• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.35
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• pp.293-314
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• 2014

This paper aims to contrast phonology of Korean and Thai in terms of language universality. Considering consonants, both languages having 21 typologically most plausible consonants display high universality in the number of consonants. However, Thai shows higher universality in regards to their substance, i.e. it differs from Korean when it comes to the structure of plosives and fricatives. Both Korean and Thai show similarities regarding the plosives due to the fact that both languages possess three contrastive consonants. However, the Thai plosives consist of plain voiced, plain voiceless and aspirated voiceless sounds that have higher universality than the Korean plosives which are plain voiced, plain voiceless and aspirated voiceless. In case of vowels, both Korean with its 10 vowels and Thai with its 9 vowels show lower universality when it comes to the total number of vowels. However, all of those vowels belong to the list of most plausible vowels which makes their universality higher in substance. In respect of syllable structure, Korean with its CVC type shows a moderately complex structure while Thai with its CCVC type has a complex structure. The coda may consist of only one consonant in each language but onset is composed of one consonant in Korean, and two consonants in Thai. The contrastive study of similarities and differences between Korean and Thai in terms of phonology will help not only understand the two languages but also provide useful information for increasing the efficacy of Korean language education for Thai learners of Korean whose number is rapidly increasing.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.28
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• pp.37-53
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• 2012

This paper examines 'an active nihilism' in Suk-je Sung's novels in detail. The focus of this study is formed from the critical mind in a critical perspective that in Korean novels before and after 2000s, characters who embody 'problematic individuals' of $Luk{\acute{a}}cs$ have disappeared and those close to 'active nihilists' has become the mainstream. The most representative example of this phenomenon is Suk-je Sung's novels. 'Active nihilists' in his novels are described as 'ascetics' who mastered various spheres such as 'billiard', 'baduk gambling', 'alcohol', 'dance', and 'book collecting', and so on. In the sense that they reject the transcendental conditions of the modern world and live in the space and time of play in which they can display their passion and potentiality to the maximum, they beings jumping over the 'reality principle'. Also, what they want to repeat is not the endless exchange of labor and capital according to the capitalist system of exchange but rather the repeated existence of their power and passion. This 'anthropology of power and passion' is 'active nihilism' which could be expressed as the 'subject of creating new value' and 'Dionysian affirmation' by Nietzsche. Suk-je Sung's novels sharply prove the stylistic essence of 'a novel' which has to create its own form every time, constantly renewing the narrative style of the past ideal model. In this respect, they are very problematic and his innovation of a form draws the attention. Further, this will certainly be the important object of research in the diachronic dimension of contemporary Korean novel.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.37
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• pp.157-183
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• 2014

Although Marguerite Yourcenar, a representative French woman writer, lived 47 years in the United States from 1939 to 1987, the American influence on her life has not been studied either at home or abroad. The purpose of this study is to examine chronologically the American influence on the following three literary works of Yourcenar: The Little Mermaid (1942), River Deep, Dark River (1966) and Recluse (1982). The Little Mermaid is a drama, presented in musical format, about the identity crisis and inner conflict of Yourcenar. Unlike the little mermaid who burst like a bubble in Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale, Yourcenar associates her death with the image of ascension. River Deep, dark river is a translation of the Negro spiritual expressing the suffering of African Americans. Recluse, her last novel, deals with the life story of a simple man living in nature on a small island. This novel shows Yourcenar's desire for a pure world that is not defiled by human greed. Yourcenar sponsored major human rights organizations and environmental groups in her life, and donated her entire fortune for human rights and the protection of Wild Fauna and Flora. The American influence on the literary works of Yourcenar can be summarized as a "great turning point", because she was transformed from a humanistic writer into an intellectual actor.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.29
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• pp.233-256
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• 2012

This paper aims to look into various symbolic meanings of the body shown in the film, Avatar (2009, James Cameron), and to ponder over a variety of media strategies carried by the pursuit of the corporality shown in this film. In a nutshell, the body in Avatar is a symbol of primitiveness rather than civilization, and the body language is a fundamental and effective means of communication much better than verbal language. A variety of physical contacts that appeared in many scenes of the movie emphasizes the role of the body as a means of real communication. Also, in the composition of the film dominated by the confrontation of civilization, numerous creatures in the planet Pandora with a variety of colors as well as a number of agencies and large body sizes express primitive richness. The narrative of the film telling the story of a 'moving' body ultimately emphasizes the superiority of the body with respect to consciousness, unlike the narrative of conventional movies dealing with the problems of the body. In addition, the corporality pursued by this film implies several important media strategies. It may reveal a self-reflection of the material civilization and the imperialism, or, on the contrary, an attempt to conceal or dilute them. It may also represent a self-reflection of the overdeveloped media technology, or simply the dilution of it. Finally, it may be an attempt to recover the feeling of "presence", not fully supported by the 3D technology, by the identification of the spectator's body and the character's body.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.37
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• pp.335-360
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• 2014

The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether high-level(level 6) essay-writing questions in Test of Proficiency in Korean (TOPIK) have been presented appropriately so as to enable foreign test-takers to display their Korean writing ability properly, and to provide some suggestions on how those questions need to be changed. To accomplish this purpose, all the essay-writing questions were collected from the 33 TOPIK tests, from the 2nd in 1998 to the 35thin 2014, and analyzed from the perspectives of their topics and formats. The results are that high-level TOPIK essay-writing questions showed a strong tendency to take as their topics Korean sociocultural structures and phenomena, or current issues in Korea, and that they frequently employed guided writing formats by providing preset ideas or/and contexts for test-takers to write in a guided way; such tendencies were analyzed to shed a negative influence on test-takers displaying their writing ability and creativity, because those topics and preset ideas or contexts provided do not allow them to express their own opinions or positions freely. It is suggested that TOPIK essay-writing questions should be changed to deal with objective and general topics which enable test-takers to write freely and logically in Korean based on their experience, because TOPIK is not a test to check whether they have enough background knowledge about the Korean society and culture, but a test to assess their Korean proficiency.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.33
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• pp.263-286
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• 2013

