THE PRESENT AND FUTURE OF ENGLISH

AND ENGLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE IN

By

JUSTIN PAUL GRATTON

Integrated Studies Final Project Essay (MAIS 700)

submitted to Dr. Angela Specht

in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of

Master of Arts – Integrated Studies

Athabasca, Alberta

August, 2015

DEDICATION

This final project is dedicated to my partner and best friend Anita McKay, that without her unending patience and support I may not have completed.

Abstract

English as a Second Language (ESL) is a necessity for the facilitation of trade and political discourse throughout the non-Native speaking countries of the world. A review of research suggests that this will continue to be the case for the foreseeable future. Local and geopolitical circumstances continue to drive the need for English education in South

Korea and this influences the production and consumption, locally and globally, of

English language goods and media.

The Present and Future of English and ESL in Korea

The English language, due to its global reach, has possibly touched every single person on this planet, at some point in his or her life. English has a dominant role in many countries, especially Korea. As Phillipson (1992) states, it is the key external link in politics, commerce, science, technology, military alliances, entertainment and (p.

30). Whether it is the shoes people wear, or the piece of litter that washes ashore after a big storm, the English language and its Latin based script is everywhere. It is the language of the world of international finance and trade and is the backbone of every microprocessor in every watch, microwave oven and alarm clock used in the world today.

It is these microprocessors that Wang (2010) says fuel the South Korean economic engine as multinational corporations like , Hyundai, SK Telecom and LG amount to 50% of ’s GDP. I explore the history of English in Korea and its future direction as a complimentary working and communicative language for youth.

This scholarly examination should demonstrate how Korea resists the trend that Gaddol

(1997) suggests towards greater regionalization and why it may secure a more evolutionary national multilingual language policy (p.58).

From a primarily agricultural rural population to a heavily urbanized and educated work force, South Korean society has changed very rapidly in the past 60 years This dramatic labour shift was brought about partly by heavy investment in education, particularly English education. This level of personal and governmental investment has resulted in a labour market heavily geared towards an individual’s English language abilities, as English is required in order to obtain even the most entry-level position in

corporations or government departments. This English language requirement has driven governments, companies and private individuals to invest heavily in English education, often by hiring overseas native English instructors in order to improve ’ accents, pronunciation, and conversation abilities. Also, it has led to a widespread perception amongst South Koreans that English language abilities are a key indicator of future success.

A career in one of South Korea’s (large family owned and controlled corporations) is highly sought after and competition is fierce. The essential skills required from prospective employees for a job with a are the following: a degree in your field, from a top ranked Korean or western university and a high score on a Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) or Test of English for International

Communication (TOEIC) test. The TOEFL test is so important in acquiring a position at these firms that according to Card (2006), Koreans spend $752 million each year on

English tests, with much of this being spent on preparation for the TOEFL assessment test. The English language is serious business for Korea and its’ multinational corporations. Samsung (2012) states that it has over 222,000 employees spread over 337 facilities in 58 countries. In order to keep an organization that large running efficiently, employees must be able to communicate effectively in English.

To understand how English language education has made such a large impact on

Korean society we must first look at the ’s relationship with English.

According to Shin (2007), English was initially brought to Korea with the introduction of

Christian missionaries between the mid-fourteenth and early twentieth century (1392-

1910). Language education was offered alongside religious teachings. Formalised

English language education began in 1883, when the government opened an

English language school in order to train interpreters. After the Japanese colonisation period of Korea (1910-1945), the US Army reintroduced English to South Korea during the , in order for Korean troops to work more directly with US and UN forces. English Language Teaching was firmly established in South Korea by the 1990s.

Earlier methods of English education were predominately done by grammar translation and rote memorisation techniques. However, according to Shin (2007) in the early 1990s

Kim Young Sam (at that time ), coaxed the Ministry of

Education to adopt a more “communicative English curriculum” which was to incorporate verbal rehearsal of practical everyday language and lead to the introduction of NET’s (Native English Teachers) into the public school system. Even with the introduction of NET’s, Koreans have struggled far more with spoken English than written. The ability for Koreans to communicate in English has always been important but there has been slow change to adopt the ‘communicative approach’ of English language teaching often referred to as Communicative Language Teaching (CLT). This reluctance has been due to the over-reliance on rote learning and grammar translation, which was deemed necessary by the general public and education officials, in helping students to obtain a high score on the written English portion of the standardized college admission test. According to the OECD (2009) Review of Innovation Policy report, the

College Scholastic Ability Test (CSAT) and subsequent enrolment in a top tier university is viewed by many in Korea as the only way in which to insure graduating students can acquire a good paying job, social connections and elevated social status. This mindset has created a situation where the immediate practical benefit of passing the CSAT has

outweighed acquiring verbal communication skills. Shim (2009) states Koreans difficulty in verbally communicating in English has been such an issue that the previous President,

Lee Myeong Bak, when he first came into power, insisted that the teaching of English should be in English so that Koreans are able to “communicate with Americans”. This has led a shift in English education policy in Korea, with gradual reforms to the university testing and admissions process in an effort to instill English verbal communication skills.

