Have the requirements to be considered a native speaker changed?

[Jozigirl]

In that case how about India? They're educated in English too

EPIK does recruit teachers from India.  They might not recruit them for all provinces but they definitely do recruit from India.

I do believe that South Africans are the next best thing to the other native countries but it does seem slightly surprising that the Korean government holds them to an equal status as the other countries for English use.

  I'm not being sarcastic when I say that I really don't know how to respond to this.  English is one of our official languages, and is used for most official documents, proceedings, education, etc.  I do know that we now have to prove our fluency in English - or at least, I did when I applied two years ago.  Many of the South Africans I have met here are, in fact, native speakers, but, of course, there are many who are equal bilinguals or second language speakers. 

[Yu_Bumsuk]

Someone who's not from one of the chosen 7 countries can get an E-1 if deemed to have valuable academic expertise in a field.

[justanotherwaygook]

In that case how about India? They're educated in English too

EPIK does recruit teachers from India.  They might not recruit them for all provinces but they definitely do recruit from India.

I do believe that South Africans are the next best thing to the other native countries but it does seem slightly surprising that the Korean government holds them to an equal status as the other countries for English use.

  I'm not being sarcastic when I say that I really don't know how to respond to this.  English is one of our official languages, and is used for most official documents, proceedings, education, etc.  I do know that we now have to prove our fluency in English - or at least, I did when I applied two years ago.  Many of the South Africans I have met here are, in fact, native speakers, but, of course, there are many who are equal bilinguals or second language speakers.

There's tons of countries that use English officially.  Also, lots use it as their primary language (I highlighted Jamaica, Belize, Trinidad and Tobago, Cook Islands, Singapore etc. before, also add in Zimbabwe and many others).  I don't know why SA (and French speakers from Canada) gets preferential treatment over so many others.

[confusedsafferinkorea]

You are way out of line with your comments, there are many people from 'native speaking countries' that have far worse accents than Filipinos, no offence but do you know how hard it is to understand some Irish and Scottish people?

D@#@! You definitely sound like a school teacher, buddy!

To say that your average Filipino has English skills that are as good as or better than your avg. Westerner still sounds a little sensationalist to me. From what I understand Ireland + Scotland = total pop of around 12mil...? Even if their pronunciation 'sucks' (by some international standard) they only account for a very small percentage of total Western Native English speakers...right?

Jrong, I am not trying to get into a brawl with you over this. Just the tone of your post seemed to me offensive towards Filipinos, that is really what I was taking you on about. Koreans use Filipinos extensively for English and have no problem with their accent and to be honest neither do I.

Peace.

[confusedsafferinkorea]

I don't know why SA (and French speakers from Canada) gets preferential treatment over so many others.

It is because we are special...   

[Jrong]

You are way out of line with your comments, there are many people from 'native speaking countries' that have far worse accents than Filipinos, no offence but do you know how hard it is to understand some Irish and Scottish people?

D@#@! You definitely sound like a school teacher, buddy!

To say that your average Filipino has English skills that are as good as or better than your avg. Westerner still sounds a little sensationalist to me. From what I understand Ireland + Scotland = total pop of around 12mil...? Even if their pronunciation 'sucks' (by some international standard) they only account for a very small percentage of total Western Native English speakers...right?

Jrong, I am not trying to get into a brawl with you over this. Just the tone of your post seemed to me offensive towards Filipinos, that is really what I was taking you on about. Koreans use Filipinos extensively for English and have no problem with their accent and to be honest neither do I.

Peace.

Oh, definitely not up for a brawl either, my friend. You know how these things go on forums, somebody says something and it snowballs into something way bigger than it would have been. I admit, my language (in writing) is lacking in conveying true meaning. I'm sure if we were talking face to face we'd just be laughing but that is the nature of the beast/forum.

Anyways, got no problem here with Filipinos -- I actually love that laid-back culture! Grew up with close Filipino friends and spent many days eating puto and freestyling (although we wouldn't call it "puto" because that means "bitch" in the language I grew up in :)). I just think the avg Western Native Speaker has a clearer accent than the avg Filipino speaker.

