西班牙塞维利亚，西安大路，
Analysis of Pragmatic Failure and College English Teaching
李华田
（华中师范大学外国语学院， 武汉430079）
Abstract: This article uses a lot of evidences to expose the pragmatic failures in people's inter-cultural communication, and analyses the types and causes of these pragmatic failures. Hence it puts forward several methods of college English teaching to help our students get rid of such pragmatic failures.
Key Words: inter-cultural communication, pragmatic failure, college English teaching
Ⅰ. Introduction
Language is a symbol for culture, and culture is an orbit of language(邢福义，1990, p.1). The relation between language and culture is like that between siamese twins—dependent on each other and restricting each other (李华田 & 邹心胜,2001). Language is featured with clear national characteristics, and every language records and reveals the cultural features of this nation. This is on one hand. On the other hand, every culture constraints its language to a certain extent. That is to say, language and culture are closely co-related with each other. Thus without the influence of the culture we can't learn a language well. That is to say, our college English teaching can't achieve its final aims if our language teaching and learning are far away from culture.
But nowadays, many, even most, teachers usually put too much emphasis on the conceptual meaning of words to the exclusion of their other six kinds of meaning—connotative meaning, social meaning, affective meaning, reflected meaning, collocative meaning and thematic meaning. They also pay too much attention to grammatical rules, ignoring the contextual application of people's speech acts. Because of our inadequate language teaching methods, our students inevitably meet with many cultural failures(李华田 & 邹心胜, 2001), especially pragmatic ones. This article will focus on the types and causes of these pragmatic failures. Hence it puts forward several methods of college English teaching to help our students get rid of such pragmatic failures.
注意写作与桌上的咖啡学英语
Ⅱ. Types and causes of pragmatic failure
The famous British linguist Jenny Thomas(1983) classifies pragmatic failures into two kinds: pragmalinguistic failure and sociopragmatic failure.
1. Pragmalinguistic failure
Pragmalinguistic failure refers to those the speakers meet with when they
don't understand the language habits of the native speakers and misuse their expressions. It also includes those the speakers have when they don't understand the expressions of the target language and use their own to cover them.
Ex.1 (After a Chinese host accompanies a foreign businessman)
Foreign Businessman: Thank you for accompanying me.
Chinese Host: Don't mention it. It's my duty to do so.
(韦琴红, 2001)
Analysis: Here, what the second speaker says makes the foreigner feel embarrassed because he misunderstands the meaning of "duty"—what one must do either because of one's job or because one thinks it right. Instead, the Chinese host should say "It's a pleasure".
Ex.2 (A foreign manager appreciates a Chinese secretary's outstanding work)
Manager: Thanks a lot. That's a great help.
Secretary: Never mind. (何自然, 1986)
Analysis: The Chinese secretary has intended to say that she is very pleased to be of help, but because she misuses "Never mind" (used when others apologizes), the foreign manager feels embarrassed.
Ex.3 (An English student studying in China is telephoning the secretary of
the department)
English student: Hello, I'd like to speak to Song Hua, please.
Secretary: I'm Song Hua. (何自然, 1986)
Analysis: What the secretary says is typical of what Chinese people usually say when receiving phone calls. Of course, some Chinese like saying "It's me". Both such Chinese responses are too straightforward and inappropriate for westerners, who will say "Song Hua speaking" instead.
2. Sociopragmatic failure
Sociopragmatic failure includes those failures people meet with when they
don't understand the cultural differences (such as those in privacy, taboo and moral value) between the east and the west, and when negative transfer of native culture to target culture occurs.
Ex.4 (A Chinese student gives a birthday present to his British friend)
British friend: Thank you. It's beautiful.
Chinese student: Don't mention it. It's only a small thing.
(何自然, 1986)
Analysis: The Chinese student doesn't understand English communication formula of giving and accepting gifts and uses the Chinese formula, which certainly makes his British friend embarrassed, because in western societies people usually reply with "I'm glad you like it" on such occasions.
Ex.5 (A Chinese visiting scholar to America is praised by her American friend
because of her clothes)
American friend: That's a lovely dress you have on.
Chinese scholar: No, no, it's just a very ordinary dress.
(何自然, 1986)
Analysis: If the Chinese scholar had said "Thank you" as Americans would say when accepting complaints, her American friend wouldn't feel embarrassed.
Ex.6 (When a British teacher goes into a Chinese campus dinning hall)
Waiter: What do you want? (何自然, 1986)
Analysis: If the Chinese waiter had said "Can I help you?" as British waiters
would say when receiving guests, he wouldn't have embarrassed the British teacher.
What listed here are only some of the typical pragmatic failures met with by Chinese people when they are having inter-cultural communications with westerners. And from these examples we can see that some Chinese people have such pragmatic failures because they don't understand the linguistic distance between Chinese and English as well as the social distance between the east and the west.
In order to help our students get rid of such pragmatic failures, we teachers should take measures to give them cultural education when teaching language knowledge, making our language teaching linked with cultural education, knowledge imparting connected with ability training(李华田 & 邹心胜, 2001). Only by doing so can we fully improve our students' quality and achieve successfully the final aims set forth by College English Syllabus.