The demand for English speaking employees has fueled English fever in Korea.

In order to ensure that their children acquire English skills at a very early age, Korean parents enrol their children in preschool and after school language academies, ideally staffed by native English instructors. This is followed up in elementary and high school with after-school academies which focus primarily on English training that can often go until 11 o’clock at night, 5 days a week.

According to Kim (2008) the Samsung Economic Research Institute reports that

Korea spends about US$15.8 billion on English education per year. This zealous attitude towards English is due to the belief in Korea that education, especially English, is regarded as “the most powerful means to achieve upward social mobility and economic prosperity”. Although as Song (2011) states: English in Korea is a language seldom used in everyday communication it has become an integral measurement in Korean educational performance. English ability and higher education directly relate to class and status in Korea (p. 36). Park (2009) states that the national enthusiasm of acquiring

English in South Korea is a big industry, with many Korean parents pressuring their children to learn English with the belief that it will improve their future employment

prospects. The student’s beliefs in English education have a great deal to do with their parents’ own beliefs. Koreans, in general, have a fanatical zeal when it comes to education. The ability to do well in English is mandatory for entrance to university, and by default, a successful career. The CSAT (College Scholastic Ability Test) that all potential university students take has an entire section dedicated to English. This one, eight-hour test will determine which university they enter. It is considered the chance to make or break one's future. The psychological burden is such that South Korea suffers from high student suicide rates. Lee (2011) reports that according to Ahn Byong Man, former Education Minister and of the Presidential Advisory Council on Education,

Science and Technology, more than 200 students committed suicide in 2009 and about

150 the following year.

Lee (2011) explains that the entire Korean education system is based on

Confucianism and is designed to have students pass a series of standardized examinations that allow the student to progress to the next level of education. If the student fails to progress, there will be very little, if any, chance in social mobility or enhancement. The long practice of equating social status with academic achievement has left behind a tradition of pouring everything into studying, where up to 75% of school age children attend private learning institutes. Ko, Haboush and Piggott’s (2003) book explains very clearly the role of Confucianism and education in Korea. Korea is one of the few countries where Confucianism is still a very real and relevant part of day-to-day life.

The situation in Korea is similar to that in . Pennycook (1994) explains that Singaporeans pragmatic view is for education to enable children to gain the skills necessary to help the country participate in the world economy. Thus, it is the people

with the knowledge of English, the people that hold the most intellectually demanding and the most prestigious high paying jobs that have a status with a certain amount of legitimacy, namely their genetic superiority. Notwithstanding, the large increases in university enrollments and the central significance of education credentials in socio- economic improvement have in fact, widened the gap between the middle and lower classes. Income distribution is more unequal than in or , with large disparities between university and secondary-school graduates. Many workers know their comparatively low wages make it virtually impossible for them to give their children a university education, since it is an ever-increasing financial burden even for middle-class families. These factors weigh heavily on parents, who hope to improve the status and reputation of their family.

Savada and Shaw (1990) note that men and women secondary-school graduates are often treated with open disdain by university educated workers in Korea. The rigid hierarchical social system places great emphasis on age, education and wealth and not on merit or ability. Park and Kim (1992) state that it is common to all hierarchical relationships that some people are always ranked higher than other and thus have more power. Hofstede and Bond (1988) call the cultural dimension connected to hierarchy a power distance. The greater the distance is, the greater are the accepted differences between people of different statuses. In cultures of great power distances, such as Korea, power is usually concentrated in the hands of the few and they naturally take advantage of the benefits at the detriment to others (p.98). Class inequality and access to education doesn’t only occur in Korea.

Phillipson (1992) says that the same level of class balkanization can be seen in

Singapore where it is government policy to establish English as the language of public, industrial and modern business sectors, which means that people that have not had the ability to study English intensely due to financial or other restraints have very little hope for upward mobility (p. 29).

The educational inequality between the classes is not only affecting the ability for upward mobility it is also affecting health. Khang, Lynch and Kaplan (2004), while studying Korean census and death certificate data, observed that educational inequalities also led to higher mortality rates amongst men and women who had attained a lower education.

