Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Hyeon Een]

This is something I've been thinking about for a while, and I also think it'll be controversial.

So that's why I like it.

My argument is this: Koreans who speak at the upper-intermediate to fluent level have great pronunciation on the whole. Admittedly it heavily leans towards the American rather than British flavor I'm fond of.. but still, it's pretty damn good.

Now, you probably want to yell at me and tell me I'm an idiot.

Before you do, I urge you to compare the average semi-fluent Korean's pronunciation to the average French, or German FLUENT speaker's pronunciation. I've never met a Frenchman who didn't have a French accent. And I've never met a German who didn't have a German accent. But I have met a container-ship-full of Koreans who had an American accent.

They are miles ahead. The only other foreigners who speak English that I think even come close are Scandinavian folk. They can have some pretty awesome accents that are accent-less: you don't even think they're American or British or Australian.. they're so accent-less they're just Scandinavian.

Obviously the ones I'm talking about are somewhat of a minority; I'm talking about the ones who really do speak English quite well. And yes, I could pick them out of a crowd of voices. But not anywhere near as close as their German or French or Spanish or Italian or other co -English-as-a-second-language-speakers.

I think it's very impressive the way Koreans, at a certain level, get the (a) accent down.

I think it's shameful the Frenchies and Germans very rarely get to this level. Maybe they're not as dedicated?

What do you think? Am I nuts, or are Koreans pretty damn good at English pronunciation when they really put their minds to it?

[some waygug-in]

Maybe the French and Germans don't harbor fantasies about becoming Americans as much as their Korean counterparts.

Not that there's anything wrong with that, but I did find that a lot of my Korean adult students' dreams were to "move to America" esp. New York City or LA.

I've met both French and German people who had no accent at all, perhaps you just need to meet more people.

[desertdust]

Yeah! Your right. I can tell your absolutely fantastic by listening to your writing

skill. In fact why don't you write some more? I'm so impressed!! I will go to bed

tonight dreaming of this experience.

[Hyeon Een]

[liveinkorea316]

I pretty much dont agree with your premise. I don't think you are comparing apples with apples. You are talking about young koreans who have been exposed to years of English education and probably studied abroad. Against who? How many French or German people have you met in those categories? I think you are talking about older French and German people or students with severly limited English language experience.

Have you heard Ban Ki Mun speaking? hard to understand. About the same as Sarkozy or Merkel methinks

[Hyeon Een]

[oldtrafford]

I have students who still say Englishee, strangeee and the list goes on!!

The Dutch, Swedes, Danes, Spanish and in fact most countries have much, much better pronunciation. Koreans don't use their Englisheee, they're too busy working through wankee grammar books and vocabulary books. Added to the fact that they are painfully shy and lazy due to all the shitty hogwons they go to. Oh, and crucially most of them don't have an interest.


So no I don't agree with you in fact I thought it was a wind up!!!

Oh, and I can't believe I forget about all the crappy tests they 'study' for!!!

[shifty]

I agree with the OP, I think an interesting insight.

Koreans' spoken English is easy to understand, not b/c of their deliberate speech or us knowing in advance of their intended reply.

No matter in which accent they studied under, their strong Korean pronunciation holds it own.

And it's very understandable, if not particularly charming.

[Whistleblower]

Hyeon Een, I have just written a 5,000 word assignment on the subject of South Korea and their passion for learning a native-speaker variety of English, particularly American English. Here is a quick introduction of the assignment:

[Carbon]

[Ya-ta Boy]

I also agree with the OP. I always have students who I'm convinced could talk on the phone with my mom and she would not know the speaker is a Korean. It's very common for my students (but not quite all) to focus on pronunciation. If they can correct their l/r, th/s, and f/v problem as well as the fish-ee thing, and syllable stress, they do a great job. Their single biggest problem, in my view, is mastering syllable stress and avoiding flatness.

It's also a correct observation that women students do better than males students, as a general rule. Our upper level classes are 'women-heavy'.

[freddy teacher]

edit

[Sticks]

I know a girl in one of my uni groups, she speaks English fluently with an American accent with no -ee and -uh suffixes. The other girls and guys have the Korean thing going on. She could seriously pass off as a television announcer. When we were having a go at reading some English passages and it came to her turn I asked her to read it again just because I was in disbelief.

And no, she hasn't been to the states.

[tomstar86]

I have ZERO students that could pass for fluent English speakers - then again, I teach predominantly elementary, with a couple of 1st & 2nd grade middle school classes, and one 3rd grade class.

A lot of them still add "EU" and "EE" on the end of EVERYTHING - changEE, strangEE, and their past tense pronunciation is universally horrific - watch-ED, wash-ED etc. Sigh.

I think the whole point is, that European learners don't want to adopt a different accent. Why should they sound American or British? As a Brit, I've never had a problem understanding Europeans who speak English - and their fluency tends to be much better than Koreans when it comes to issues such as grammatical accuracy and usage of idioms.

Tom

MOD EDIT

[nate1983]