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1. synchronic study
【答案】 A synchronic study takes a fixed instant (usually at present) as itspoint of observation. Language can be studied at a given point in time or overtime. When we study language at a particular time, it is called synchroniclinguistics. Synchronic linguistics focuses on the state of language at anypoints in history. For example, a study of the features of the English used inShakespeare’s time would be synchronic. In modern linguistics, synchronic studyseems to enjoy priority over diachronic study. The reason is that unless thevarious state of a language is successfully studied it would be difficult todescribe the changes that have taken place in its historical development.
2. polysemy
【答案】 Polysemy means a single word having several or many meanings. Accordingto Crystal, polysemy is a term used in semantic analysis to refer to a lexicalitem which has a range of different meanings. Polysemic words are signs of anadvanced culture. Polysemy is also an essential feature of a language’s economyand efficiency. Historically polysemy can be understood as the growth anddevelopment or change in the meaning of words. For example, table has severalmeanings, including a kind of furniture, form, tabulation, etc.
3. illocutionary act
【答案】 According to Austin’s model, a speaker might be performing three actssimultaneously when speaking: locutionary act，illocutionary act, and perlocutionary act.Illocutionary act is the act of expressing the speaker’s intention (conveyingmeaning in context; the intention of the speaker while speaking). It is the actperformed in saying something. For example, in the sentence “I am thirsty”, thepropositional meaning is what the utterance says about the speaker’s physicalstate. The illocutionary force is the effect the speaker wants the utterance tohave on the listener. It may be intended as request for something to drink.
4. blend
【答案】 Blend, also blending, is the term for portmanteau word. In morphology,a relatively unproductive process of word formation by which new words areformed from the beginning (usually the first phoneme or syllable) of one wordand the ending (often the rhyme) of another, or by joining the initial parts ofthe two words. Examples of blends formed this way are English smog (formed fromsmoke and fog), brunch (breakfast and lunch). Blending is usually notconsidered part of I-Language.
5. What is the difference between langue andparole?
【答案】
Saussuredistinguished the linguistic competence of the speaker and the actual phenomenaor data of linguistics as langue and parole. Langue refers to the abstractlinguistic system shared by all the members of a speech community. Parolerefers to the particular realization of langue in actual use. It variesenormously according to individuals. The speeches, the idiosyncratic utterancesmade by individuals are all examples of parole.
Langue is relativestable and systematic, parole is subject to personal and situationalconstraints; langue is not spoken by an individual, parole is always anaturally occurring event. Langue is the social, conventional side of language,while parole is individualized speech. What a linguist should do, according toSaussure, is to draw rules from a mass of confused facts, i.e. to discover theregularities governing all instances of parole and make them the subject oflinguistics.
6. Use Searle’s notion of indirect speech actto explain the following exchange between A and B:
A: Let’s go to the football match tonight.
B: I have to prepare tomorrow’s presentation.
【答案】
A speech act whichis performed indirectly is sometimes known as an indirect speech act. Indirectspeech acts are often felt to be more polite ways of performing certain kindsof speech act, such as requests and refusals. According to Searle, when aspeaker is using indirect language, he is performing two speech acts simultaneously:one is the primary speech act and the other is the second speech act. Theprimary one is the speaker’s goal of communication and the second one is themeans by which he achieves his goal.
The utterance of Ais a kind of invitation, which expresses that A wants to go to the footballmatch tonight with B. But B doesn’t directly answer yes or no. B’s answer “Ihave to prepare tomorrow’s presentation”, the propositional meaning is what theutterance says about the speaker’s upcoming presentation. The illocutionaryforce is the effect A wants the utterance to have on B. That is B turns downA’s invitation.
7. What is Contrastive Analysis?
【答案】
Contrastiveanalysis is an approach to analysis of second language acquisition, based on abelief that a more effective teaching pedagogy would come out when thesimilarities and differences between native language and target language aretaken into consideration. Contrastive analysis compares the forms and meaningsacross the two languages to spot the mismatches or differences.
