• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.79-91
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• 2011

The purpose of this paper was to take an in-depth look at early American English around the $17^{th}$ and $18^{th}$ century when immigrants from different European countries started to move into the New World. The paper attempted to describe early American English in relation to the process of immigration and settlement from a historical perspective. With a focus on major features of early American English such as uniformity, archaism and richness of lexicon, the paper tried to answer the questions such as how settlement influenced the formation and distribution of regional dialects across the continent, why immigrants tended to show a preference for a uniform way of speaking rather than choosing a variety of regional dialects for communication, and what role foreign languages played in the development of early American English. The overall findings based on the answers to these questions showed how American English went through a variety of processes and changes at the early stages of its development to become a national language later. The paper concluded with some remarks about the implications of the findings for EFL learning and the direction of future research on early American English.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.139-160
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• 2011

This study examines correlations between affective variables and English learners' achievement in native teachers' classes. Specifically, it aims to study the relationships among Korean college students' English learning motivation, anxiety, WTC (willingness to communicate) and their English achievement scores. For the purpose, the questionnaire surveys were conducted, and the students' English scores were analyzed and compared. The participants were 216 university students taking the general English courses as a requirement for graduation. The results indicated that although the students had high level motivation to learn English, especially for social reasons, their WTC in and outside the classroom was low. Also, unlike the previous studies on foreign language anxiety, their anxiety level was not significant. Anxiety and motivation were negatively correlated; WTC and motivation were positively correlated. However, according to the regression analysis, the explanatory power of the three affective variables was not significant for the students' achievement scores. Several possible reasons and some pedagogical implications are provided in the conclusion.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.177-194
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• 2011

This study examines the use of discourse markers in cross-cultural communication between EFL learners in an e-learning environment. The study analyzes the use of discourse markers in a corpus of an interactive web with a bulletin board system through which college students of English at Japanese and Korean universities interacted with each other discussing the topics of local and global issues. It compares the use of discourse markers in the learners' corpus to that of a native English speakers' corpus. The results indicate that discourse markers are useful interactional devices to structure and organize discourse. EFL learners are found to display more frequent use of referentially and cognitively functional discourse markers and a relatively rare use of other markers. Native speakers are found to use a wider variety of discourse markers for different functions. Suggestions are made for using computer corpora in understanding EFL learners' language difficulties and helping them become more interactionally competent speakers.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.213-235
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• 2011

The aim of this study is to present preliminary results from an ongoing large-scale study of English-language future goal orientations held by Japanese university students. The work here involves an investigation of learners in multiple disciplines, from five universities, both public and private, in the Kanto-region of Japan, and their perspective on their future use of English. The results summarize written essays on L2-goal orientations. Preliminary results indicate Japanese learners (n = 629) as a whole have disparate L2-learning goals; however, these can be summarized into four broad categories: career, personal life, study, and general; and early findings indicate that most learners (63.56%) are oriented to career or personal goal orientations, while others are oriented to study and general. These early results help us to gain a better understanding of the future goals of Japanese university learners and their views of English usage in the future.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.291-307
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• 2011

The primary purpose of this study was to report overall findings of academic English proficiency of university ESL students in an ESL program from 2003 to 2008 at a university in the U.S. Furthermore, this study proposes to explore the effectiveness of the ESL program on developing the ESL learners' academic English proficiency. In order to achieve these purposes, this study applied a quantitative research methodology which analyzed data (more than 3,000 samples) collected by the university ESL program. The data included the ESL learners' English proficiency test scores. The results indicated that the effectiveness of the ESL program was significant in improving the ESL learners' cognitive/academic language proficiency across all three groups: ESL-only, ESL + Under, and ESL + Grad. That is, after either a complete ESL program intervention only or both a partial ESL program intervention and taking academic courses, the three groups' academic English proficiency was increased to almost same degree The findings are discussed and implications for pedagogy are suggested.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.1-22
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• 2007

The study examined the effects of explicit derivational morphology instruction (henceforth DMI) on the incidental vocabulary acquisition and reading comprehension of 132 Korean 1st-year high school students who responded to a battery of tests (two vocabulary tests and a reading comprehension test). Multiple statistical tools were used to analyze the data: Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA), Analysis of Variance (ANOVA), Simple Regression Analysis, Tests of Simple Main Effects, and effect size computation using Cohen's d. The results indicated that (a) DMI enhanced students' ability to infer word meanings in context, (b) DMI promoted high proficiency students' reading comprehension, whereas it impeded intermediate proficiency students' reading comprehension, (c) vocabulary knowledge has a strong positive predictive value for reading comprehension, and (d) the gaps of vocabulary knowledge across proficiency levels were still substantial, despite the observation that DMI promoted students' vocabulary acquisition. These results have a bearing on English as Foreign Language (EFL) reading pedagogy.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• no.6
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• pp.75-88
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• 2000

There are many reasons why foreigners have difficulties learning English. In addition to the difference between English and the learner's grammar, the large number of irregularities found in English become another obstacle to learning English. Understanding the difference and the irregularities will help us not only have a good command of English but also teach English more effectively. Many irregular or alternating patterns, or even anomalies in Modern English are the results of historical changes. In this paper, I would like to focus on some of the irregular or alternating patterns found in different components of the grammar of English and to show how they can be accounted for historically. Through this study, I would like to show that the irregular patterns and anomalies in English were once regular and systematic, they have deviated from the regular patterns of the grammar as time has gone by, and they have survived in Modern English as irregular and alternating patterns. Many of the irregular or alternating patterns can be traced back by phonological, morphological and/or semantic changes in the history of English. Finally, by looking at language history, we can hold a more tolerant view on many anomalies present in English.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• no.6
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• pp.159-178
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• 2000

In systemic grammar an English clause is analysed simultaneously from the point view of its ideational function, interpersonal function and textual function. This study deals with only the ideational function of the three functions, which accounts for the underlying content of a clause. Transitivity is the subsystem of the ideational function. It specifies the different types of process that are recongnized in the language and the structures by which they are expressed. The purpose of the paper is to describe the transitivity of English clause on the basis of systemic approach. For this we analyzed the three subsystems of transitivity which are physical process, mental process and relational process in the form of features. And we described the sets of the features of the three different types of process in English clause in the framework of the system network.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.193-211
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• 2003

This study aims to illustrate students' and teachers' perceptions towards certification of English proficiency and proficiency- based curriculum, and to investigate their needs for developing college English program. A total of 597 students and 28 teachers participated in the survey. The findings showed that both groups acknowledged the usefulness of the certification of English proficiency and proficiency-based curriculum. However, both groups showed a negative response to 'waive test' (testing for the replacement of English required class). They also expressed high level of needs in increasing the number of courses and credit hours, reducing the class size, and improving facilities. Both groups perceived speaking and listening as more important skills, while students showed various preferences for effective language practice activities. The findings of this study suggest t hat the introduction of certification of English proficiency should he supplemented with follow-ups both in pedagogical aspect and on administrative level.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.173-192
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• 2003

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the semantic ambiguity of coordination connected by 'and' in English and show a clear explanation for the meaning of the sentence. Two sentences which are connected by 'and' can be divided into the symmetric conjunction and the asymmetric conjunction according to its meaning. Especially, in order to explain the different meaning in the asymmetric conjunctions, we introduce the theory of presupposition and entailment, which provides the solution to the ambiguity in meaning. It can be said that presupposition and entailment can logically explain the meaning of natural language.