在一个库中的学生
Ⅲ. Measures to be taken in college English teaching
1. Curriculum planning
According to Prof. 洪岗(1999), there is almost no difference in pragmatic
competence between seniors and freshmen. Then why does this occur? The authors of this article think that it is partly due to the fact that both we teachers and textbooks have paid too little attention to pragmatic competence. Hence, in order to change our present condition, we should change our textbooks at first. Of course, we don't mean that it is necessary for us to use another textbook, but we do mean that we should at least add to our present textbooks some cultural knowledge such as those about nation, history, geology, economics, customs, moral values, and a comparison between eastern culture and western culture. Only by adding cultural and pragmatic knowledge to textbooks can we help our students master the difference between our own culture and the culture of the target language, and grasp the useful concepts and maxims about language and culture, which in turn will guide them in their language practice.
2. Speech teaching
Speech teaching means that we teachers should teach language in its specific
context and pay adequate attention to contexts. That is to say, we teachers should teach our students about what to say on what occasion. Only by doing so can we help our students communicate successfully in English. Prof. 韦琴红(2001) gives a very good example to illustrate this point:
Ex.7 If you have done something for somebody, and he says "Thank you", you should say " ".
A. No, thank you B. How are you
C. That's all right D. Of course
Among these four choices, which one is the best answer? Generally speaking, Choice A is not a proper answer because it is a Chinese way to accept other's thanks. But it is all right on some special occasions—when one is forced by his boss to do too much additional work on weekends and can't have the date having been arranged with his girlfriend. Choice B can't be used here because it is a way to show one's concern for others. Choice C can be used in three kinds of situations: ① agreeing with other's request, ② response to other's apology, and ③ response to other's thanks, thus Choice C is the most appropriate answer to this question. Generally speaking, people don't use Choice D when responding to other's thanks. But it is OK in a special situation—one has made great efforts to do something for another person and thinks he can accept the other's thanks with an easy conscience.
3. Vocabulary teaching
In vocabulary teaching, we teachers should pay much attention to registers
of words, especially the difference between English and Chinese. On the other hand, we teachers should analyze the cultural connotations of words, emphasizing the other six kinds of word meaning in addition to connotative meaning. For example, we should not only teach our students what is meant by "ambition", "privacy", "independence", "religion", "modesty", "team work", "social level" and "environmental protection" , but also tell them what "shepherd", "horse", "castle", "knight" and "nightingale" remind the British people of. Only after knowing such matters will the students not fail in their inter-cultural communications.
4. Grammar teaching
In order to improve our students' linguistic competence, we teachers should combine language teaching with pragmatic proficiency. For example, imperative sentences do not necessary mean orders. Let's look at the following three examples: ① Be quite. ② Have some coffee. ③ Give us this day our daily bread. Among these three imperative sentences, only sentence ① is an order. Sentence ② expresses a kind of offer, and sentence ③ is a pray or an earnest hope (Johnson, 1978). Let's look at another example: The structure "to be + inf." is usually used to express the future time. But when it is used with the second person, it can also mean an order—"You are to be here by eight o'clock"(何自然, 1986).
5. Reading
Reading includes in-class reading and after-class reading. During our in-class reading, we teachers should rely on the topic of and evidence in the reading passage to introduce western culture and make a comparison between eastern culture and western culture. Such knowledge is very interesting to students. It will not only widen their range of knowledge, but also arouse their interest in language learning. For example, in western societies, one will not be thought to be honest enough if he doesn't look at the person he is speaking to, which can be proved by the proverb "Never trust a person who can't look at you in the eye". But it is rather impolite to "stare" at the addressee.
On the other hand, we teachers should guide our students in their after-class reading. Most students pay too much attention to vocabulary and main contents of what they are reading to the exclusion of cultural knowledge. One of teachers' tasks is to give them guidance in a complete comprehension of the passage, no matter whether it is a story, a novel, a play or a biography. Of course, we teachers can also propose they read books and articles about western cultures.
Ⅳ. Conclusion
In a word, people's pragmatic failure in their inter-cultural communication urges us to change our curriculum and our traditional modes of teaching. On one hand, we should add some cultural knowledge points to our textbooks, and on the other hand, we should pay adequate attention to students' linguistic competence and performance. Only by doing so can we help our students avoid pragmatic failure in their inter-cultural communication and thus achieve our teaching aims successfully.
克服对失败的恐惧。混合媒体
Main References
1. Johnson, K., Communicative Syllabus Design and Methodology, Oxford: Pergamon,
1978
2. Thomas, Jenny, Cross-cultural Pragmatic Failure, Oxford: Applied Linguistics,
1983(2)
3. 何自然，中国学生在英语交际中的语用失误，北京：外语教学与研究，1986(3)
4. 洪 岗， 英语语用能力调查及对外语教学的启示，北京：外语教学与研究， 1999(4)
5. 李华田 & 邹心胜, 日常交际中的文化错误与大学英语文化教学, 泰安: 语言文化教
育研究, 2001(5)
6. 韦琴红, 语用失误与大学英语教学, 载西安: 西安外国语学院学报, 2001(3)
7. 邢福义, 文化语言学, 武汉: 湖北教育出版社, 1990
你是不是住在我的酒窝里 不然为什么我的每次笑都是因为你
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