文化背景知识对高中生英语阅读的影响调查
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摘要
近年来,在外语教学中,教师会发现学生在阅读英语文章时出现一些理解上的错误,这个问题已经引起越来越多的关注。学生在做阅读时,对阅读文章的错误理解和对阅读文章理解的障碍,与英语和汉语言文化的不同以及所反映的文化差异是密切相关的。实际上,英语阅读就是一种跨文化的交际,对目的语的文化背景知识的了解是学生成功地进行外语阅读理解的前提。学生在做英语阅读的过程中,学生的任务不仅仅是为了获得知识,更重要的是进行不同文化之间的交流。学生在理解阅读篇章的同时,能够批判地吸收外国优秀文化。教师经常能够了解到,学生在做英语阅读理解的篇章时,他们认识全部词汇,他们也能够理解所有的语法结构,但是仍然不懂其真正含义,造成这种结果的主要原因是学生不能够了解英语语言的某些社会文化涵义和社会文化背景。
到目前为止,有关外语学习和文化背景知识的教学的研究已经进行很多年了。可是,仍有相当一部分教师,在实际的英语阅读教学中,只注重语言知识的讲解,而对于阅读中所涉及的文化背景知识简单提及,甚至干脆略过。这种教学非常不利于学生阅读能力的提高。
在最近几年,英语教师已经逐渐意识到文化背景知识与外语教学之间关系的重要性了。在实际教学中,强调文化背景知识的教学也非常普遍,但是在实践调查中,文化背景知识的教学在语言课堂的运用还是十分有限。本文目的在于,从高中生所掌握文化背景知识的角度,来说明在英语阅读教学中加强文化背景知识传授的重要性,对于阅读教学中存在的问题,提供具体的解决方案,让学生得益于跨文化的阅读教学。
为了完成本文的研究,内容设计依据普通高中课程标准英语教材,设计了一个测试,一个问卷调查。测试和问卷的内容均涉及到英语国家的历史、习俗、地理、文学、宗教、政治制度等方面的文化背景知识。参与测试与问卷的学生为长春市某高中的高二和高三的学生。测试与问卷结果显示,学生的阅读学习很大程度上停留在知识的表面,而相关的文化背景知识十分匮乏,具体表现如下：(1)学生对课本中涉及的的文化背景知识的了解十分有限。(2)学生知识面狭窄,只重视课本基础知识,忽视对课外知识的学习。(3)学生学习文化背景知识的途径有限,同时也受教师文化背景知识水平的限制。
本人通过对英语阅读教学中所存在的问题进行分析,参考一些文献资料,以及本人多年的高中学英语教学实践,提出以下建议：1)教师应转变教学观念,在教学中既能做到顺畅的语言知识教学,又能渗透文化背景知识教学。2)教师应改变教学方法,在教学中适当引入文化背景知识的教学。3)教师应该强化媒体教学,使文化背景知识的输入更加通畅4)学生应该扩展思维,注意增加文化背景知识的输入。5)教师和学生应该共同合作,选用真实性强的文化背景材料进行阅读,提高学生的阅读能力。
文化背景知识是外语学习中的一个不可缺少的部分,因为语言与文化密不可分。通过对文化背景知识理论的探讨以及在英语阅读课堂上的实践活动,阐述了文化背景知识的重要性,分析了文化背景知识对阅读能力的影响,探索了加深学生对文化背景的理解的有效途径。
In recent years, in foreign language teaching teachers may find that students make comprehension mistakes when reading English texts. This problem has attracted more and more attention. This kind of understanding error or comprehension barrier that students have when they do reading closely relates to the cultural differences between Chinese and English. In fact, English reading comprehension is a cross-cultural communication, and the familiarity with the target language culture background is the premise of students'successful EFL reading comprehension. When students do the foreign language reading comprehension, their task is not only to acquire knowledge, but to communicate cross-culturally. Students can critically absorb the cultural heritage in the target language while reading. When students do English reading comprehension, many teachers learn that they might not understand what a sentence really means or what a paragraph is mainly about, even though they know every single word and can understand all the grammatical structures in sentences of the paragraph. This can be explained as the result of their ignorance of the social implications and backgrounds of the English words.
