A rose by any other name?
Learner English and variety–
status labelling: the case of
English in South Korea
JAE JUNG SONG
An outsider’s plea for correct variety-status labelling
Varieties of English and
variety-status labelling
One of the major achievements of Braj Kachru’s
(1991) ‘liberation linguistics’ is that it has squarely
placed Outer Circle varieties such as Indian
English, Nigerian English and Singaporean
English on a par with Inner Circle varieties such
as American English and British English – in the
face of negative attitudes, ranging ‘from amused
condescension to racist stereotyping’ (Bruthiaux,
2003: 160). Following in Kachru’s footsteps,
many scholars have demonstrated that these
Outer Circle Englishes are legitimate varieties of
English, with distinct characteristics and with
growing numbers of native speakers (e.g.
Deterding, 2007; Jowitt, 1991; Sailaja, 2009).
Indeed these Outer Circle English varieties are
increasingly used, in respective countries, not
only as the major or default medium of communi-
cation but also in the context of important domains
such as education, media, government, literature
and popular culture. The Kachruvian perspective
has also given rise to the ‘egalitarian’ view that
Inner Circle English speakers are no longer the
only ones who can lay claim to the ownership of
English. Outer Circle English speakers are now
thought to be as much custodians of English as
Inner Circle English speakers are.
One obvious way of recognizing Outer Circle
Englishes as legitimate varieties of English is to
give them unique identification labels (i.e. based
on names of countries or adjective forms thereof),
just as Inner Circle Englishes come with their own.
56 English Today 126, Vol. 32, No. 4 (December 2016). Printed in the United Kingdom
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For instance, the ‘new’ variety of English spoken in
Singapore is called Singapore English or
Singaporean English, just as the ‘old’ variety of
English spoken in the US is called US English or
American English. This labelling practice not
only identifies different varieties of English
uniquely but also makes it easy to regard Outer
Circle Englishes as equal to Inner Circle
Englishes in terms of legitimacy, status and such-
like. Unfortunately, the labelling practice has not
stopped there, but has extended itself to learner var-
ieties of English (i.e. Learner Englishes) attested in
the Expanding Circle countries, e.g. China, Japan,
South Korea (Korea hereafter) and
non-Anglophone Europe. In Expanding Circle
countries, English is generally taught as a school
subject – that is, as a foreign language – and
used in very restricted domains, typically with for-
eigners. Nonetheless some scholars are happy to
JAE JUNG SONG is Professor of Linguistics at the
University of Otago (New Zealand). His research
interests lie in linguistic typology, syntax, Korean,
Oceanic languages and language policy. His books
include Word Order (Cambridge UP, 2012), The
Korean Language: Structure, Use and Context
(Routledge, 2005), Linguistic Typology:
Morphology and Syntax (Pearson, 2001) and
Causatives and Causation (Longman, 1995). He is
also editor of The Oxford Handbook of Linguistic
Typology (Oxford UP, 2011), and co-editor of
Case, Typology and Grammar (John Benjamins,
1998).
doi:10.1017/S0266078416000122
© 2016 Cambridge University Press
 speak of Chinese English (Ahn, 2015; Bolton,
2003; Qiong, 2004; Xu, 2010), Dutch English
(Edwards, 2010), Japanese English (Ahn, 2015;
Stanlaw, 2004) and Korean English (Ahn, 2014
& 2015; Hadikin, 2014; K.-J. Park, 2009; Shim,
1999). Regardless of their true variety status, the
fact that these Learner Englishes have been given
identification labels may engender and encourage
perceptions of their uniqueness. For instance, by
calling it ‘Korean English’ one gives English in
Korea a unique identity as if it existed as a func-
tional variety of English, especially because Inner
and Outer Circle Englishes are labelled the same
way, e.g. American English or Singaporean
English. However, English in Korea should not
be given such an identification label, because no
such variety of English exists in Korea. In fact,
‘Korean English’, to borrow Görlach’s (2002:
151) words, ‘is little more than a catchphrase’ –
perhaps inspired by Kachruvian liberation linguis-
tics. Some may argue that as long as we understand
that we are not talking about New English varieties
such as Singaporean English, it does not really
matter whether we give Learner Englishes such
identification labels. However, we must take
issue with this kind of unrigorous labelling practice
and demand that it should be discontinued, because
it may encourage, if not promote, perceptions,
especially among non-specialists or outsiders,
that we are dealing with new, instead of learner,
varieties of English.
The purpose of this article is to make a plea for
the label ‘X English’ to be reserved for New
Englishes – and also for the Inner Circle
Englishes – and the label ‘English in X’ to be
used for Learner Englishes. I will focus on
English in Korea as an example of illustration, as
I am most familiar with it. But the point to be
made here applies to other incorrectly labelled
learner varieties of English. Note that I make this
plea as an outsider who draws upon World
Englishes research for his own work (e.g. language
policy) but finds himself having to remind his read-
ers that English in Korea is not a New English var-
iety (e.g. Song, 2012: 19). The remainder of the
article proceeds as follows. First, I will discuss
two possible reasons why the distinction between
New English and Learner English has not always
been maintained as vigorously as it should.
Second, I will review a few instances of the label
‘Korean English’ and show that the use of the
label is unjustifiable for the learner variety of
English in Korea. Third, I will demonstrate that
the ‘evidence’ adduced in support of English in
Korea as a New English variety does not exit or
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cannot be accepted as evidence. Fourth, I will pro-
pose a simple way of coding New English, Learner
English and Hybrid English so that they can be
clearly distinguished from each other. Finally, I
will bring the article to a close with a brief
conclusion.
New English vs. Learner English
The need to distinguish New English and Learner
English has been emphasized by a number of scho-
lars (e.g. Görlach, 2002; Mollin, 2007; Buschfeld,
2013). For instance, Mollin (2007) provides specif-
ic criteria for recognizing X as a New English, as
opposed to a Learner English, and she applies
them to Euro-English only to conclude that it
does not qualify as a New English –
Euro-English, as Mullin (2007: 182–183) con-
cludes, ‘remains situated in Kachru’s Expanding
Circle in which English is used as a foreign lan-
guage only’. Buschfeld (2013: 60–69) makes a
similar attempt to distinguish between English in
Cyprus (= a Learner English) and Cyprus English
(= a New English) by using Mollin’s criteria in
conjunction with one additional criterion (i.e. nat-
ural vs. instruction-based acquisition).
Notwithstanding these attempts to maintain the dis-
tinction between New English and Learner
English, the incorrect labelling practice persists,
as I will demonstrate below with particular refer-
ence to English in Korea.
There may be multiple reasons for this unfortu-
nate state of affairs. For instance, Bruthiaux
(2003: 167–168) points to the lack of clarity in
defining the concept of the Expanding Circle: it
is not clear whether ‘the concept is meant to
cover countries, country-based varieties, speakers,
or non- (or barely-) speaking learners’. Bruthiaux
(2003: 168) avers that this lack of clarity has
resulted in ‘“me-too” calls [. . .] for additional var-
ieties to be admitted to the ever-expanding family
of [N]ew Englishes’. One other reason may be
that the distinction between Outer Circle English
(= New English) and Expanding Circle English
(= Learner English) is not as clear-cut as the
Kachruvian Three-Circle model would seem to
suggest. Recent research has indeed demonstrated
that the distinction in question is a fuzzy one and
should be regarded as a continuum (e.g.
Nesselhauf, 2009; Hundt & Vogel, 2011;
Buschfeld, 2013). For instance, Buschfeld (2013)
demonstrates that English used in Cyprus does
not fit into either variety category and should
instead be considered to be a hybrid of a New
English and a Learner English. In view of the
57
 fuzzy nature of this distinction, it may be somewhat
difficult to refrain from applying to Expanding
Circle Englishes the same kind of label used for
Outer Circle Englishes, when the difference
between these two variety types turns out to be a
matter of degree. Nonetheless we should avoid
using inaccurate labels such as ‘Korean English’,
not least in order to obviate misrepresentation
and/or misinterpretation. ‘Korean English’ is a
misnomer, because no such New English variety
exists, not even as a hybrid kind of English. For
Learner Englishes, the label ‘English in X’ must
instead be employed.
‘Korean English? You mean,
Konglish?‘1
There seem to be at least three different ways in
which researchers use the label ‘Korean English’:
(1) some use the label to imply that English in Korea
will eventually become a New English (Hadikin,
2014; K.-J. Park, 2009);
(2) some use the label and then ask others to define it
(Ahn, 2014); and
(3) some use the label and point to EFL textbooks as
evidence of its validity (Shim, 1999).
Each of these uses will now be discussed in turn.
First, Hadikin (2014: 9) decides to call English
in Korea ‘Korean English’ by analogy with
Indian English or Singaporean English, arguing
that this labelling decision ‘leads one away from
the idea that Korean English is a problem to be
fixed and more towards the idea that the English
spoken in Korea [. . .] can be seen as a legitimate
variety’. In fact, Hadikin (2014: 16) goes so far
as to claim English in South Korea to be a ‘New
English’, not ‘just bad English’. Indeed his book
is entitled: Korean English: A corpus-driven
study of a new English. Hadikin (2014: 16)
seems to justify his use of ‘Korean English’,
because ‘this is the way [he] see[s] the future of’
English in Korea. What this means is that English
in Korean is not a New English, but Hadikin still
chooses ‘Korean English’ over ‘English in
Korea’ because he believes that it will eventually
become a New English. This is most unusual rea-
soning. It is almost akin to calling a tadpole a
frog, because a tadpole will eventually turn into a
frog. The difference here is that there is every pos-
sibility that English in Korea will never evolve into
a New English variety, as can be seen in the grow-
ing numbers of Koreans who are now switching
from English to Chinese as their most important
foreign language.
58
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We turn now to Ahn (2014), who adopts the
label ‘Korean English’, while acknowledging that
English in Korea is an Expanding Circle variety.
In point of fact, she (2014: 214) suggests that it
is ‘still situated between foundation and exonorma-
tive stabilization’, the first two stages in
Schneider’s (2007) five-stage evolutionary model
of (postcolonial) New Englishes.2 Schneider’s
model is designed to deal with postcolonial New
Englishes such as Singaporean English. But let
us set aside the issue of Korea being a country
never colonized by an English-speaking country.
The point is that Ahn does not seem to be overly
concerned about her use of ‘Korean English’, in
spite of the fact that Schneider (2007: 50) himself
highlights the need to distinguish between ‘English
in X’ (= Learner English) and ‘X English’ (= New
English). Having decided to call English in Korea
‘Korean English’, Ahn proceeds to investigate
native and non-native English teachers’ attitudes
towards English in Korea without explaining to
her interviewees what she means by ‘Korean
English’. In fact, Ahn’s interview begins with the
question ‘Have you heard of Korean English?’
and includes subsequent questions such as ‘How
would you define Korean English and Konglish?’
(Ahn, 2014: 203). Note that Konglish is a term
that is used, usually derogatively, to refer to
Korean expressions that make use of English
words or phrases – sometimes in conjunction of
Korean words or phrases – in an idiosyncratic man-
ner to the effect that their meanings differ greatly or
radically from the original meanings in English.3
So much so that Konglish ‘might rather be concep-
tualized as a sub–variety of Korean, in the form of
words and phrases’ (Lawrence, 2012: 73). For
example, eye shopping (window shopping), host-
ess (barmaid), talent (celebrity) and menbwung
(‘brain fade’, based on English mental and
Korean bwungkoy ‘collapse’) are Konglish expres-
sions. As such, Konglish is part and parcel of
Koreans’ linguistic repertoire. By calling English
in Korea ‘Korean English’, however, Ahn has
effectively identified it as a unique variety of
English. Korean English does not exist, however.
Thus it comes as no surprise that ‘the overwhelm-
ing majority of [Ahn’s] interviewees interpreted
the term Ko[rean]E[nglish] as Konglish’ (Ahn,
2014: 203). In this context, one of her interviewees
is worth quoting:
Korean English? [. . .] but I don’t think there is
Korean styled English [. . .] Possibly [. . .] Konglish?
[. . .] there is no such thing as Korean English. (Ahn,
2014: 217)
 Nonetheless Ahn (2014) refers to English in Korea
consistently as ‘Korean English’ throughout her
article.
Thirdly and finally, we turn to the case of Shim
(1999), who adduces evidence for ‘Korean
English’ from EFL textbooks used in Korea.
While considering Korea to be a member of the
Expanding Circle, with no institutionalized variety
of English used for intranational communication,
Shim (1999: 256) claims that Korean English exists
in codified form, namely in the context of EFL
textbooks used in Korean schools, to the effect
that codified Korean English ‘now serves as the
endonormative standard for Korean English educa-
tion.’ Recall that Bruthiaux (2003: 168) warns
against this kind of ‘me–too’ call for additional
varieties of English to be added to the ever–
expanding family of New Englishes. In fact, he
cites Shim’s claim as one such ‘me–too’ call.