ContrastiveAnalysis aims to compare languages (e.g., L1 and L2) in order to determinepotential errors for the ultimate purpose of isolating what needs to be learnedand what does not need to be learned in a second language learning situation.The goal of contrastive analysis is to predict what areas will be easy to learnand what areas will be hard to learn. By such an analysis, it is supposed thatsome leaning difficulties could be predicted in terms of language transfer.Contrastive Analysis was associated in its early days with behaviorism andstructuralism.
8. arbitrariness of language
【答案】
(1) Arbitrarinessis the core feature of language, which refers to the fact that there is nological or intrinsic connection between a particular sound and the meaning itis associated with. A good example is the fact that different sounds are usedto refer to the same object in different languages. Arbitrariness of languagemakes it potentially creative, and conventionality of language makes a languagebe passed from generation to generation. For example, it is unable to explainwhy a book is called a /buk/ and a pen a /pen/.
(2) However, thereseems to be different levels of arbitrariness. ① Arbitrary relationship between the sound of amorpheme and its meaning. You may object to this when you think of words withdifferent degrees of onomatopoeia, namely, words that sound like the soundsthey describe. But in English, totally different words are used to describe thesound. For example, bark in English and 汪汪in Chinese. ② Arbitrarinessat the syntactic level. According to systemic functionalists and Americanfunctionalists, language is not arbitrary at the syntactic level. As we know,the order of elements in a sentence follows certain rules, and there is acertain degree of correspondence between the sequences of clauses and the realhappenings. In other words, syntax is less arbitrary than words. E.g., thereare two sentences. “He came in and sat down”. “He sat down and came in”. Thefirst sentence means that the man came in first and then he sat down, but thesecond sentence means the opposite, perhaps he got into his wheelchair andpropelled himself into the room. ③ Arbitrary and Convention, convention means you have to say things inthis way and you cannot change the expression any other way. For learners of aforeign language, it is the conventionality of a language that is more worthnoticing than its arbitrariness. That may be why when we are burying ourselvesin memorizing idioms, we feel nothing of the arbitrariness of the language butare somewhat tortured by its conventionality.
9. Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis
【答案】
(1) Sapir-Whorfhypothesis suggests that our language will mould our view of the world andconsequently, different languages may probably express their unique ways ofunderstanding the world. The hypothesis has two important points, linguisticdeterminism and linguistic relativity. Linguistic determinism refers to thenotion that a language determines certain nonlinguistic cognitive processes.Different languages offer people different ways of expressing around, theythink and speak differently. Linguistic relativity refers to the notion thatsimilarity between language is relative, the greater their structuraldifferentiation is, the more diverse their conceptualization of the world willbe.
(2) Thus, twoversions of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis have been developed, a strong versionand a weak version. The strong version of the theory emphasizes the decisiverole of language as the shaper of our thinking patterns. The weak version ofthe hypothesis, however, is a modified type of its original theory, suggestingthat there is a correlation between language, culture and thought, but thecross-culture differences thus produced in our ways of thinking are relativerather than categorical. So far, many researches and experiments conductedprovide support to the weak version.
(3) Linguisticdeterminism, or the strong version, has been criticized for its excessiveconcern with surface structures of individual languages. In fact, all languagesare fundamental of the same universal human character, including thelexical-semantic and syntactic components of language and all normal humanbeings are gifted with the same linguistic faculty and cognitive capacity. Theflaws of that hypothesis can be revealed through the following analysis. ① Different grammatical structuresdo not mean that speakers of different languages differ in thinking logic orreasoning. ② Equivalenttranslation is always possible in spite of the fact that in practice there arehardly any people in perfect control of two genetically different languages. ③ People who have good command oftwo genetic-unrelated languages do not have “double minds” or do not have tochange their thinking logic when speaking foreign tongue.
10.