At present, many researches on cultural background teaching have been conducted for a long time. In language teaching, it is a commonplace to stress the importance of cultural background teaching, but in real language class, cultural teaching has remained quite limited。
In recent years, English teachers have gradually realized the important relationship between culture background knowledge and teaching foreign languages. However, while teaching reading comprehension, a number of teachers only emphasize language points, yet neglect the cultural background knowledge of the passage. Obviously, this kind of teaching method is not very helpful to improve students'reading ability to comprehend the text. The purpose of this thesis is to make teachers realize the importance of cultural background knowledge in reading comprehension, to make teachers pay more attention to the importance of cultural background in reading comprehension and to offer specific solving ways to actual problems in reading teaching, to let students benefit from this kind of cultural teaching.
In order to complete the study of this thesis, research instruments, a quiz and questionnaire, are applied, whose content are designed based on senior school English textbooks. The test and the questionnaire cover culture background knowledge of history, custom, geography, literature, religion and political system in English-speaking countries. The students who are investigated are all from No.2 Senior High School and No.17 Senior High School. The results of this study convey the message that student' learning are restricted to the language knowledge and they lack cultural background knowledge. Here are the problems:1) students'cultural background knowledge involved in textbooks is limited.2) students fix more attention on knowledge from textbooks instead of on extracurricular information 3) the sources of students'learning cultural background knowledge are limited and restricted by the teacher's proficiency of knowledge in this field.
As a senior school English teacher, with English teaching experience for many years, I hope this study could provide some suggestions for English learning in the future.1) Teachers should change the old teaching concept, and pay equal attention to the language knowledge and cultural knowledge.2) Teachers should change the teaching method, and emphasize the cross-cultural and communication teaching.3) Teachers should improve the teaching method with the aid of media, and broaden the channel of cultural background knowledge input.4) Students should broaden their mind, and increase the chance of cross-cultural knowledge input.5) Teachers and students should work together, and select the culture background material with strong authenticity, and cultivate students' ability to read material independently.
Culture background learning is a necessity in language learning, because. language and culture shouldn't be separated. This thesis clarifies the importance of culture background in language learning through the study of the knowledge of culture background and the practical activities in English reading comprehension class, analyses the influence that culture background has on reading ability, and explores the available approach that students can gain in culture background knowledge learning.
到目前为止,有关外语学习和文化背景知识的教学的研究已经进行很多年了。可是,仍有相当一部分教师,在实际的英语阅读教学中,只注重语言知识的讲解,而对于阅读中所涉及的文化背景知识简单提及,甚至干脆略过。这种教学非常不利于学生阅读能力的提高。
在最近几年,英语教师已经逐渐意识到文化背景知识与外语教学之间关系的重要性了。在实际教学中,强调文化背景知识的教学也非常普遍,但是在实践调查中,文化背景知识的教学在语言课堂的运用还是十分有限。本文目的在于,从高中生所掌握文化背景知识的角度,来说明在英语阅读教学中加强文化背景知识传授的重要性,对于阅读教学中存在的问题,提供具体的解决方案,让学生得益于跨文化的阅读教学。
为了完成本文的研究,内容设计依据普通高中课程标准英语教材,设计了一个测试,一个问卷调查。测试和问卷的内容均涉及到英语国家的历史、习俗、地理、文学、宗教、政治制度等方面的文化背景知识。参与测试与问卷的学生为长春市某高中的高二和高三的学生。测试与问卷结果显示,学生的阅读学习很大程度上停留在知识的表面,而相关的文化背景知识十分匮乏,具体表现如下：(1)学生对课本中涉及的的文化背景知识的了解十分有限。(2)学生知识面狭窄,只重视课本基础知识,忽视对课外知识的学习。(3)学生学习文化背景知识的途径有限,同时也受教师文化背景知识水平的限制。
本人通过对英语阅读教学中所存在的问题进行分析,参考一些文献资料,以及本人多年的高中学英语教学实践,提出以下建议：1)教师应转变教学观念,在教学中既能做到顺畅的语言知识教学,又能渗透文化背景知识教学。2)教师应改变教学方法,在教学中适当引入文化背景知识的教学。3)教师应该强化媒体教学,使文化背景知识的输入更加通畅4)学生应该扩展思维,注意增加文化背景知识的输入。5)教师和学生应该共同合作,选用真实性强的文化背景材料进行阅读,提高学生的阅读能力。
