More or less parents in South Korea undergo tongue surgery procedures on their children. That is, by cutting a thin ribbon of tissue under the tongue, in the belief that the operation will make their children speak English better in pronunciation. Performing the operation should allow the child to easily pronounce English Retroflex or drag consonants backwards, which are considered very difficult for Koreans.
This phenomenon is called tongue tie because the child's frenulum is too short. The frenulum is a thin tissue that is under the tongue precisely in the middle and is useful for connecting the tongue to the floor of the mouth.
In the article entitled "Some people in South Korea prefer cutting when English licks the tongue." (Demick, 2002) many parents who come to plastic surgery clinics, one of which came to Dr. Nam Il Woo, "Parents really want their children to speak English, so they want surgery," said Dr. Nam. Even in a broadcast an Idol boy band 'EXO' named Kim Jongdae admitted to having carried out the operation, to clarify the pronunciation of the word.
"I wanted to be able to sing well when I was in high school. Like a laminate on a tooth, it can't be restored," said Chen. Chen used to think it was a minor surgical procedure but it turned out to be very painful. Luckily it didn't affect his vocal cords
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