In the past decades, neoliberalism has permeated (foreign) language education, as has been discussed by critical research in the fields of: curriculum theory, applied linguistics, discourse analysis, language policy, language assessment, to name a few. Despite the fact that research on foreign language education and neoliberalism is certainly…

This paper discusses how critiquing the convergence of neoliberalism and coloniality can become a crucial juncture for imagining alternatives to neoliberal foreign language education. Neoliberalism and coloniality are both mediated by aspects of subjectivity, which not only obscures their co-dependence, but also naturalizes their logic as they…

The late Ruqaiya Hasan was an enthusiastic but exacting reader of Vygotsky: she reproached him for lacking a theory of language use, for using an asocial model of education without class variation in semantic code, and above all for using an atomistic unit of analysis, namely lexical word meaning. In this paper, I take up these criticisms and…

The notion of native speakerism describes the tendency to privilege and uphold "native speakers" as inherently more qualified to teach English on the arbitrary basis of linguistic birthright. In spite of the widespread recognition and critique of native speakerism within TESOL, it remains pervasive in professional practice, most evident…

This paper examines how entrepreneurial visions of the future contribute to neoliberalism's appropriation of language learning as a strategy for capital accumulation. Taking as an example South Korea's heavy investment in children's English language learning -- commonly known as early English education ("yeongeo jogi gyoyuk") -- it…

Education has long been an interest of foreign missionaries. Many criticisms have been raised over the promotion of imperialism in foreign missionary education. However, what is often overlooked is the positive mutual impact foreign educators have had on both their host and home societies. This article explores the influence of early educational…

This book critiques dominant discourses and debates pertaining to cultural identity, set against the current backdrop of growing social stratification and unequal access to quality education. It addresses current discourses concerning globalisation, ideologies and the state, as well as approaches to constructing national, ethnic and religious…

This paper articulates the challenges of the South Korean education system through a co-constructed narrative, employing duoethnographic methodology. The authors offer critical and contextualized perspectives on their personal and professional observations on the dysfunctional aspects of South Korean education including dehumanization and…

This project began as a content analysis of five South Korean high school Social Studies textbooks. Yet, it has evolved into an epistemological experiment to pursue the question of "what does it mean to leave America for Asia, at least methodologically, for the researcher who left Asia for America?" Using the textbooks as a mediating…

This paper uses the introduction of critical pedagogy to an English as a Foreign Language class in the Republic of Korea as a case study for a "modest critical pedagogy" (Tinning 2002). Focusing on the stress and resistances experienced during the introduction, we suggest a modest critical pedagogy that 1) makes the paradigm itself an…

Recent reforms of high school education in Korea have focused on transforming the uniform and standardized system into a deregulated and diversified system that has an emphasis on school choice and competition. Situating the high school diversification policy in the context of the recent controversy of the neoliberal educational reform, this study…

This study with 213 South Korean college students (113 men) examined the cross-cultural generalizability of (a) the factor structure of the Frost Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (F-MPS) and (b) the existence of adaptive perfectionists, maladaptive perfectionists, and nonperfectionists. A confirmatory factor analysis did not support the…

Brown and Levinson's ([1978] Politeness: Some universals in language use, Cambridge University Press, 1987) politeness theory has been criticized as being ethnocentric by displaying a Western preoccupation with autonomy and individualism. Many non-western societies, it is argued, are better understood by appealing to cultural discernment or group…

Freire wrote that reading one's world is a necessary precursor to writing it, or conscienzation. The present dissertation, expanding on Kellner's concept of multiple literacies (1998; 2002a; 2005b; 2006a; 2008), explores what it means to read and write one's world in the context of globalization. Given the arrival of a new imaginary, with its…

Since the 1990s, universities in South Korea have participated in an aggressive movement to globalize their institutions through the medium of English by hiring English-proficient faculty. To attain tenure, faculty must publish in international indexed journals (IIJs), which results in a de facto language policy of publishing in English because…