Is this a right way in politics that attitude of Japanese scholars to separate Natsume Soseki from the expansionism of pre-war Japan to protect 'sanctity'? Nowadays, most Japanese scholars are regarded to share the desire that minimize the memory of the behavior of Japanese Imperialism in East Asia, such as Korea, China, etc. Furthermore, 'the desire to minimize' inescapably concluded in avoidance, concealment, at last the temptation of deliberate misleading. Until now, the controversy about the Natsume Soseki's travel to Korea and Manchuria has repeated in defence and criticism surrounding the self-awareness and recognition of others of Natsume Soseki, making the expression in a record of Natsume's travel as the subject of study, for example, the degrading expression about Chosun people and scorn for Chinese and Russian. This paper will investigate that Natsume's travel is the political practice which is combined with the desire for the empire, focusing on the political context in the action of journey of Natsume and its contents other than the expression itself.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.39
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• pp.433-460
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• 2015

This paper was analyzed the politeness and the expression of ending sentence in family conversations in the virtual language of cartoon characters. Younger speakers have a tendency to unite sentence-final particle to the polite form, older speakers have a tendency to unite it to the plain form in the historical genre. But younger speakers and older speakers unite sentence-final particle to the plain form in other fiction genres. Using terms of respect is determined by circumstances and charactonym. Comparing the translation of conversations with the original, there were the different aspects of translated works. When Japanese instructors are used to study Japanese as the instructional media, they give a supplementary explanation to students. 'WA' 'KASIRA' that a female speaker usually uses are used by a male speaker, 'ZO' 'ZE' that a male speaker usually uses are used by a female speaker in the virtual language of cartoons. In the field of the translation, it is translated 'KANA' 'KASIRA' into 'KA?', 'WA' 'ZO' 'ZE' into 'A(EO)?', 'WAYO' 'ZEYO' into AYO(EOYO)'. When we use sentence-final particle in the virtual language of cartoon, we need to supply supplementary explanations and further examinations.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.27
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• pp.105-122
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• 2012

This article aims that Chinese characters represented in Korean films have been explored for historical consideration of Korean's viewpoint on Chinese from early modern to the present day. During Japanese colonial period, Chinese had been hateful and feared by most of Korean because Korean had been acted high-handedly by chinese in early modern time and had covertly regarded chinese as threatening competitors in economical part of the colony, refered to the chinese characters represented in the films, For the Lover(1928) and Secret of Chinese Street(1928). Chinese had been called as enemy forces in Korean movies, such as Marines are Gone(1963), Dragon competed with tiger(1974) made with Korean battle field setting and Manchuria setting developed a Korean independence movement, after Korean War in the 1960-70s maintained the cold war system in the World. According to analyzing chinese characters depicted in Failan(2001), A Good Rain Knows(2010), Korean public have a friendly attitude with contemporary Chinese as China has been the great trade partner of Korea with interdependent relationship after 1992, the year of Korea have established diplomatic ties with China.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.38
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• pp.461-500
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• 2015

This study aims to investigate the effective method to improve the competence of the Vocabulary by the image and listening towards the ELF. In the first part, we observed the problems and point improvement on learning vocabulary based on learner survey. In the second part, we analyzed two remarkable studies: - consistent and adapt method, communicational context - method based on the lexical, morphological semantical, notional and thematic field Then we proposed effective methods that are applicable to the vocabulary's learning in the class : - learning vocabulary by combining the words - learning vocabulary based on the meaning field - learning vocabulary as concrete characters - learning vocabulary by the descriptive character - learning vocabulary with the type "who am I?" - learning vocabulary by listening For teachers, one of the difficulties to the conduct of vocabulary course is that learners take passive position. Specifically, it is the teachers who play an important role because it runs in the direction of the course. However, learners do not show the active attitude for vocabulary lessons despite the course to take to improve their vocabulary skills. Therefore, teachers must prepare course materials that can both improve the competence of the vocabulary of learners and cause their interest or desire on the current vocabulary. This is why teachers should exploit various materials depending on the skill level of the learner vocabulary.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.25
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• pp.87-106
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• 2011

This article studies that Korean literature has been renewed to World literature-oriented in the history of Modern Korean literary criticism from early modern period to present for reflecting the slogan, "globalization of Korean Literature" as well as contextualizing the necessity, "new relationship between Korean literature and World literature". Some writers, such as Lee Gwangsoo a pioneer of Modern Korean literature and the group for foreign literature[haioei-munhak-pa] introducing World literature to Korea and Lim hwa a prominent critic of proletarian literary theory under Japanese Colonial period, have understood European literature as World literature Korean literature had to reach. Inevitably the hierarchical relation between Korean literature and European literature as World literature had been interiorized to them. Meanwhile Jo Dong-il and Paik Nak-chung who have been representative researchers of Korean literature had tried to broken down the hierarchical relation between Korean literature and European literature interiorized to Korean writers until the 1980s, with Korean literature could be accomplished to World literature meaning. Since the late 1990s Park Sung-chang and Park Sang-jin who are leading researchers of comparative literature in Korea these days, have emphasized the methodology of new comparative literature for 'universality of literature' between Korean literature and World literature, which have been the renewal way of Korean literature in today's age of globalization.