HYOSEONG BAE (GRADUATE SCHOOL OF SOGANG UNIVERSITY)
ISAIAH YOO (Sogang University)

COMMON ERRORS IN ENGLISH GRAMMAR BOOKS PUBLISHED IN KOREA : ENGLISH FOR ACADEMIC/SPECIFIC PURPOSES

English grammar books published in Korea often misuse terminology and provide unclear or incorrect definitions. For instance, some books describe quantifiers like much and many as quantifiable adjectives and categorize words like which and what followed by nouns as adjectives, rather than their correct classification as determiners. Additionally, some books use example sentences that do not align with the definitions they present. One example is the description of an adjective-like participle. Consider the sentence "I saw a dog sitting on a chair." Some grammars describe the participle phrase "sitting on a chair" as being similar to an attributive adjective in their function. However, this structure should be analyzed as a reduced relative clause, exemplified by the expanded form "I saw a dog which was sitting on a chair." This study explores two main issues in English grammar books widely used in Korea: terminology misuse and incorrect explanations. It aims to identify the sources of these errors and propose solutions to improve the understanding of English grammar among Korean learners. By addressing these issues, we hope to contribute to more accurate and effective grammar instruction.

HyoSeong Bae is an MA student in English education from Sogang University. His research interests include analysis of English grammar books published in Korea. He has been teaching English grammar and reading at an English institute for the past year.

Isaiah WonHo Yoo is Professor in the Department of English Literature & Linguistics at Sogang University. His primary research focuses on how corpus linguistics informs language pedagogy. His publications have appeared in Corpora, TESOL Quarterly, the Journal of Second Language Writing, Linguistic Inquiry, and Applied Linguistics.