Well, ppl on a forum disagree without any factual (statistical) evidence to back their argument up...what's new?

Pace

[Squire]

I'm not sure why you'd think that.  No attack here, but it seems like the main difference between, say, a SA English speaker and an American, Canadian or British speaker would be the accent.  Even those who are bilingual are, well, bilingual - they speak both fluently and with native proficiency.  Bilingual (from birth) is not like bilingual (from school) - it means that you learn simultaneously, and are a native of both.

If we're gonna play accent politics, well it will be a rough time for a lot of us with regional accents in the U.S. or the U.K.

Accent isn't really the issue here. My point is that many SA NETs may have been educated in English (like Indians) but don't actually use it with family and friends. I know of quite a few who are fluent in English (like Scandinavians, Dutch etc) but will speak Afrikaan among themselves, or require me to speak a bit slower to have a conversation. In that respect it's not quite the same as the other NET countries where typically we speak English from birth, English with our families and friends and are educated in English in the cultures that Koreans are interested to know about

There's also the issue that we are to some degree meant to be a link to the 'western' countries where Koreans often go to study or work. Lots of Koreans go to the US, Canada, the UK and Australia but how many go to South Africa?

In that case how about India? They're educated in English too

EPIK does recruit teachers from India.  They might not recruit them for all provinces but they definitely do recruit from India.

I do believe that South Africans are the next best thing to the other native countries but it does seem slightly surprising that the Korean government holds them to an equal status as the other countries for English use.

  I'm not being sarcastic when I say that I really don't know how to respond to this.  English is one of our official languages, and is used for most official documents, proceedings, education, etc.  I do know that we now have to prove our fluency in English - or at least, I did when I applied two years ago.  Many of the South Africans I have met here are, in fact, native speakers, but, of course, there are many who are equal bilinguals or second language speakers.

Which is the point. It seems like a bit of a loss of face for KETs to have other teachers brought in who speak English as a second language. That's more likely to happen with SA's and I'm surprised the Korean government don't appear to have an issue with that

I didn't know EPIK recruited Indians. Interesting.

[Frozencat99]

I'll never understand why the Irish/Scottish are used as the "can't understand what they're saying" accent. While they may have interesting intonation patterns, it's sensationalist to say that they're at all hard to understand.

People have said Kiwis are hard to understand but I think that might have to do with how attractive the accent is.

[TheWB18]

I'm not sure why you'd think that.  No attack here, but it seems like the main difference between, say, a SA English speaker and an American, Canadian or British speaker would be the accent.  Even those who are bilingual are, well, bilingual - they speak both fluently and with native proficiency.  Bilingual (from birth) is not like bilingual (from school) - it means that you learn simultaneously, and are a native of both.

If we're gonna play accent politics, well it will be a rough time for a lot of us with regional accents in the U.S. or the U.K.

Accent isn't really the issue here. My point is that many SA NETs may have been educated in English (like Indians) but don't actually use it with family and friends. I know of quite a few who are fluent in English (like Scandinavians, Dutch etc) but will speak Afrikaan among themselves, or require me to speak a bit slower to have a conversation. In that respect it's not quite the same as the other NET countries where typically we speak English from birth, English with our families and friends and are educated in English in the cultures that Koreans are interested to know about

There's also the issue that we are to some degree meant to be a link to the 'western' countries where Koreans often go to study or work. Lots of Koreans go to the US, Canada, the UK and Australia but how many go to South Africa?

Fair enough.  I can't speak too much to languages within South Africa.

As for the Western part, though, I think South Africa is very Western, perhaps much more so than India; and although South Koreans may not want to visit, or may not visit at all, they also probably aren't visiting New Zealand in huge numbers but we don't doubt that NZ is a Western country.

I think the secret to why SA gets a yes and India gets a no lies in what other English-speaking countries are denied, i.e. all of the English-speaking Caribbean islands.  And what English-as-lingua-franca countries are denied, i.e. Nigeria, Ghana, etc.

