquired from different regions, illuminating how they apply the same language ideology that they are contesting in their effort to secure their positions as Korean English teachers and speakers.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.

References

  • Ahn, H. (2014). Teachers’ attitudes towards Korean English in South Korea. World Englishes, 33(2), 195–222.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ahn, H. (2015). Awareness of and attitudes to Asian Englishes: A study of English teachers in South Korea. Asian Englishes, 17, 132–151.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bhatt, R. M. (2002). Experts, dialects, and discourse. International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 12(1), 74–109.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Brutt-Griffler, J., & Samimy, K. K. (1999). Revisiting the colonial in the postcolonial: Critical praxis for nonnative-English-speaking teachers in a TESOL program. TESOL Quarterly, 33, 413–431.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Butler, Y. G. (2004). What level of English proficiency do elementary school teachers need to attain in order to teach EFL?: Case studies from Korea, Taiwan, and Japan. TESOL Quarterly, 38(2), 245–278.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cho, J. P. (2012). Global fatigue: Transnational markets, linguistic capital, and Korean-American male English teachers in South Korea. Journal of Sociolinguistics, 16, 218–237.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chun, S. Y. (2014). EFL learners’ beliefs about native and non-native English-speaking teachers: Perceived strengths, weaknesses, and preferences. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 35(6), 563–579.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chung, J., & Choi, T. (2016). English education policies in South Korea: Planned and enacted. In R. Kirkpatrick (Ed.), English language education policy in Asia (pp. 281–299). Dordrecht: Springer.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Holliday, A. (2005). The struggle to teach English as an international language. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jenkins, J. (2007). English as a lingua franca: Attitude and identity. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jenks, C. J. (2017). Race and ethnicity in English language teaching: Korea in focus. Bristol, UK: Multilingual Matters.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Kachru, B. (1992). The other tongue: English across cultures. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kim, S. A. (2002). A critical reflection on the “teaching English through English” classes in the Korean context. English Teaching, 57(4), 315–346.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kubota, R., & Lin, A. (2006). Race and TESOL: Introduction to concepts and theories. TESOL Quarterly, 40(3), 471–493.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lee, M. (2015). “Gangnam style” English ideologies: Neoliberalism, class and the parents of early study-abroad students. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 19(1), 35–50.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lee, Y. S. (2015). Innovating secondary English education in Korea. In B. Spolsky & K. Sung (Eds.), Secondary school English education in Asia: From policy to practice. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Matsuda, A. (2003). The ownership of English in Japanese secondary schools. World Englishes, 22(4), 483–496.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ministry of Education, Science, and Technology (MEST). (2008). Elementary curriculum explanatory booklet: Foreign language English. Seoul: MEST.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ministry of Education, Science, and Technology (MEST). (2011). An introduction to national English ability test (NEAT): A handout for explaining new policies to parents. Seoul: MEST.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ong, A. (1999). Flexible citizenship: The cultural logics of transnationality. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Park, J. K. (2006). Professionalization of TEFL in Korea: The roads behind and ahead. The Journal of Asia TEFL, 3(4), 113–134.

    Google Scholar 

  • Park, J. K. (2009). Teaching English as a global language in Korea: Curriculum rhetoric and reality. Asian Englishes, 12(1), 124–129.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Park, J. K., & Kim, M. K. (2014). Teaching and learning of EIL in Korean culture and context. In R. Marlina & R. A. Giri (Eds.), The pedagogy of English as an international language: Perspectives from scholars, teachers and students. Dordrecht: Springer.

    Google Scholar 

  • Park, J. S. Y. (2009). The local construction of a global language: Ideologies of English in South Korea. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Park, J. S. Y. (2013). English, class, and neoliberalism in South Korea. In L. Wee, R. B. H. Goh, & L. Lim (Eds.), The politics of English: South Asia, Southeast Asia and the Asia Pacific. Amsterdam: John Benjamin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Park, J. S. Y. (2015). Structures of feeling in unequal Englishes. In R. Tupas (Ed.), Unequal Englishes: The politics of English today. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Park, J. S. Y., & Lo, A. (2012). Transnational South Korea as a site for a sociolinguistics of globalization: Markets, timescales, neoliberalism. Journal of Sociolinguistics, 16(2), 147–164.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Park, K. J. (2009). Characteristics of Korea English as a glocalised variety. In K. Murata & J. Jenkins (Eds.), Global Englishes in Asian contexts: Current and future debates. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Park, S. J., & Abelmann, N. (2004). Class and cosmopolitan striving: Mothers’ management of English education in South Korea. Anthropological Quarterly, 77(4), 645–672.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ruecker, T., & Ives, L. (2015). White native English speakers needed: The rhetorical construction of privilege in online teacher recruitment spaces. TESOL Quarterly, 49(4), 733–756.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Seidlhofer, B. (2004). Research perspectives on teaching English as a Lingua Franca. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 24(1), 209–239.

    Google Scholar 

  • Seth, M. (2002). Education fever: Society, politics, and the pursuit of schooling in South Korea. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shim, J. R. (1999). Codified Korean English: Process, characteristics and consequence. World Englishes, 18(2), 247–258.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Shim, J. R. (2002). Changing attitudes toward TEWOL in Korea. Journal of Asian Pacific Communication, 12(2), 143–158.

    Google Scholar 

  • Song, J. (2016a). Emotions and language teacher identity: Vulnerability, conflicts and transformation. TESOL Quarterly, 50(3), 631–654.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Song, J. (2016b). (il)Legitimate language skills and membership: English teachers’ perspectives on study abroad returnees in the EFL classroom. TESOL Journal, 17(1), 203–226.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Takeshita, Y. (2000). Japanese English as a variety of Asian Englishes and Japanese students of English. Intercultural Communication Studies, 10(1), 1–8.

    Google Scholar 

  • Young, T. J., & Walsh, S. (2010). Which English? Whose English? An investigation of “non-native” teachers’ beliefs about target varieties. Language, Culture and Curriculum, 23(2), 123–137.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2017 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Song, J. (2017). Korean English Teachers’ Conflicts and Struggles Over Local, Global, and ‘Legitimate’ Englishes in School. In: Jenks, C., Lee, J. (eds) Korean Englishes in Transnational Contexts. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-59788-1_10

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-59788-1_10

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-59787-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-59788-1

  • eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics