Analysis of distribution and selection factor of ‘은/는’ and ‘이/가’ in the native speaker corpus and the Korean learner’s corpus

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the usage of Korean particles `은/는` and `이/가` to find out the characteristics of interlanguage development of Korean language learners. Data includes 4,000 sentences which are extracted randomly from the native speaker corpus and Korean language learner corpus. Each sentence was coded with the factors of ` the head of a sentence`, `definiteness`, `animateness`, and `subjective` in four groups- the native `이/가`, the native `은/는`, learner `이 /가` and the learner 은/는. The statistical analyses (Chi-square test and Binary logistic regression) were performed to prove the difference in distribution between native speakers and Korean learners. The results showed that there was a statistically significant difference in the four groups. `은/는 is used in the circumstance of `the head of a sentence`, `definiteness`, more in the learners` data rather than native speakers` data. Also, it was also coded according to the types of predicates- verb, adjective, and copular. `은/는` is used extensively in verbs and a copular especially in the learner`s corpus. Therefore it is believed that learner`s selection of `은/는` and `이/가` would be the indicative of the development of interlanguage development and can provide the explanations of learner`s errors of learning Korean.