Bruthiaux’s (2003: 171) criticism bears quoting
at length:
If we are to follow Shim’s (1999) approach and
announce a ‘New English’ wherever we find it taught
extensively as a foreign language but spoken by a
small minority and rarely or never for purposes of
internal communication [as in the case of the
Expanding Circle, a member of which Shim con-
siders Korea to be], there is no reason not to extend
the favor to other languages, and the resulting
sociolinguistic picture begins to look very odd
indeed. [. . .] viewing the [Kachruvian] model as a set
of new varieties defined on the basis of linguistic
practices among professional groups such as lan-
guage teachers, as Shim (1999) suggests with refer-
ence to English in Korea, leads to a theoretical dead
end. [. . .] if classroom practices are a sufficient cri-
terion for identifying a variety of a language, if
‘Korean English’ then why not ‘British French’, and
because French is presumably studied by someone
somewhere in Korea, why not ‘Korean French’ too?
And so on, potentially ad absurdum.’
What counts as evidence for Korean
English?
Buschfeld (2013: 4) laments the fact that most
World Englishes ‘studies seem to presuppose var-
iety status for the type of English under investiga-
tion on the basis of impressionistic observations
[. . .] and hence do not ask the variety status ques-
tion at all [emphasis added].’ This is not the
place to review criteria that can be used to distin-
guish between New English and Learner English.
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However, it is worth mentioning one such criterion
here, because Buschfeld’s assessment applies to
the previous studies on English in Korea. Mollin
(2007: 170) provides a set of three developmental
criteria for regarding X as a New English, as
opposed to a Learner English: Expansion,
Nativization and Institutionalization. I will focus
on Expansion, the initial stage of development, as
it is presupposed by the other two criteria. By
Expansion is meant that English must first be
used in many different functional domains in the
community.4 In other words, English must signifi-
cantly occupy different domains of interpersonal
communication within the country (Mollin, 2007:
170). Mollin further points to widespread compe-
tence in English as a prerequisite for Expansion.
Needless to say, unless most people in the country
have competence in the language, English is not
going to be used in many functional domains,
because speakers are unable to express themselves
in it. Does English in Korea meet this criterion for
New English? The answer is no, and I will explain
why by evaluating the ‘evidence’ alluded to by
those who have promoted the incorrect label of
‘Korean English’.
Shim (1994) paints a picture of Korea as a coun-
try with a high level of bilingualism. In fact, Shim
(1994: 237) estimates that at least half of the
younger generation (aged 15–40) are Korean–
English bilinguals, since ‘all Korean children are
exposed to at least three years of formal English
education during the mandatory education period,
and since more than sixty percent of middle school
graduates also finish high school education, during
which English education is even more strongly
emphasized.’ Since 1997, English has been taught
from Year Three at the primary school level, and
the retention rates from primary to middle school
and from middle to high school are actually nearly
100 per cent (Song, 2012: 28, 34). In view of these
developments, one would expect Koreans to have a
higher level of competence in English than they did
when Shim (1994) was published. Note, however,
that Shim (1994: 237–238) includes Koreans with
even a limited proficiency in English under her cat-
egory of Korean–English bilinguals. Thus her
claim that at least half of the younger generation
are Korean–English bilinguals must be taken with
a grain of salt. As evidence for her claim, Shim
(1994: 234) argues that ‘[t]he increase in the num-
ber of English words in Korean naturally resulted
in code–mixed sentences in discourse.’ She also
observes that some Koreans code–mix beyond
the level of English words to the extent of code–
switching. However, her evidence falls far short
59
 of her argument, as it comes only from the mass
media. Shim (1994: 235) is well aware of this prob-
lem when she writes that ‘[o]ne can argue that the
examples that I have presented so far are all from
popular media of advertisements, and television
shows, and these cannot be used as concrete evi-
dence for linguistic changes in everyday discourse
patterns.’ Song (1998: 267–268) calls Shim’s
(1994) claim into question by pointing out that
code–mixing and –switching cannot be substan-
tiated unless evidence comes not only from the
mass media but also from other domains such as
home, school and work, because (Shim’s) mass
media data are representative of what Haarmann
(1986) refers to as ‘impersonal bilingualism’, i.e.
the use of English for appealing to the public’s
positive feelings, not for practical communication.
