Identity and honorifics use in Korean study abroad

This study examines quantitative (DCT data) and qualitative (recordings of natural conversations, retrospective interviews) to explore the use of Korean honorifics by four advanced male learners on a study abroad program at a university in Seoul. Although the DCT data reveal that all four learners possessed strong underlying pragmatic knowledge regarding when honorific forms (contaymal) and non-honorific forms (panmal) should normatively be used, their use of these forms in real world interactions frequently departed from native norms. To explain this gap between knowledge and usage, the paper explores questions of these speakers’ identities, drawing on a growing body of literature that sees identity as pivotal to explaining second language acquisition, particularly in the study abroad context.