“先天下之忧而忧，后天下之乐而乐”这句成语，摘自南宋文学家兼军事政治家范仲淹所著的“岳阳楼记”。
范仲淹少怀大志，想替国家做些工作，可是当他做参知政事的时候却因迭次奏请朝廷减轻赋税，整顿武备，选拔贤能，以及其他有利国计民生的建议，招受政敌的仇视。他们在宋仁宗帝前诽谤他，使他遭受贬谪，被迫离京，到遥远的地方邓州去做太守。同时他的好友滕子京也被贬到岳州做知州。
滕子京受到贬职，极为愤慨。范仲淹深恐他心境狭小，会惹出祸来，就想找个机会，规劝他要克制情感，小心谨慎，胸襟宽敞，免遭意外。
恰巧滕子京就职未久，由于他的才能，把岳州治得很好，人民都能安居乐业。滕子京觉得心境愉快，就想把陈旧的岳阳楼重新修建，扩大规模，恳请范仲淹写篇文章留作纪念。范仲淹抓住了这个好机会，在文章里暗暗规劝他。他指出：一个品格高尚的君子，不可因物而喜，和一般游山玩水的俗人一样；也不可因自己遭遇不幸而悲伤，和一般忧郁的诗人、被贬的官吏一样；而要以国事为重，处处想到国家和人民。因此他在这篇文章的末尾写道：
“唉！我所探索到的古人的心，与上述今日的游山玩水者和心境忧郁的诗人有所不同。高尚的人既不受环境的影响，也不受心境所左右。他若在厅堂庙宇供职，所关怀的应是人民的福利；虽与宫廷相隔山山水水，但仍关怀皇上的安危。所以他无论在职或在野，都满心忧虑。那么他什么时候才快乐呢？答案是：他应是先天下之忧而忧，后天下之乐而乐。唉，如果没有这样的人，我还有谁可做朋友呢？”
【参考译文】
The idiom “To bethe first to worry about the affairs of the state and the last to enjoyoneself!” is an excerpt from the Yueyang Pavilion written by Fan Zhongyan, aChinese writer, strategist and statesman in Northern Song Dynasty.
Fan Zhongyan, withgreat ambition, wanted to do some work for the country. But when he was apolitical adviser, he was envied by his political enemies for repeatedly askingthe court to reduce taxes, rectify military equipment, select talents and othersuggestions which were beneficial to the national economy and people’slivelihood. They slandered him before Emperor Renzong of the Song Dynasty, sothat he was banished and forced to leave the capital and to be Taishou(similarto mayor in ancient China) of a remote place called Dengzhou. At the same time,his friend Teng Zijing was also demoted be Zhizhou(similar to mayor in ancientChina) of Yuezhou.
Being demoted, TengZijing felt very indignant. Afraid that Teng’s narrow mind would make sometroubles, Fan Zhongyan managed to find an opportunity to persuade him tocontrol his feelings, be cautious and broad-minded , so as to avoid accidents.
It happened thatalthough he was a new Zhizhou, Teng Zijing’s governance over Yuezhou isexcellent, due to his talent. People there gained well-being. Teng Zijing feltdelightful so he planned to rebuild the old Yueyang Pavilion to a larger one.He requested Fan Zhongyan to write an article to commemorate. Fan Zhongyanseized this opportunity and exhorted him tactfully in his article. He pointedout that a man of lofty mind are not supposed to be made happy by naturalbeauty like those common people who enjoy travelling in natural scenery, nor tobe made sad by his own situation like those melancholic poets or demotedofficials. Instead, a man of lofty mind is supposed to attach great importanceto state affairs and think of the country and the people all the time. So hewrote in the end of the passage:
“Ah! I have triedto study the minds of lofty ideals in ancient times. Perhaps they weredifferent from the people I motion above. Why is this? The reason is that theywere not thrown into ecstasies over their success, nor felt depressed overtheir failures. When they were in high position at court, they concerned aboutthe people, when they were in remote place, they concerned about their emperor.They worried when they got promoted or when they were sent into exile. Then,when were they happy? They would say: ‘To be the first to worry about theaffairs of the state and the last to enjoy oneself!’ Oh, who else should I seekcompany with save them.”