관광영어교육의 국제화 방안에 관한 연구

A study on internationalization of tourism English education

Tourism English education needs to internationalize its educational contents in order to help students improve their abilities in intercultural communication. Employees in the tourist industry need intercultural communication skills because tourist services take place through face-to-face communicative situations with foreign tourists. This article explored the level of international understanding of tourism majors and their needs assessment for the internationalization of tourism English curricula. The study results showed that the level of internationalization of the students was 3.5 out of a 5 points Likert-type scale, implying that there is much need to improve it, particularly the level of intercultural sensitivity which marked the lowest point in 4 categories of internationalization. A needs assessment for the internationalization of tourism English education was high (M=3.74), being compared with the level of internationalization in current tourism English classes (M=2.92). A correlation analysis also revealed that there was a significant relationship between the needs level and English language ability of the respondents. Based on the study results, suggestions were made as to what components of internationalization should be emphasized and how to implement international education in tourism English.