文化背景知识是外语学习中的一个不可缺少的部分,因为语言与文化密不可分。通过对文化背景知识理论的探讨以及在英语阅读课堂上的实践活动,阐述了文化背景知识的重要性,分析了文化背景知识对阅读能力的影响,探索了加深学生对文化背景的理解的有效途径。
In recent years, in foreign language teaching teachers may find that students make comprehension mistakes when reading English texts. This problem has attracted more and more attention. This kind of understanding error or comprehension barrier that students have when they do reading closely relates to the cultural differences between Chinese and English. In fact, English reading comprehension is a cross-cultural communication, and the familiarity with the target language culture background is the premise of students'successful EFL reading comprehension. When students do the foreign language reading comprehension, their task is not only to acquire knowledge, but to communicate cross-culturally. Students can critically absorb the cultural heritage in the target language while reading. When students do English reading comprehension, many teachers learn that they might not understand what a sentence really means or what a paragraph is mainly about, even though they know every single word and can understand all the grammatical structures in sentences of the paragraph. This can be explained as the result of their ignorance of the social implications and backgrounds of the English words.
At present, many researches on cultural background teaching have been conducted for a long time. In language teaching, it is a commonplace to stress the importance of cultural background teaching, but in real language class, cultural teaching has remained quite limited。
In recent years, English teachers have gradually realized the important relationship between culture background knowledge and teaching foreign languages. However, while teaching reading comprehension, a number of teachers only emphasize language points, yet neglect the cultural background knowledge of the passage. Obviously, this kind of teaching method is not very helpful to improve students'reading ability to comprehend the text. The purpose of this thesis is to make teachers realize the importance of cultural background knowledge in reading comprehension, to make teachers pay more attention to the importance of cultural background in reading comprehension and to offer specific solving ways to actual problems in reading teaching, to let students benefit from this kind of cultural teaching.
In order to complete the study of this thesis, research instruments, a quiz and questionnaire, are applied, whose content are designed based on senior school English textbooks. The test and the questionnaire cover culture background knowledge of history, custom, geography, literature, religion and political system in English-speaking countries. The students who are investigated are all from No.2 Senior High School and No.17 Senior High School. The results of this study convey the message that student' learning are restricted to the language knowledge and they lack cultural background knowledge. Here are the problems:1) students'cultural background knowledge involved in textbooks is limited.2) students fix more attention on knowledge from textbooks instead of on extracurricular information 3) the sources of students'learning cultural background knowledge are limited and restricted by the teacher's proficiency of knowledge in this field.
As a senior school English teacher, with English teaching experience for many years, I hope this study could provide some suggestions for English learning in the future.1) Teachers should change the old teaching concept, and pay equal attention to the language knowledge and cultural knowledge.2) Teachers should change the teaching method, and emphasize the cross-cultural and communication teaching.3) Teachers should improve the teaching method with the aid of media, and broaden the channel of cultural background knowledge input.4) Students should broaden their mind, and increase the chance of cross-cultural knowledge input.5) Teachers and students should work together, and select the culture background material with strong authenticity, and cultivate students' ability to read material independently.
