Formation of lntercultural ldentity of Korean University Students Using Critical Literacy

This study investigates the intercultural identity formation of Korean university students observed in the critical pedagogy based on instructional context of a university course mediated in English. Currently, intercultural communicative competence (ICC) courses have started advocating a change from communicative approach to ICC approach in English education. Since the late twentieth century, in line with the postmodernism theory of language, there has been an increasing amount of research on the relationship between language and identity. It is now commonly believed that the use of language cannot be separated from the user’s value which s/he uses to construct and renegotiate his/her sense of self in the larger networks of society. This study looked at how the Korean university students form intercultural identity in the local socio-political context. The results of the study show that the students have various identities and they intertwined among the identities to transform into intercultural identity with vigorous negotiations that take up, resist, and shift between different identities. This study also suggests some implications for the use of the critical intercultural approach in English education.