• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.172-180
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• 2024

Background: Webtoon, a digital form of comics created in the Republic of Korea, has spread widely with advantages that anyone can become a cartoonist and that autonomy of creation is guaranteed. The purpose of this study is to identify the working conditions of webtoon writers and analyze the relationship between these conditions and depressive symptoms. Methods: A survey was carried out on webtoon writers and a survey data of 312 webtoon writers were analyzed. The questionnaire included basic socio-demographic characteristics, webtoon writers' contractual type, fields of activity (webtoon creator, story writer, illustrator), and working environment (labor discretion etc.). We investigated depressive symptoms and analyzed its relation to the work environment of webtoon writers. Results: Webtoon writers were exposed to long working hours, high labor intensity, limited labor discretion, negative comments from readers, and had a high prevalence of depressive symptoms. Compared to story writers who contracted directly with platforms, story writers and the illustrators who contracted with content providers (CPs) were 9.51 times (OR = 9.51, 95% CI = 1.47 - 61.33) and 6.47 times (OR = 6.47, 95% CI = 1.08 - 38.75) more likely to have depressive symptoms, respectively. Conclusions: This study emphasizes the urgent necessity to improve the overall working environment in the webtoon industry and implement measures to tackle the escalating mental health challenges faced by illustrators and story writers contracted with CPs, especially given the increasing popularity of novel comics.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.75-87
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• 2015

This study aims to explore how the copyright for writers of informative TV programs and documentaries is protected in the reality of broadcasting. For this study, 12 writers and the head of copyright department of the Korea TV & Radio Writers Association were interviewed in depth for research. Our interview findings suggest that writers have worked without written agreement signed by some form of legally binding contract. Instead, they have made verbal contracts. Writers should be aware of the reality of copyrights and request to readjust of basic copywriting fee from the Writers Association and each broadcasting station.

• Asia Pacific Journal of Corpus Research
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.17-29
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• 2021

The current study explores small corpora of critiques written by Chinese and non-Chinese university students and how strategies used by these writers compare with high-rated L1 students. Data collection includes three small corpora of student writing; 20 student critiques in 2017, 23 student critiques from 2018, and 23 critiques from the online Michigan MICUSP collection at the University of Michigan. The researchers employ Text Inspector and Lexical Complexity to identify university students' vocabulary knowledge and awareness of syntactic complexity. In addition, WMatrix4® is used to identify and support the comparison of lexical and semantic differences among the three corpora. The findings indicate that gaps between Chinese and non-Chinese writers in the same university classes exist in students' knowledge of grammatical features and interactional metadiscourse. In addition, critiques by Chinese writers are more likely to produce shorter clauses and sentences. In addition, the mean value of complex nominal and coordinate phrases is smaller for Chinese students than for non-Chinese and MICUSP writers. Finally, in terms of lexical bundles, Chinese student writers prefer clausal bundles instead of phrasal bundles, which, according to previous studies, are more often found in texts of skilled writers. The current study's findings suggest incorporating implicit and explicit instruction through the implementation of corpora in language classrooms to advance skills and strategies of all, but particularly of Chinese writers of English.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.1-26
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• 2007

This study aimed to investigate how EFL learners perceived English writing tasks and teachers' written feedback. The subjects were 82 mixed major college EFL students aged 19-24; the majority were freshmen females. Based on the scores estimated from the essay evaluation test, they were placed into two groups (proficienand less-proficient writers) and responded to an in-class questionnaire. The results indicated that: (1) regardless of writing proficiency, a large number of the students felt that they were just fair writers, which could be derived from low confidence and high anxiety; (2) grammar and vocabulary were perceived as the main features that determined good EFL writers and also prevented the students from performing the writing task successfully; (3) they believed that teachers' feedback contributed to the development of their English writing skills because it helped them apprehend what to improve or avoid in the future, acquire better English usage, and correct their errors; and (4) the proficient writers were more willing to correct errors themselves after being provided clues than the less-proficient writers. Implications of the findings for EFL classrooms are discussed.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.23-36
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• 2009

This paper aims to investigate the use of reference and substitution as cohesion devices by advanced Korean EFL writers and English native writers. Twelve research articles (totaling 218 pages, 93,033 words) written in English were collected in academic journals. Half of the research articles were prepared by Koreans and the other half were written by native writers. Several demonstrative pronouns, personal pronouns and demonstrative adverbs were selected as referential cohesion devices for this study. Three substitutional cohesion devices were also chosen. Their frequency was investigated at first, after which their preference was analyzed. There was not much difference in the overall use of cohesion devices between the two groups. Some devices were used by Korean writers more often than native ones. Reasons for this could be high English proficiency of Korean writers, their hyper-correction or the influence of Korean culture. Other more distinctive cohesion features such as conjunctions are recommended for analysis of cohesion in future research.