[Squire]

I'll never understand why the Irish/Scottish are used as the "can't understand what they're saying" accent. While they may have interesting intonation patterns, it's sensationalist to say that they're at all hard to understand.

People have said Kiwis are hard to understand but I think that might have to do with how attractive the accent is.

I've read multiple studies that suggest some Scottish and Irish accents are the most 'correct' (phonetic?) way of speaking English. I'm English and I'd agree with that. We don't pronounce r's in lots of words and frequently drop t's. North Americans are all over the place with vowels (bax for box, thet for that).

The really strong accents (from Scotland at least, but anywhere really) tend to be used by working class people and are less pronounced among the middle classes who are statistically more likely to have degrees- enabling them to work in Korea. There's no point denying any of that. That's how it is the UK and I'd expect how it also is in the states, to a lesser extent

[justanotherwaygook]

I think the secret to why SA gets a yes and India gets a no lies in what other English-speaking countries are denied, i.e. all of the English-speaking Caribbean islands.  And what English-as-lingua-franca countries are denied, i.e. Nigeria, Ghana, etc.

I don't understand this.  Why are they denied?

[Gansie]

I would like to point out that English as a second language in South Africa is WAY different than in South Korea. As far as I know South Koreans don't do poetry and even Shakespeare in their English classes. The standard of English here is more like the third language subjects we have back at home.

It's Afrikaans, not Afrikaan.

But I agree, many Afrikaans-speaking people have thick accents and many also have problems with pronunciation. But anyone who went to university should have no problem with English and they certainly should not ask someone to speak slowly so that they may understand better!

Personally, I'm bilingual. My mother is English and my father is Afrikaans. I grew up speaking both languages, but as I grew up in a mostly Afrikaans community, I tend to say I'm Afrikaans. I feel it's silly that people have concerns about South African teachers, but I'm just being too touchy about that.  ::)

Honestly, I think all of us should have been tested for our English skills. I've met a few people from the USA, Canada and even UK who did not possess the best English either.

[Yu_Bumsuk]

Honestly, I think all of us should have been tested for our English skills. I've met a few people from the USA, Canada and even UK who did not possess the best English either.

Indeed. One only needs to read this board to figure that out.

[Frozencat99]

Honestly, I think all of us should have been tested for our English skills. I've met a few people from the USA, Canada and even UK who did not possess the best English either.

Indeed. One only needs to read this board to figure that out.

Forum/Online English is at a lower standard than English being used for an actual purpose for most people I know. If I was writing an essay or preparing a lesson, I'd be much more careful, precise and concise that I would be here.

I do think we should have been tested though. If you're going to be teaching grammatical structure, you should probably know it without having to look at an ESL textbook for a refresher.

[Jozigirl]

Accent isn't really the issue here. My point is that many SA NETs may have been educated in English (like Indians) but don't actually use it with family and friends. I know of quite a few who are fluent in English (like Scandinavians, Dutch etc) but will speak Afrikaan among themselves, or require me to speak a bit slower to have a conversation. In that respect it's not quite the same as the other NET countries where typically we speak English from birth, English with our families and friends and are educated in English in the cultures that Koreans are interested to know about

That doesn't mean that they're not necessarily considered native speakers.  I agree that there are some South Africans here who probably should not have been hired but the same can be said of some teachers from other countries too.  I am as English as they come in SA (to the point that South Africans often think I'm from the UK) yet I regularly speak Afrikaans with family and friends - for various reasons.  We're just used to changing between languages. 

As for them "requiring you to speak slower to have a conversation", I often get asked by North Americans to speak slower.  Similarly, I have some British friends here (mostly from Northern England) to whom I have to listen very carefully - and frequently ask them to repeat things - in order to understand what they're saying because their accents are quite thick.  It's usually just a case of adjusting to different intonations and accents.

There's also the issue that we are to some degree meant to be a link to the 'western' countries where Koreans often go to study or work. Lots of Koreans go to the US, Canada, the UK and Australia but how many go to South Africa?