Culture background learning is a necessity in language learning, because. language and culture shouldn't be separated. This thesis clarifies the importance of culture background in language learning through the study of the knowledge of culture background and the practical activities in English reading comprehension class, analyses the influence that culture background has on reading ability, and explores the available approach that students can gain in culture background knowledge learning.
引文
[1]包惠南.文化语境与语言翻译.北京：中国对外翻译出版公司,2001 217期
[2]蔡立颖.浅谈中西方文化差异.今日科苑,2007-12-23
[3]陈燕.英语教学应注重有效的输入和输出[J].广西民族学院学报(哲学社会科学版),2004,(S1)
[4]段学莲.交际中的中西方文化差异.中国科技信息,2008-03-15
[5]段连城.美国人与中国人—中美文化的融合与撞击[J].河北师范大学学报,2001年
[6]郭铭华.论母语在外语课上的作用[J].外语与外语教学,2002,(04)
[7]关士杰.跨文化交流学[M].北京：北京大学出版社,2001年
[8]胡文仲.外语教学与文化.湖南教育出版社,19997
[9]何田.英语学习背景知识新编.北大出版社,1998年
[10]何兆熊.新编语用学概要.上海外语教育出版社,2000 226-228
[11]黄晓萍.日常生活中的中西方文化差异.内蒙古电大学刊,2007-08-10
[12]何玉磊.浅论元认知策略在高中英语阅读教学中的应用[D].辽宁师范大学,2006
[13]金璐.浅谈中西方文化差异与外语教学.成功(教育),2008-07-15
[14]李慧兰.中西文化差异在汉英语言中的反映.开封大学学报,2007-09-25
[15]李立贵.谈谈文化背景知识传授的方法.国外外语教学,1998
[16]李波阳.英语阅读的儿项基本原则[J].杭州电子工业学院学报,2004,(02)
[17]刘超立,艾英(译),施瓦布(德).《希腊神话故事.宗教文化出版社,1996年,
[18]罗荣.图式理论和英语阅读理解.中小学外语教学,2001
[19]林莉.跨文化交际与中西方文化差异.科技信息(学术研究),2007-10-15
[20]林青.语篇分析在高中英语阅读教学中的应用[D].福建师范大学,2006
[21]倪雪华.在英语词汇教学中应注意中西方文化的差异.科技资讯,2007-11-03
[22]聂雪琴.中西方文化差异和英语教学.双语学习,2007-11-20
[23]彭晓兰.寓文化教学于语言教学中是提高阅读理解的有效途径[J].辽宁教育行政学院报,2004,(05)
[24]宋德生.图式理论及其对外语教学的启示.西安外国语院学报,2001,(2)：75-78
[25]施国华.中西方文化差异与英语教学.商场现代化,2008-02-15
[26]吴凤琴.浅议中西方文化差异在翻译中的处理.科技信息(学术研究),2008-03-25
[27]赵雷.中西方文化差异之隐私.科技信息(学术研究).2008-02-25
[28]朱小艳.小议英语教学离不开了解中西方文化差异.湖北广播电视大学学报,2007-09-20
[29]Barrey Tomalin, Susan Stempleskl. Cultural awareness. Oxford University Press,1972
[30]Baker,Mona. Routledge Encyclopaedia of Translation Studies. London. Routledge,1998
[31]Carrel PL, Joan C.Eisterhold. Schema Theory and ESL Reading Pedagogy,1983
[32]Carrel,P.C.,Devine,J.& D.E.Eskey(eds.). Interactive Approaches to Second Language Reading. Cambridge University Press
[33]David Nunan. Desigh for a Leaner-centered Curriculum Second Language Teaching Research.2001
[34]Gillian Brown. Language and Understanding.,1994
[35]Hatim, Bsil and Mason,Ian. Discourse and the Translation. Longman Group UK Limited,1990