This is not to say that only elites have borrowed from English to serve their own means. This is far from the case. Subsequent Korean governments have increased their efforts to make English education and testing based more on conversational English, as opposed to grammatical and listening tests, and the increased globalisation of popular media and communication. As a result, Koreans are beginning to adopt English as their own, in a hybrid variety of Korean and English that is called .

Korea and the city of have had a rather weak relationship with English.

Some policy makers and business interests feel that Korea needs to adopt English as an official language in order to make the nation more competitive, others have argued that this would bring about the deterioration of the and the destruction of national identity. Regardless of the opinions for or against the use of English, it has been democratically adopted and transformed by Koreans into something linguistically unique.

Lawrence (2010) describes Konglish not like a traditional ‘pidgin’ or ‘creole’ but, rather,

as a new sub-variety of Korean, a variety like that of Chinglish or Janglish, which has developed as a creative mix of English and the local language. They are creative in that they are not static, but dynamic with new elements appearing and disappearing over time.

They are a ‘mix’ in that elements of English are mixed with elements of the local language, changed, or recombined with other elements of English in unique ways.

This is not, altogether, surprising considering the cultural influence that English has had in Korea and the majority of the world. Crystal (2003) notes 75 countries where

English ‘holds a special place’ with L1 and L21 speakers. This total includes approximately 98 million people that call English their second language and a further 350 million ESL speaking immigrants in English speaking countries. When you combine these totals with the estimated number of L1 speakers at 370 million and the outer circle countries at 2, 900 million, where there’s a minimal use of English as a second language one can clearly see the spreading influence of English (Crystal, 2010). Wei and Su (2012) estimate that alone is home to 390 million people who have learned or are learning

English.

Today, any international traveller or businessperson would be hard pressed not to find the global reach of English. The landscapes of every nation from the restaurants, road signs and shops they visit will seem all to familiar to them. Throughout the world you will never be too far from a 7-Eleven, KFC, Starbucks or other multinational brands.

Added to which, and more compellingly, in many cities around the globe, local

1 L1 is defined as the first or native language with which a person sociolinguistically identifies with. L2 would be a second or acquired language that a person has learned after their native language.

equivalents have been developed of these brands. Copycat clones that embrace the spirit of the original, but with a decidedly local flavour.

This linguistic legacy can be traced back over 300 years to what Ferguson (2003) calls “Anglobalization” where the combination of free trade, mass migration and capital investment has helped spread the English language and it’s institutions around the world.

Globalisation has connected the world and made it a more consumerist, Americanised and homogenised place. Everywhere you go you will find the predictable assortment of global corporations and institutions, regardless of their origins, communicating with you in English. The institutional supremacy of English internationally, has been further solidified with the formation of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). The

Chinese led and Beijing located AIIB (2015) has written into the bank’s “Articles of

Agreement” that the working language for the bank and its fifty seven prospective founding members, will be in English. Local enterprises in an effort to market themselves and make themselves more visible, will also adopt the use of English. This has and will continue to alter the linguistic landscape of many of the world’s cities.

Linguistic landscape as defined by Landry and Bourhis (1997) is a ‘language of public road signs, advertising billboards, street names, place names, commercial shop signs, and public signs on government buildings [which] combines to form the linguistic landscape of a given territory, region, or urban agglomeration’ (p.25). Has the

Anglicanisation of the linguistic landscape of Korea been brought about by market forces and in a display of linguistic superiority by the upper classes’ domination through

English? Lawrence (2012) doesn’t seem to think so. In his study of the Korean and

English linguistic landscape in South Korea he came upon some surprising conclusions:

These uses of English, Korean, and Chinese are influenced by larger

sociolinguistic patterns relating to modernity, luxury and youth. On minbaks in

Shinduri one can find only Korean, but in hotels and pensions there is a high

frequency of English. This is because the hotels on this beach are luxurious,

beachside retreats for companies and MTs (Konglish for ‘membership training’,

that is, university student party/trips). The amusement park has more

English and Konglish than anywhere in Korea because of its specialized nature

as a Disneyworld-style amusement park. Beer and wine posters and labels have

English, whereas soju (alcohol) posters have Korean. In other words, products

that are associated with modernity (cell phones, Everland), luxury (hotels,

wine) and youth (beer, T-shirts) are in English. Regions follow a similar

pattern. Gangnam, Bundang, and beach/amusement resorts are associated with

luxurious, modern living, and have a high frequency of English. These patterns

contrast with those for products such as hanyak (oriental medicine), hanbok

(Korean clothing), soju (Korean alcohol), and for districts such as the

Namdaemun market and Insadong, where a much higher frequency of the

Korean language is used. In the youthful domain of graffiti, tagging in English

often occurs. Therefore, if nothing else, this study strongly suggests that, in the

linguistic landscape of contemporary Korea, English served as a marker of

modernity, luxury and youth (Lawrence, 2012).

