Three Varieties of Non-inner Circle English
This section serves to discuss the grammatical and lexical aspects of three varieties of NICE. This is not to champion these varieties over others but instead, to merely help illustrate in more detail the ways in which English has manifest itself througho
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5.1 Konglish Konglish is the variety of English spoken in South Korea (officially, the Republic of Korea). There are several websites dedicated to Konglish and these are accessible and informative for EFL students and teachers alike. Often, such websites have been established by EFL teachers themselves, given that they would be more likely to have been exposed to the English used by Koreans and then might seek to create websites designed to educate individuals on this language variety. Even as a linguist, my concern is less with the origins of non-inner circle Englishes’ use of grammar/lexis and instead, the more practical issue regarding defining what constitutes NICE in terms of their established grammar and lexis, in order to clarify the error-innovation issue. On the Korean radio station Morning Special, there is a section called ‘MS Konglish Dictionary’. In this context, the examples provided are indeed presented as errors to be corrected, but they are not presented in a negative manner. Nonetheless, by implying that the English as used by Koreans involves errors across the board, especially within a medium which can potentially reach many people, it also sends the message once © The Author(s) 2019 A. Baratta, World Englishes in English Language Teaching, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-13286-6_5
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again that Konglish, or NICE in general perhaps, are wrong whenever they deviate from standard English. If indeed those who listen to the programme desire nothing less than standard English from their own use of English, then the programme serves a purpose. Koreans perhaps do not need to be taught Konglish if they already speak it. However, the distinction between error and difference could be made more clear, especially within the context of a radio programme which can potentially reach many people. In the June 2000 issue (86–87), here is a list of some of the errors: • Neither of students are coming. • The surgeon who operated the King released new details of his injuries. • I recommend you a walk along the park. Clearly, none of these sentences would cause communication difficulties. Jung and Min (1999: 34–35) also point out that as Korean does not have a distinction between at and in in terms of the distinctions made in English regarding dimension and semantic differences, this can be transferred into English. The example provided concerns the sentence, ‘the writer is a visiting professor in Korea University’. However, given enough time and usage of such expressions, the aforementioned societal codification can indeed take place. Once again, however, I raise the issue of terminologies, as this can lead to different perceptions and counter the negative perceptions that are arguably perpetuated by the use of blends, such as Konglish, Chinglish and so on. Ahn (2014), for example, uses the term Korean English to describe the English used in Korea. While Konglish is also referred to, Ahn is suggesting that the difference between the two is that the former refers to the nativisation of Englis
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