[36]Hinkel,E.(ed.). Culture in Second Language Teaching and Learning. Cambridge:Cambridge University Press,1999
[37]Newmark.. Approaches to Trans!ation.Pergamon,Oxford,1982
[38]Nida.Eugene A. Language.Culture,and Translating. ShangHai Foreign language Teaching Press,1993
[2]蔡立颖.浅谈中西方文化差异.今日科苑,2007-12-23
[3]陈燕.英语教学应注重有效的输入和输出[J].广西民族学院学报(哲学社会科学版),2004,(S1)
[4]段学莲.交际中的中西方文化差异.中国科技信息,2008-03-15
[5]段连城.美国人与中国人—中美文化的融合与撞击[J].河北师范大学学报,2001年
[6]郭铭华.论母语在外语课上的作用[J].外语与外语教学,2002,(04)
[7]关士杰.跨文化交流学[M].北京：北京大学出版社,2001年
[8]胡文仲.外语教学与文化.湖南教育出版社,19997
[9]何田.英语学习背景知识新编.北大出版社,1998年
[10]何兆熊.新编语用学概要.上海外语教育出版社,2000 226-228
[11]黄晓萍.日常生活中的中西方文化差异.内蒙古电大学刊,2007-08-10
[12]何玉磊.浅论元认知策略在高中英语阅读教学中的应用[D].辽宁师范大学,2006
[13]金璐.浅谈中西方文化差异与外语教学.成功(教育),2008-07-15
[14]李慧兰.中西文化差异在汉英语言中的反映.开封大学学报,2007-09-25
[15]李立贵.谈谈文化背景知识传授的方法.国外外语教学,1998
[16]李波阳.英语阅读的儿项基本原则[J].杭州电子工业学院学报,2004,(02)
[17]刘超立,艾英(译),施瓦布(德).《希腊神话故事.宗教文化出版社,1996年,
[18]罗荣.图式理论和英语阅读理解.中小学外语教学,2001
[19]林莉.跨文化交际与中西方文化差异.科技信息(学术研究),2007-10-15
[20]林青.语篇分析在高中英语阅读教学中的应用[D].福建师范大学,2006
[21]倪雪华.在英语词汇教学中应注意中西方文化的差异.科技资讯,2007-11-03
[22]聂雪琴.中西方文化差异和英语教学.双语学习,2007-11-20
[23]彭晓兰.寓文化教学于语言教学中是提高阅读理解的有效途径[J].辽宁教育行政学院报,2004,(05)
[24]宋德生.图式理论及其对外语教学的启示.西安外国语院学报,2001,(2)：75-78
[25]施国华.中西方文化差异与英语教学.商场现代化,2008-02-15
[26]吴凤琴.浅议中西方文化差异在翻译中的处理.科技信息(学术研究),2008-03-25
[27]赵雷.中西方文化差异之隐私.科技信息(学术研究).2008-02-25
[28]朱小艳.小议英语教学离不开了解中西方文化差异.湖北广播电视大学学报,2007-09-20
[29]Barrey Tomalin, Susan Stempleskl. Cultural awareness. Oxford University Press,1972
[30]Baker,Mona. Routledge Encyclopaedia of Translation Studies. London. Routledge,1998
[31]Carrel PL, Joan C.Eisterhold. Schema Theory and ESL Reading Pedagogy,1983
[32]Carrel,P.C.,Devine,J.& D.E.Eskey(eds.). Interactive Approaches to Second Language Reading. Cambridge University Press
[33]David Nunan. Desigh for a Leaner-centered Curriculum Second Language Teaching Research.2001
[34]Gillian Brown. Language and Understanding.,1994
[35]Hatim, Bsil and Mason,Ian. Discourse and the Translation. Longman Group UK Limited,1990
[36]Hinkel,E.(ed.). Culture in Second Language Teaching and Learning. Cambridge:Cambridge University Press,1999
[37]Newmark.. Approaches to Trans!ation.Pergamon,Oxford,1982
[38]Nida.Eugene A. Language.Culture,and Translating. ShangHai Foreign language Teaching Press,1993