Korea's intense quest for globalization, combined with rapid growth in economic development, has caused the number of young students (secondary school age and younger) leaving Korea for overseas study to rise steadily in recent years. This phenomenon of young Korean students studying overseas is termed jogi yuhak, which can be directly translated as Early Study Abroad (ESA). The phenomenon of ESA has stirred both interests and concerns to Korean society for more than a decade. At the same time, American schools are beginning to see more of these ESA students in their classrooms, as a result of the United States being the preferred destination country for more than one-third of the ESA students in Korea. Although the growing presence of ESA students in school classrooms has begun to attract increasing attention from educators and researchers in the United States, there are no clear statistics investigating the numbers of ESA students in the United States, and that most school officials are even unaware of the trend. The qualitative phenomenological study was used to explore the lived experiences of Korean ESA students in the United States in relation to their adaption to their new environment, as well as the factors that they perceive to help or challenge them in attaining successful adaption. Ten Korean Early Study Abroad (KESA) students attending schools in the Washington Metropolitan region were recruited for this study, and face-to-face, semi-structured interviews were conducted to gather information regarding experiences and perceptions of KESA students in the United States. Findings show that most KESA students feel that having friends, participating in extracurricular activities and maintaining contacts with their families and friends in Korea using social media and instant messaging helped them as they made the transition into American culture. Students also indicated that the language barrier, being away from family, not owning a car, difficulty keeping in touch with old friends, cultural differences and racism are the most serious challenges for them during their adaptation period. This research documents the unique challenges faced by KESA students and provide a helpful guideline for counselors and educators working with ESA students from Korea, as well as indicate the directions that should be pursued by further research. / Ph. D. / The rapid increase in young Korean Early Study Abroad (KESA) students in recent years and the growing presence of these KESA students in American school classrooms, added to the lack of information about these students, created the need for this research study to explore the experiences of KESA students through their own voices. Ten KESA students from the Washington Metropolitan region were recruited and interviewed to provide insights regarding their experiences and perceptions of their life in the United States. According to the results, most KESA students feel that having friends, participating in extracurricular activities and maintaining contacts with their families and friends in Korea using social media and instant messaging helped them during their adaptation period, whereas they claimed the language barrier, being away from family, not owning a car, difficulty keeping in touch with old friends, cultural differences and racism as the most serious challenges. This research sheds light on KESA students’ experiences and yields a valuable guideline for counselors and educators in the United States when working with ESA students from Korea.

This study investigates how Korean Parachute Kids perform academically in their schools and what social factors contribute to Korean Parachute Kids' academic performance. Korean children who came to the U.S. for educational purposes without their parental supervision are called `Korean Parachute Kids'. They have several characteristics: most of them come from high SES families, their parents have high expectations of their children and force them to go to the U.S., Korean Parachute Kids are pressured to attend Ivy League colleges, and their parents tend to compensate for their absence with money or presents. Korean Parachute Kids who come to the United States without their parents encounter many problems, both academically and socially. Many Korean Parachute Kids struggle to adjust and face academic failure due to language barriers, cultural differences, and the different curricula in the U.S. This failure occurs even though acquiring an education is the reason for Korean Parachute Kids' stay in the U.S. and is what their parents have invested exorbitant amounts of money. In light of the absence of their parents, many Korean Parachute Kids' behaviors go unchecked, which may, in turn, cause these children to be maladjusted in many aspects of their school lives. Korean parents' high expectation for their children's academic success is regarded as one of the factors that cause their children to misbehave. Research is needed in order to inform Korean parents and Korean and U.S. society about the academic and social implications of early study abroad for Korean children. Guidelines should also be provided in order for Korean parents to discern what the good and bad aspects of early study abroad in the U.S. are for their children. This research will also be beneficial to educators in America in that they will be aware of Korean Parachute Kids' academic and social difficulties in school since the number of Korean Parachute kids who study in the U.S. continues to increase. / Urban Education

