earticle

영어

This study aims to understand Koreans' perception of Cantonese by analyzing the contents of tweets on Twitter which is a representative social media among social network service(SNS). Social network analysis(SNA) enables to find out how the perception of Cantonese appears in the communication of social media users, what keywords are related, and what topics are being discussed. Moreover, there are very few studies employing network analysis for exploring the perception of Cantonese or Lingnan culture. From this perspective, SNA seems to hold considerable importance. Furthermore, this study is expected to serve as basic data for understanding the perception of Cantonese, and further suggest new approaches and methodologies for researching Lingnan culture overseas. The results indicate that Cantonese is perceived by Koreans as a language primarily used by people in Hong Kong and Guangdong, and has not expanded to the whole Lingnan region. Excluding the key word “Cantonese”, which is the most frequently appearing key word in Cantonese-related tweet text, the following key words appeared in the following order of “Putonghua”, “Hong Kong”, “movie”, “English”, “pronunciation”, and “songs”. Culturally, it's evident that their perceptions of Hong Kong movies, actors, music, and singers are influenced by Cantonese. Moreover, Koreans have a keen interest in Cantonese pronunciation, tones, and linguistic notation. Going forward, my intention is to examine Lingnan culture through data collection from diverse social network services, including Twitter and other SNS such as Instagram and Facebook. I will also additionally examine whether there is a change in the public perception before and after COVID-19.