• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.261-282
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• 2007

The purpose of this study is to investigate American traditional values and American culture in English education. The understanding of American culture in English education requires the analysis of world changes in the global age. The history of American English, the formation of American society, and the background of natural environment are described in relation to the traditional American values of the earliest settlers, such as multi-culture, individual freedom, frontier heritage in the West, equality of opportunity and wealth and material abundance. Hence the case studies of students' project presentations on the American culture in English education exemplify the reflection of American traditional values in the current American life and society. It is concluded that project-based method with regard to cultural studies in English education reveals very positive learning effects by driving students' interests and active participation through the student-centered, creative, and cooperative project presentations.

• 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.

• Speech Sciences
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• v.8 no.4
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• pp.171-184
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• 2001

American English vowels and Korean vowels were compared by the plotformant method. For American English vowels, six General American English speakers pronounced English words in the b_t environment. For Korean vowels eight Kyongsang dialect speakers and eight Seoul dialect speakers pronounced Korean words in the environments of k_t, p_t and t_t. The formant plots were obtained by plotting F1/F2 tokens of 13 American English vowels on the F1xF2 plane. In spite of personal variations the 13 vowel spaces of all six American English speakers maintained their relative positions with some overlaps. Clear distinctions were made between i-I, e-$\varepsilon$, u-$\sigma$, and o-c. The domain of c and $\alpha$ overlapped for three American English speakers, but it did not for three other speakers. The 8 Korean vowel spaces of Kyongsang dialect speakers and Seoul dialect speakers were very similar and maintained their relative positions. No distinction was made between e and $\varepsilon$. In contrast with American English e which is a neutral vowel, Korean e was a back vowel. The comparison of 13 American English vowel positions and 8 Korean Vowel positions is expected to shed some light on the errors of English vowel pronunciation of Korean learners.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.3 no.3
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• pp.49-56
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• 2011

This study investigates how American English high back vowels are identified. American English and Korean speakers participated in a phonetic experiment for this study. This study shows their response times of the vowels and discusses how the speakers identified them. For the experiment I used a synthesized vowel continuum between American English /u/ and /$\mho$/based on American English male speakers' voice obtained by Peterson and Barney (1952). I manipulated spectral steps and vowel duration of the stimuli. The statistical results showed that American English speakers were not able to distinguish the stimuli based on spectral quality. Instead they relied on vowel duration. This suggests that the American English high back vowels have changed since Peterson and Barney recorded them in 1952. The Korean speakers also relied on vowel duration, not spectral quality since they could not distinguish them. American speakers' response times of these vowels were not affected by both spectral quality and vowel duration. Koreans' response times were affected by vowel durations only.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.20 no.7
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• pp.203-211
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• 2020

Given that American English and British English show differences for several vowels and that Korean students have mainly been exposed to American English, this study examined 27 Korean university students' identification of American and British English vowels. The results showed that Korean students' identification accuracy of American English vowels was higher (64.7%) than that of British English (54.7%), thus indicating that Korean students' familiarity with American English affected the students' identification of English vowels. However, vowel variation also affected students' identification of English vowels in that only the American English vowels in the words beat, bat, but, burt, bart, bite were better identified than the corresponding vowels in British English. Among the vowels which exhibit differences between American English and British English, the students' identification accuracy of the American English vowels in burt, bart, bat was significantly higher than that of British English and the error patterns for these vowels were also different. The analysis of vowel error patterns indicated that Korean students had much difficulty with non-rhotic vowels and [a] in bat in British English. Further, the vowels in bot and boat demonstrated a similar [ɑ]-[ɔ]-[ʌ] confusion and also a confusion between rounded vowels in spite of the differences of these vowels between American English and British English. Some pedagogical implications for teaching of English vowels were discussed based on the findings of the present study.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.8 no.3
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• pp.11-20
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• 2016

It is well known that vowels are shorter before voiceless consonants than voiced ones in English, as in many other languages. Research has shown that the ratio of vowel durations in voiced and voiceless contexts in English is in the range of 0.6~0.8. However, little work has been done as to whether the ratio of vowel durations varies depending on English variety. In the production experiment in this paper, seven speakers from three varieties of English, New Zealand, British, and American English, read 30 pairs of (C)VC monosyllabic words which differ in coda voicing (e.g. beat-bead). Vowel height, phonemic vowel length, and consonant manner were varied as well. As expected, vowel-shortening effects were found in all varieties: vowels were shorter before voiceless than before voiced codas. Overall vowel duration was the longest in American English and the shortest in New Zealand (NZ) English. In particular, vowel duration before voiceless codas is the shortest in New Zealand English, indicating the most radical degree of shortening in this variety. As a result, the ratio of vowel durations in varying voicing contexts is the lowest in NZ English, while American and British English do not show a significant difference each other. In addition, consonant closure duration was examined. Whereas NZ speakers show the shortest vowel duration before a voiceless coda, their voiceless consonants have the longest closure duration, which suggest an inverse relationship between vowel duration and closure duration.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.1 no.3
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• pp.87-93
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• 2009

The purpose of this experimental study is to investigate and compare the vowel lengths of English diphthongs and low vowels among native-English-speaking Americans and Korean college exchange students. To do this eight words and sixteen sentences were uttered and recorded by nine subjects, five Korean subjects and four American subjects. Results showed that the vowel lengths of English low vowels between American subjects and Korean subjects were different, which may lead to foreign accent of Korean speakers. Comparing the average length of English low vowels of Korean subjects with those of American subjects, we can see that American subjects tend to pronounce the English low vowels longer than Korean subjects do. In the pronunciation of diphthongs /eI/ and /ou/, Korean subjects pronounced longer than American subjects did. However, in the pronunciation of diphthongs /au/, /aI/, and /ɔI/, American subjects pronounced longer than Korean subjects did.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.2 no.4
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• pp.67-74
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• 2010

The purpose of this study was to explore the cross-linguistic difference in the spectral movement pattern of American English and Korean vowels. Eight American vowels /a/, /e/, /$\varepsilon$/, /i/, /I/, /o/, /u/, and /$\mho$/, and five Korean vowels, /a/, /e/, /i/, /o/ and /u/ in a fricative-vowel environment produced by adult speakers of each language were analyzed. The spectral movement patterns of the first two formant frequency values were measured and analyzed. The results showed that Korean vowels had minimal spectral movement, both in F1 and F2 values, as compared to American English vowels. Moreover, no consistent direction of movement was found in the three corner Korean vowels, while American English vowels showed consistent direction of movement for each vowel of the same phonemic category.

• Asia Pacific Journal of Corpus Research
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.43-59
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• 2023

This study aims to compare the structures of light verb constructions (LVCs) taking decision as the deverbal noun in Malaysian English, British English and American English. A general corpus made up of Internet forum threads from Lowyat.Net, was created to represent Malaysian English while the British National Corpus (BNC) and Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA) were used to represent the supervarieties. Light verbs make and take are found to be heading deverbal noun decision. Differences are observed in the use of articles. The frequency of Malaysian English LVCs without article is the highest while supervarieties LVCs prefer indefinite article. The high occurrences of LVCs without articles in Malaysian English can be attributed to the influence from Malaysian substrate languages. Findings also show that descriptive adjective is the most frequently used modifier in all three varieties of English. This suggests the standard LVC structure, comprising a light verb, the indefinite article, and a deverbal noun is no longer rigidly adhered to even among the native speakers of English.

• English & American cultural studies
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.105-125
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• 2013