Contrastive Analysis of Mongolian and Korean Monophthongs Based on Acoustic Experiment

음향 실험을 기초로 한 몽골어와 한국어의 단모음 대조분석

This study aims at setting the hierarchy of difficulty of the 7 Korean monophthongs for Mongolian learners of Korean according to Prator's theory based on the Contrastive Analysis Hypothesis. In addition to that, it will be shown that the difficulties and errors for Mongolian learners of Korean as a second or foreign language proceed directly from this hierarchy of difficulty. This study began by looking at the speeches of 60 Mongolians for Mongolian monophthongs; data were investigated and analyzed into formant frequencies F1 and F2 of each vowel. Then, the 7 Korean monophthongs were compared with the resultant Mongolian formant values and are assigned to 3 levels, 'same', 'similar' or 'different sound'. The findings in assessing the differences of the 8 nearest equivalents of Korean and Mongolian vowels are as follows: First, Korean /a/ and /$\wedge$/ turned out as a 'same sound' with their counterparts, Mongolian /a/ and /ɔ/. Second, Korean /i/, /e/, /o/, /u/ turned out as a 'similar sound' with each their Mongolian counterparts /i/, /e/, /o/, /u/. Third, Korean /ɨ/ which is nearest to Mongolian /i/ in terms of phonetic features seriously differs from it and is thus assigned to 'different sound'. And lastly, Mongolian /$\mho$/ turned out as a 'different sound' with its nearest counterpart, Korean /u/. Based on these findings the hierarchy of difficulty was constructed. Firstly, 4 Korean monophthongs /a/, /$\wedge$/, /i/, /e/ would be Level 0(Transfer); they would be transferred positively from their Mongolian counterparts when Mongolians learn Korean. Secondly, Korean /o/, /u/ would be Level 5(Split); they would require the Mongolian learner to make a new distinction and cause interference in learning the Korean language because Mongolian /o/, /u/ each have 2 similar counterpart sounds; Korean /o, u/, /u, o/. Thirdly, Korean /ɨ/ which is not in the Mongolian vowel system will be Level 4(Overdifferentiation); the new vowel /ɨ/ which bears little similarity to Mongolian /i/, must be learned entirely anew and will cause much difficulty for Mongolian learners in speaking and writing Korean. And lastly, Mongolian /$\mho$/ will be Level 2(Underdifferentiation); it is absent in the Korean language and doesn‘t cause interference in learning Korean as long as Mongolian learners avoid using it.