Ermm...SA is considered a western country.  We follow many western traditions due to our mixed heritage.  There may not be as many Koreans travelling to SA for study purposes as there are to the countries you mention but that's probably because many people are just uninformed about the country.  I recently showed some photos to some foreign friends in which I was petting lion cubs in a game park.  Considering how many people from 'western' countries think that SA has wild animals running around, that the lion cub was my pet and the game park in the background was my backyard, I'm not surprised by some of the other perceptions I've encountered. 

Being a native speaker of a language doesn't necessarily mean that you're more knowledgeable about the language than a second language speaker.  NZ and Australia - even the US and Canada - also have many people who have studied in English but don't speak English at home or with friends but are considered native speakers.

[ytuque]

I know many people from the Philippines since I am from California, and very few are anywhere close to having native fluency.


CDW... you obviously haven't been to the Philippines itself then to make a statement like that. I have travelled there extensively and met people from all social levels and the vast majority of them speak as good as, if not better English than a lot of 'native speakers' I have known or heard.

Actually, I made the comment, and it isn't necessary to travel to the Philippines to talk to Filipino immigrants since there are close to 800,000 in my home state. I've never heard anyone in California compliment Filipinos as a group for their accent or conversational abilities.  I've met a handful of Filipino English teachers here in Korea, and only half were anywhere close to native fluency and accent.

[twak24]

Jozigirl, preach it, sister!
I am a South African and I can understand that some people are relatively uneducated and ignorant about our little slice of paradise, so let me just add my 2 cents worth for those of you who are actually interesting in correcting your misconceptions. I am Caucasian and speak English as my mother-tongue. I learned some Afrikaans and Zulu at school, but I do not posses fluency in either of those languages high enough to hold an academic or philosophical convo. Heck, I'm not sure I could cold a convo of much depth at all in Zulu, come to think of it, and if I read an Afrikaans book, I would probably be relying on a dictionary 60% of the time.

I hail from the Northern suburbs of Johannesburg, and the majority of my Caucasian friends (and even some black friends who grew up in the same areas and went to the elite private schools) don't even know how to say, "Hello, how are you?" in Afrikaans or any other South African language other than English. I know this its true for parts of Cape Town and KwaZulu Natal too falling into the same socio-economic bracket (as Jo'burg's Northern suburbs).

There is quite a fair amount of South Africans who cannot speak a single word of any other language other than English.

[TheWB18]

I think the secret to why SA gets a yes and India gets a no lies in what other English-speaking countries are denied, i.e. all of the English-speaking Caribbean islands.  And what English-as-lingua-franca countries are denied, i.e. Nigeria, Ghana, etc.

I don't understand this.  Why are they denied?

My thoughts were, either:

1) They have an image of a Westerner and/or English-speaker in their mind, and it's someone from the established first world;

2) They have a certain racial image that they can only get in these 7 countries;

[Jrong]

I think the secret to why SA gets a yes and India gets a no lies in what other English-speaking countries are denied, i.e. all of the English-speaking Caribbean islands.  And what English-as-lingua-franca countries are denied, i.e. Nigeria, Ghana, etc.

I don't understand this.  Why are they denied?

'White people' countries only, ideally (in their minds).

[cowboy7]

I think the title of this thread kind of coerced everyone into arguing over which countries generally should be allowed to teach English in South Korean schools.  That's not the case here.  It just happens that ONE university would like to hire a native speaker from one of the countries on that list because whoever posted that ad felt like people from there were probably good enough at English to teach at their school.

The person who put up the ad might not even know that people from Belize and the Cook Islands use English as a primary language, I didn't.  I don't think they were like, hey I know all the countries where English is a primary language but f*ck Trinidad and Tobago, let's leave them off the list. 

But then again, there could be a situation where the person at that school already hired three South Africans before and they were a bad fit and so they decided to leave South Africa off the list.  That was just a hypothetical, please don't be mad, I could have easily used any other country. 

If you look at it simply, one school just prefers an American, Canadian, Australian, English, or Filipino NSET.  Sometimes schools look for a female NSET only but in no way does it mean men can't teach English well.