In their joint reply to Song’s criticism, Baik &
Shim (1998: 277) provide a few more examples
of Korean–English code–mixing and –switching
that they observed in their ‘chance meetings in
public places with people who may or may not
be proficient bilinguals [emphasis added].’ Baik
& Shim (1998: 277–288) conclude: ‘[h]opefully,
the above observations are sufficient evidence
that code–mixing is a widespread phenomenon in
Korea.’ (Note that Baik & Shim (1998) do not
extend their additional observations to Shim’s
(1994) claim for Korean–English code–switching.)
Unfortunately, these examples count as no more
than the kind of impressionistic observation that
Buschfeld (2013: 4) speaks of. Indeed recent
research (Moon, 2009; J. S.-Y. Park, 2009) indi-
cates that the use of English words – let alone
code–mixing and –switching – in Korea can only
be attested to a considerably lesser extent than
Shim (1994) and Baik & Shim (1998) lead one
to believe. As J. S.-Y. Park (2009: 34, 35) points
out:
[e]ven though there can be no doubt that influence of
English on Korean society has been growing over the
past several decades, Baik and Shim’s [1998] char-
acterization of the Korean sociolinguistic situation
can be misleading. [. . .] More than a decade after
Baik and Shim’s writings, Korea’s pursuit of English
has intensified even more than what they have [sic]
described, but it still remains true that active usage of
English is more or less contained within specific
linguistic domains such as popular culture, rather
than spreading further to dominate all aspects of
Korean language use.
Further (obvious) evidence against Shim’s claim
for widespread Korean–English bilingualism
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comes from the fact that Koreans spent over US
$18 billion on private tuition in 2013, a third of
which went towards private English lessons
(Allkpop, 3 September, 2014). Koreans annually
spend as much as US $752 million on EFL profi-
ciency tests (Card, 2006); Korea is the world’s lar-
gest market for TOEFL (Card, 2006). This heavy
investment notwithstanding, Korea ranked a disap-
pointing 65th, jointly with eight other countries,
out of 169 countries in 2014 TOEFL iBT scores
(Educational Testing Service, 2015). These facts
simply do not support Shim’s depiction of Korea
as having a high level of Korean–English bilin-
gualism; rather, they indicate the status of
English as that of a foreign language to be learned,
unfortunately, at extremely high costs and with
relatively poor results. The ineluctable conclusion
is that there is no widespread competence in
English and, consequently, no evidence for
Expansion in Korea.
A similar objection can be made about Hadikin’s
(2014) ‘corpus–driven’ study. Hadikin’s intervie-
wees consist of 40 Korean–English bilingual
Koreans from Seoul (Korea) and 30 Korean–
English bilingual Koreans from Liverpool (UK).
Hadikin recruited volunteers by using university
(e–)noticeboards, Facebook, already recruited
volunteers’ social networks and the like.
Hadikin’s semi–structured interviews with these
bilingual Koreans constitute his ‘Korean English’
corpus data. It is, however, unreasonable to think
that these data can somehow be representative of
English in Korea, because his interviewees were
not at all sampled and stratified in terms of age,
gender, education, socioeconomic class and the
like. While he does not provide any background
information on them, it is likely that Hadikin’s
interviewees were mainly university students or,
more generally, young Korean–English bilingual
Koreans – Hadikin (2014: 16) calls them ‘educated
users’. Thus Hadikin’s study is not about English
in Korea, let alone ‘Korean English’, but about
English spoken by a very small number of educated
bilingual Koreans. However, when we recognize X
as a New English, we must do so on the basis of
societal bilingualism in the country under investi-
gation, not on the basis of a small minority of bilin-
gual speakers in that country. What is needed is
sociolinguistic domain research, that is, the kind
of research that involves Koreans from all walks
of life and systematically investigates their linguis-
tic practices in different domains such as home,
school and work. If one claims, as Hadikin does,
that a given variety of English is a New English
on the basis of a small minority of (educated)
 bilingual speakers, then one will have to say that
virtually every country outside the Inner Circle
speaks a New English.
Variety–status coding: a proposal
Schneider (2007: 50) proposes that when a local
variety of English is accepted as providing the lin-
guistic norm for its speakers, that variety should be
‘given symbolic expression by substituting a label
of the ‘English in X’ type by a newly coined ‘X
English’’. This entails that a New English is to be
called ‘X English’ while a Learner English is to
be given the label of ‘English in X’ (X being the
name of the country or the adjective form thereof).
This is intended to maintain a strict distinction
between New English and Learner English.