This study demonstrates, in the context of Korea, that English language use is not necessarily the sole property of the wealthy educated elites. Although, areas that are frequented or occupied by the upper class do have increased English use, it is becoming

increasingly more common as a language of youth and modernity. Perhaps the educational reforms of increased English CLT combined with globalisation have effected

English use. Making access to English more democratic and allowing the youth of Korea a new voice in which to express themselves in a creative way, without the hindrances of traditional Confucian decorum. Lee (2004) says this is why Korean pop musicians use

English as a language of ‘self-assertion’ and ‘resistance’ against older conservative values. This is especially true about Korean women. Lim (2011) states that traditional

Korean values have often made women sacrifice careers to raise a family, however, this trend is changing amongst younger educated Korean women. As in the case of Ahn Soo

Hyun: “Things have changed a lot. I have more friends who are not married than who are married. I don’t feel lonely. I have lots of friends to hang out with, and so I am not thinking about marriage yet”.

It is not difficult to see a correlation between an increase in young, unmarried educated women with disposable incomes and the increase in English use in the Korean landscape, in areas that are popular and frequented by young people, especially women.

Korea’s youth are spending more time being global consumers of culture than raising families. Korea’s global reach doesn’t stop at its shores. According to the Korean

Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade or MOFAT (2009), there is also a large Korean diaspora of close to 6.8 million people, approximately 2.535 million (37%) of which that live in the top five inner circle English speaking countries of The United States, Canada,

Australia, The United Kingdom and New Zealand. Many of these overseas Koreans immigrated on their own or were adopted during or after the Korean War.

According to Choi (2003) a diaspora can have an impact on a home country’s economy in three ways: Through trade and investment, overseas remittances and the transfer of human resources and labour. Korean communities seem to have an ethic of empathy and solidarity that they use to maintain ties with Korea. I believe these ties help bind not only the people, but also the English and Korean languages together.

There are other ties that bind Korea and the English language together other than economics and family. The United States Forces Korea or USFK (2011) states that Korea is home to over 28,500 American military personnel. The United States Forces Korea is tasked: to defend the Republic of Korea against external aggression and maintain the stability in Northeast Asia. I envision greater future US participation in Korea and specifically the larger region, especially given China’s growing influence and a general increase in prosperity in the region. This will be especially true of US military involvement in Korea.

Takashi Inoguchi and Paul Bacon (2005) agree that the US will most likely retain a substantial military presence in , especially Korea, given its indispensability to the maintenance of regional peace and security (p.128). Xinbo from The Brookings

Institute agrees that the US will continue to maintain a presence in Korea even after unification. The US will continue to retain the security alliance with a unified Korea and maintain its military presence on the peninsula (Xinbo, 2000). The Congressional

Research Service (2012) report to the United States Congress states that the purpose of the United States “pivot” to the Asia-Pacific region announced by President Obama in

2011 is to strengthen existing allies in Asia and build new partnerships with India and

Vietnam. It seems that US political and military influence may only grow stronger in

Asia and in Korea, which like Crystal (2003) suggests are chief reasons for languages to become and continue being international; and, is also why I believe English will still maintain a level of importance in the region.

I believe like Grin (1991) that the spread, maintenance, and decline of languages is not a purely linguistic process, but is also a result of the interplay between complex social, political and economic forces (p. 169). This complex interplay of conditions is why Korea is an interesting country to study in the context of the future of English and

English language teaching. The future for English is bright in Korea. This will not necessarily be the English that we are used to, but a combination of standard American

English for business and political purposes and Konglish as a medium for expression internationally and at home. While some language purists might argue that this hybridization of the two languages might do harm to both languages, I believe it is just a natural evolution that global English must make. Korea has a long way to go to bridge the gaps of inequality in its society, as it pushes itself to being a just and fair developed nation. However, with the changing attitudes amongst youth, Confucianism will slowly give way and become less important in society thus making the use and learning of

English more accessible for all, and not just something needed only for the wealthy and educated. The government should continue to support and promote continuing language education as a matter of economic and social policy. In particular improving access to affordable language education, which should help to address some of the current inequalities evident in the country.

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