本文旨在以學習者定位的角度切入，探討小留學生在求學各階段會遭遇到的優勢與挑戰。研究對象為兩位曾經於童年時期在加拿大求學的台灣小留學生，研究方法主要包含研究對象所撰寫之英語學習歷程、口述英語學習歷程與半結構式訪談，目的在於了解研究對象在人生各階段的經歷、自我定位與他者定位，透過「整體 — 內容」分析法，研究結果顯示小留學生在回到母國之後，經常受到他者的正向定位，因而獲得許多優勢，如獲得許多師長、同儕的讚揚、較多參與英語相關活動機會、英語課上獲得老師特別給予的自由、以及在面對大學與研究所課業上相對較少的負擔。而這些小留學生享有的特權也與台灣「英語瘋」的現象息息相關。不過這些小留學生也面臨許多挑戰，如在出國初期遭遇許多語言障礙產生的挫折、回台灣後相當不適應以考試為導向的教學、人際關係上遭遇挫折與國文科目的挑戰。同時交叉分析個案後，顯示出家長在確保小留學生未來學習順利與否，扮演相當關鍵的角色。最後於文末提出給予老師、家長與小留學生的建議，以及未來研究建議方向。 / This study aims to reveal the advantages and challenges that early study abroad students face through exploring the positioning of two Taiwanese students who studied abroad at a young age at different stages of their lives. The study adopts a qualitative research method with written narratives, oral narratives and semi-structured interviews as data and the data collected is analyzed using a holistic-content approach. The research findings indicate that the two early study abroad students positioned themselves and were positioned positively after they returned to their own country and enjoyed various privileges, such as peers’ admiration and teacher’s encouragement for their superior English skills, ample opportunities to participate in many English-related activities in school, freedom granted by teachers in English classes, and less schoolwork burden in university or graduate school. Nevertheless, the participants also face unique challenges. Both of the participants suffer from great frustration at the beginning of their study abroad experiences and were not used to the test-oriented English education after returning to Taiwan. In Jessica’s case, difficulties in learning the Chinese subject and troubled interpersonal relationships also existed. The findings also reveal the importance of parents’ role in facilitating these early study abroad students’ sustained English development. Suggestions for teachers, parents, early study abroad students and implications for future research are provided at the end of the thesis.

This dissertation examines effects of globalization on language, identity, and education through the case of four Korean jogi yuhak (early study abroad) students attending Toronto high schools. Resulting from a 2.4-year sociolinguistic ethnography on the language learning experiences of these students, the thesis explores how globalization--and the commodification of language and corporatization of education in the new economy, in particular--has transformed ideas of language, bilingualism, and language learning with respect to the transnational circulation of linguistic and symbolic resources in today‘s world. This thesis incorporates insights from critical social theories, linguistic anthropology, globalization studies, and sociolinguistics, and aims to propose a "globalization sensitive" Second Language Acquisition (SLA) theory. To better grasp the ways in which language learning is socially and politically embedded in new conditions generated by globalization, this new SLA theory conceives of language as a set of resources and bilingualism as a social construct, and examines language learning as an economic activity, shaped through encounters with the transnational language education industry. The analysis examines new transnational subjectivities of yuhaksaeng (visa students), which index hybrid identities that are simultaneously global and Korean. In their construction of themselves as "Cools" who are wealthy and cosmopolitan, yuhaksaeng deployed newly-valued varieties of Korean language and culture as resources in the globalized new economy. This practice, however, resulted in limits to their acquisition of forms of English capital valued in the Canadian market. As a Korean middle class strategy for acquiring valuable forms of English capital, jogi yuhak is caught in tension: while the ideology of language as a skill and capital to help an individual‘s social mobility drives the jogi yuhak movement, the essentialist ideology of "authentic" English makes it impossible for Koreans to work it to their advantage. The thesis argues that in multilingual societies, ethnic/racial/linguistic minorities‘ limited access to the acquisition of linguistic competence is produced by existing inequality, rather than their limited linguistic proficiency contributing to their marginal position. To counter naturalized social inequality seemingly linguistic in nature, language education in globalization should move away from essentialism toward process- and practice-oriented approaches to language, community, and identity.

This dissertation examines effects of globalization on language, identity, and education through the case of four Korean jogi yuhak (early study abroad) students attending Toronto high schools. Resulting from a 2.4-year sociolinguistic ethnography on the language learning experiences of these students, the thesis explores how globalization--and the commodification of language and corporatization of education in the new economy, in particular--has transformed ideas of language, bilingualism, and language learning with respect to the transnational circulation of linguistic and symbolic resources in today‘s world. This thesis incorporates insights from critical social theories, linguistic anthropology, globalization studies, and sociolinguistics, and aims to propose a "globalization sensitive" Second Language Acquisition (SLA) theory. To better grasp the ways in which language learning is socially and politically embedded in new conditions generated by globalization, this new SLA theory conceives of language as a set of resources and bilingualism as a social construct, and examines language learning as an economic activity, shaped through encounters with the transnational language education industry. The analysis examines new transnational subjectivities of yuhaksaeng (visa students), which index hybrid identities that are simultaneously global and Korean. In their construction of themselves as "Cools" who are wealthy and cosmopolitan, yuhaksaeng deployed newly-valued varieties of Korean language and culture as resources in the globalized new economy. This practice, however, resulted in limits to their acquisition of forms of English capital valued in the Canadian market. As a Korean middle class strategy for acquiring valuable forms of English capital, jogi yuhak is caught in tension: while the ideology of language as a skill and capital to help an individual‘s social mobility drives the jogi yuhak movement, the essentialist ideology of "authentic" English makes it impossible for Koreans to work it to their advantage. The thesis argues that in multilingual societies, ethnic/racial/linguistic minorities‘ limited access to the acquisition of linguistic competence is produced by existing inequality, rather than their limited linguistic proficiency contributing to their marginal position. To counter naturalized social inequality seemingly linguistic in nature, language education in globalization should move away from essentialism toward process- and practice-oriented approaches to language, community, and identity.