Unfortunately, ‘English in X’ is not always easy
to use unambiguously as a Learner–English label,
because it can also be understood as a generic ref-
erence to all variety types of English found in X:
Learner English of the majority of speakers,
English spoken by a minority of bilingual speakers,
and English spoken by a small number of residents
or visitors from the Inner or Outer Circle countries.
To address this potential problem, I propose a sim-
ple coding convention. For New Englishes, a two–
letter ISO country code and ‘E’ (short for English)
will be juxtaposed in that order (a complete list of
ISO country codes is available at https://country-
code.org). For instance, Indian English will be
coded as INE, Nigerian English as NGE and
Singaporean English as SGE. For Learner
Englishes, E and a two–letter ISO country code
will be linked, in that order, with the lower case
‘i’ (short for in) intervening between E and the
ISO code. For instance, the Learner English variety
in Korea will be coded as EiKR, the Learner
English variety in China as EiCN, the Learner
English variety in Japan as EiJP, and so on.
Unlike the label ‘English in Korea’, EiKR will
not be understood ambiguously, because this
code refers to the Learner English variety in
Korea only. Following Buschfeld (2013), I also
suggest that Hybrid Englishes – i.e. varieties bear-
ing a resemblance to both New English and
Learner English – be double–coded, with a slanting
slash between the two codes. For instance, Hybrid
English in Cyprus will be coded as EiCY/CYE.
Moreover, if Hybrid English in XY is more akin
to one than the other end of the continuum, the cod-
ing convention can make use of a greater–than sign
‘>’ to reflect this complexity. For instance, English
spoken in Cyprus can be coded as CYE>EiCY,
because it is thought to be closer to the New
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English end than the Learner English end
(Buschfeld, 2013: 202). If one does not wish to
commit oneself to saying to which end of the con-
tinuum Hybrid English spoken in Cyprus lies clo-
ser, one can simply code it as EiCY/CYE. If
Hybrid English in XY is more akin to the
Learner English end than the New English end, it
will be coded as EiXY>XYE or simply as EiXY/
XYE.
Conclusion
When one decides to call a variety of English ‘X
English’, as opposed to ‘English in X’, one should
make that judgment call on the basis of the right
kind of data: sociolinguistic data collected from a
wide range of speakers in different functional
domains of linguistic communication. It is incor-
rect to call a variety of English in X ‘X English’
in the absence of such sociolinguistic data, because
the question of whether it is a New English or a
Learner English is ultimately a sociolinguistic
one (cf. Hundt & Mukherjee, 2011). Thus it is
not acceptable to generalize from the linguistic
practices of a small minority of (educated) bilin-
gual speakers to the variety status of English for
a whole country. Nor is it right to label a Learner
English variety ‘X English’ simply because one
believes that it will become a New English variety
at some time in the future. Unfortunately, articles
and books continue to appear, calling learner var-
ieties of English ‘X English’, ‘Y English’ and so
on. In this article I have attempted to show why
this labelling practice is wrong, and have presented
a simple labeling scheme as a theoretically coher-
ent alternative to it. As Bruthiaux (2003: 175)
argues, it is ‘[b]etter to base a model of English
worldwide on a sociolinguistic description of con-
texts for the language than to see it primarily as
promotion of selected varieties [e.g. to New
English status] – less liberation and more linguis-
tics, as it were.’ That way, we will be able to
learn more about different varieties of English
under investigation, be they Learner Englishes or
New Englishes.
Notes
1 This is taken from the response given by one of
Ahn’s (2014: 203) interviewees when asked the ques-
tion ‘Have you heard of Korean English?’.
2 In Schneider’s (2007: 21–70) dynamic model, the
evolution of postcolonial New Englishes consists of
five stages: (1) Foundation, (2) Exonormative
Stabilization, (3) Nativization, (4) Endonormative
Stabilization and (5) Differentiation.
61
 3 Konglish can also refer to learner errors, that is,
English words or phrases that Koreans use incorrectly
when speaking or writing English, e.g. fish thorns
instead of fish bones, as the Korean word kasi (가시)
means ‘piscine bone’ as well as ‘thorn’.
4 Nativization refers to the process of a variety of
English ‘acquiring new characteristics in form which
mark it off from other varieties’ (Mollin, 2007: 171).
Institutionalization, as the last stage in the development
of a New English, ‘refers to the acceptance of the new
variety with its nativized characteristics as the norm [=
Schneider’s (2007) endonormative stabilization]’
(Mollin, 2007: 171).
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