• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
• /
• v.20 no.1
• /
• pp.107-116
• /
• 2020

This paper aims to explore the vocabulary difference between South and North Korean English textbooks as a first step toward a unified vocabulary list. To this end, both South and North Korean English textbooks in 2000s and 2010s are digitized into a corpus of text files, and a vocabulary list is constructed based on the corpus with reference to its concordances for the vocabulary use and contexts using AntConc 3.5.7. The vocabulary list of North Korean English textbooks are compared and found in their differences of quantity and quality of the English vocabulary in English education. Both quantitative and qualitative differences are found in between South and North Korean English textbook corpus. Both South and North aim that students learn about 3,000 words throughout the English education. North Korean English textbook contains more special academic vocabulary while South Korean English textbook is constrained by a strict vocabulary control which does not allow such a flexibility. Differences of vocabulary and their use are caused by the capitalistic market economy of South and the socialists' planned economy of North. Differences are also attributed to the religious words and grammatical vocabulary appearance.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
• /
• v.17 no.11
• /
• pp.242-251
• /
• 2017

For the purposes of this research, a corpus of words was created from the English textbooks of the "First Middle School" for the gifted in North Korea, and using the corpus, their linguistic characteristics were analyzed. Although there have been many studies that identified the traits of English textbooks in the North Korea's general middle school, not much focus has been placed on the English textbooks used at North Korea's First Middle School. Initially, the structure of English textbooks of the first, second, fourth, and sixth grades that had been procured from the Information Center on North Korea was reviewed, after which their corpus was created. Then, by using Wordsmith Tools 7.0, linguistic properties and high frequency content words appeared in the English textbook of the first grade were analyzed specifically. Basic statistical data gathered indicated that while the number of vocabulary did not increase as students progress through the grades, the words used tended to diversify incrementally. In the mean time, a distribution of the high frequency content words by grade illustrated that a big difference was found between the content words used in the English texts of each grade, and it was a subject matter of the texts that determined such difference.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
• /
• v.17 no.4
• /
• pp.331-341
• /
• 2017

This paper aims to analyze English vocabulary of the North Korean textbooks diachronically using the constructed English textbook corpus. The North Korea English textbooks attained from Information Center on North Korea of the Ministry of Unification are divided into before and after Kim Jong-Il era for the year of 1996 in which the curriculum revision has been conducted. They are stored as text files to analyse vocabularies using WordSmith Tools 7.0. The vocabulary size of the revised textbooks increased after the curriculum reorganization, but the number of vocabulary types and vocabulary diversity decreased. After the curriculum revision, it was found that lots of vocabulary related to the establishment of the Kim Jong-Il system appeared as the keyword. It was also found that some vocabularies reflected the economic and social life of North Korea. In addition, through comparison of the 100 high-frequency word list and keywords, it can be concluded that the vocabulary of the English textbooks of North Korea is gradually changing into communicative contents from contents related with written language.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
• /
• v.20 no.7
• /
• pp.274-281
• /
• 2020

N-gram analysis casts a new look at the n-word cluster in use different from the previously known idioms. It analyzes a corpus of English textbooks for frequently occurring n consecutive words mechanically using a concordance software, which is different from the previously known idioms. The current paper aims at extracting and comparing 4-gram words clusters between South Korean high school English textbooks and its North Korean counterpart. The classification criteria includes number of tokens and types between the two across oral and written languages in the textbooks. The criteria also use the grammatical categories and functional categories to classify and compare the 4-gram words clusters. The grammatical categories include noun phrases, verb phrases, prepositional phrases, partial clauses and others. The functional categories include deictic function, text organizers, stance and others. The findings are: South Korean high school English textbook contains more tokens and types in both oral and written languages. Verb phrase and partial clause 4-grams are grammatically most frequently encountered categories across both South and North Korean high school English textbooks. Stance is most dominant functional category in both South and North Korean English textbooks.

• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
• /
• v.9 no.2
• /
• pp.153-168
• /
• 2003

Since 1945, geography textbooks of South Korea and North Korea have been developed differently. Taking both geography textbooks of South Korea(printed in 1996 and 1997) and them of North Korea(printed in 1995), this study compares and analyse geography textbooks of South and North Korea systematically, then to show their likeness and difference. Results of this study are as follows: First, Most of contents in South Korean textbooks consist of explations and many tables, graphs and photographs leading to inquiry activities, whereas those in North Korean textbooks consist of mostly sentences that explain topics, diagrams and sketches. Second, Geographical education in South Korea puts strong emphasis on human geography and regional geography, whereas that in North Korea does strong emphasis on physical geography, economic geography and education of cartography. Third, The geographical words of South Korean textbooks contain words written in Chinese character and words of English origin, whereas Those of North Korean textbooks do many pure Korean words.

• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
• /
• v.39 no.3
• /
• pp.409-424
• /
• 2004

This study examines Korean-related description from 1931 to 2002 in 18 university-level ‘World Regional Geography’ textbooks, being published as English. During this period, the amounts of Korean-related contents in world regional geography textbooks have gradually increased. The main Korean-related topics were generally ‘Colonization by Japan’, ‘Korean War’, ‘Rapid economic development in South Korea’, and ‘North Korea’. The distorted information and erroneous description about Korea were mostly found in textbooks. The national and cultural identity of Korea was severely distorted and made a fallacy by ‘accidental-centered’ thought. It is suggested that foreign geographers who refer ‘Korea’ in World Regional Geography textbooks need to critically re-examine the ways in which Korean-related contents are in proper place.