• Korean Association of Arts Management
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• no.58
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• pp.49-88
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• 2021

Contemporary literary writers engage in multiple jobs and activities in the changing industrial and institutional environments to manage careers and produce literary value. The notion of art entrepreneurship envisages writers as the actors pursuing optimal rewards at both literary and economic levels by applying creative knowledge and skills to the management of career. In contrast, the notion of creative labor argues that writers go through career insecurity as they pursue self-fulfillment through work. This paper critically reviews two notions and suggests the notion of cultural intermediaries to better understand their production of literary value within the variety of relational contexts where they are situated. This paper analyzes the structures and characteristics of a wide range of intermediary practices by literary writers. Based on the analysis, I argue that the autonomy of literary value the writers construct and their status of entrepreneur-labourer are contingent upon the relational contexts within which they practice the intermediary work. I also suggest that literary writers by utilizing a variety of tactics cope with the changes that shape the autonomy of literature and invent new roles and identities as cultural intermediaries. Furthermore, literary writers develop not only self-management skills to adapt to the changing environments but also the collective capacity to cope with the constraints derived from the structural change of literary production and circulation. Finally, I argue that the art management discipline can reflect upon and support the creative endeavors of literary writers by embracing the critical understanding of structural changes suggested by the disciplines of humanities and social sciences.

• Journal of the Korean Society for information Management
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• v.39 no.3
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• pp.23-50
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• 2022

This article aims to improve the cultural program for the resident writers in libraries by identifying the current status of the resident writer support project, examining users' perceptions and preferences, and investigating librarians' perceptions of the program. The research methods included an investigation (survey) of the program operation status, user perception and preference surveys, and interviews with librarians about their perceptions of the program. Data were collected from libraries with the cultural program for resident writers between May and November 2021. Findings showed there were challenges in operating the library cultural program due to the lack of resident writers' quality, frequent changes in the program formats (online or offline), and library closures during the COVID-19 pandemic. For the program improvement, suggestions were made, including inviting good-quality resident writers and writers from other fields to the program, training resident writers, advertising the programs using online and offline media, training staff, and developing programs considering user ages and preferences and diversity in local communities.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.1-20
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• 2004

The findings in contrastive rhetoric research of the twentieth century have shown that different cultures have different conventions in organizing written texts. These culture-related conventions were claimed to influence English texts written by L2 learners, including Asian learners of English. However, due to the massive inflow of the American culture into Asia as well as increased exposure to English in the midst of globalization of the last decade, it is quite probable that the textual gap between the native English writers and Asian EFL writers have been reduced. The present study investigates the changes that have taken place in EFL writer's knowledge of genre-specific writing over the past decade. To this aim, this study compared four sets of application essays written by four groups of applicants (1) native American applicants in 1993, (2) Korean EFL applicants in 1933, (3) native American applicants in 2003, and (4) Korean EFL applicants in 2003. The results suggested that the disparity between the Korean EFL writers' and the native English writers' texts were becoming less noticeable at the macro-level, possibly due to Korean EFL writers' enhanced textual awareness of English genre structures Pedagogical implications are discussed.

• English & American cultural studies
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.1-31
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• 2018

It is needless to say that America's indiscriminate artillery and chemical attacks have worsened the conditions of Vietnam's tropical rain forests, causing war-torn combat troops and civilians to suffer more from the participation and aftermath of the Vietnam war. Around two decades after the Vietnam War, American and Vietnamese writers dealing with the destruction of the human and nature of the Vietnam War and the following traumatic experience commonly report the horrors of inhumane warfare, but some differences among them appear in the reception of the ecocide consciousness. For American writers who had been involuntarily involved or who had stayed in the back area as interpreters and counter-intelligence force, the Vietnam War was often a kind of exotic "addicted adventure" which their American hometown could not provide. But apart from overcoming postwar post-traumatic stress by writing of healing which was shared with American war writers, Vietnamese writers have been able to overcome the scars of war as the communal memorial, which Jonathan Shay emphasized as the necessary comforting ritual by community members showing the sign of honor and care. On the other hand, American war writers were on the side of "separate peace," as Jeong stressed, and the Vietnam War to them was more racist like the case of "body count." Nevertheless, it is fortunate that the hideous experience of war could turn them all into the creativity pool, just as the 5,000 square mile of bomb creators have been used as the postwar fish ponds.

• Journal of English Language & Literature
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• v.56 no.5
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• pp.999-1026
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• 2010

There was a Golden Age of Fantasy novels in the United Kingdom in the 19th Century, which had the major writers, Lewis Carroll and George MacDonald. These writers pushed the boundaries of imagination and created a new world in which explore their own selves and societies. Fantasy novels flowered in the 1860s when a group of writers including Carroll and MacDonald published their works. These writers used the trait of dream framing to create their own fantasy world in which they took the action against the complicated and oppressive Victorian reality. Carroll's fantasy worlds of Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass were an insane and chaotic world where the certainty of the real world was overturned. MacDonald's dream worlds of At the Back of the North Wind and the Princess books including The Princess and the Goblin and The Princess and Curdie were ideal societies in which imaginative characters could create harmony between fantasy and reality. Fantasy writers engaged in making journey to other lands to do philosophical and moral discussion critiquing Victorian society and to find insights into those problems in their works. Thus, their fantasy journey traverses time and place can produce some suggestive answers to the questions that lie in other times and realities as well as theirs.