Humanistic Strategies in English Teaching 英语教学中的人文策略.docx

存档编号 赣南师范学院学士学位论文humanistic strategies in english teaching 英语教学中的人文策略教学学院 外国语学院 届 别 2013届 专 业 英 语 姓 名 学 号 指导教师 完成日期 2013-03-01 contentsabstract - 0key words - 0.introduction - 1. the character of language taboos - 22.1 temporal spirit - 22.2 nationality - 32.3 language region - 3.the similarities between chinese and english taboos - 43.1 disease or death - 43.2 sexual discrimination - 53.3 human body and physical behavior - 63.4 age and weight - 7. the divergences between chinese and english taboos - 74.1 religion - 84.2 privacy - 94.3 name and address - 104.4 color - 114.5 number - 12. conclusion - 12bibliography - 14abstract: language serves as the tool of communication between people. it emerges during the process of human beings productive labor and changes with the development of society. when learning a language, we should obtain the knowledge of its cultural background, so as to avoid making offences and attain the expected communicative goals. a national language can reflect the cultural features, and the special linguistic taboos as part of language, it will lurk behind each nation of different cultural psychology. ethnic culture mode has its universality and individuality, and at the same time, in the social history, the values, customs and other many differences caused a chinese-english taboo language of cultural differences. the great differences between chinese and western culture, the cultural consciousness and culture embodies the spirit of disparate taboo words. taboo words in english can exploit cultural analysis of language research field, promote the development of cultural linguistics, also can avoid pragmatic failures, and conduce to the international exchanges smoothly.key words: language taboo international exchange culture analysis communication摘要：语言是人们交际的工具，它在人类的生产劳动过程中产生并随着社会的发展而改变。为了获得预期的交际目的，避免歧义，我们在学习一门语言的同时，也应该掌握它文化背景的相关内容。一门语言可以反映一个国家的文化特点，而作为其中一部分的特殊语言禁忌则隐藏在每个国家的不同文化心理学中之后。宗教文化模式有它的普遍性和独特性，与此同时，价值观、习俗以及许多其它差异导致了中西禁忌语在社会历史中的文化差异。文化意识和文化是中西文化差异中最主要的原因，体现了禁忌语不同的精髓。英语中的禁忌语可以拓展语言研究领域的文化分析，促进文化语言学的发展，还可以避免功利主义错误，有助于国家间合理的交换。关键词：语言禁忌 跨国家的交流 文化分析 交际. introductionin the long course of history, every nation has its own culture and deep historical foundations. the eastern and western all ethnic groups made his way of thinking, morality and social patterns and a culture value of the great differences. taboo words and the corresponding euphemism exist on different culture and language. american linguist, sapir edward had said: “language is a guide of social reality.” as a social culture phenomenon, taboo words, in a different extent, which reflect the different social values, moral and mental state and social and cultural traditions should be reflected back the society depends on national cultural flows.the definitions and origin of taboo word: taboo word is usually refers to the communication of the word which is avoided to use. “ban” in international academic circles is known as a “taboo”. it is started from the western the local dialect in the tango islands of pacific islands. 1777, a british capital whose name was james cook traveled to that islands and found people used many kinds of taboos. then he brought the phenomenon back to britain and spread them. it is translated in english as “taboo” or “tabu”. peter trudgill said in sociolinguistics - an introduction to language and society, penguin, 1983 “taboo and considered the ban, or be considered to be immoral and inappropriate behavior, these activities were banned seems no reason. in the language, taboo and those cant say things in particular, and those cant use the words and phrases. from the practical standpoint, of course, means a kind of words was generally banned. however, if these words in at any time, they are forbidden in the language is not able to exist”.the first and religious english taboos are relevant in ancient greece or rome; the gods have a fear, not daring to its name. as china is a god worshipped, from the original nature, to worship man-made religious worship that human civilization. in the early days, the underdevelopment because of science and culture, people cannot be properly understood phenomena of nature and blindly fear something and phenomena which link up with language errorsthe famous austria psychologists, freud in his work the totem and taboos, said “a taboo is a man, a place, a thing or a temporary situation, they have the mysterious force conduct itself the role or is the mysterious power sources. it also often has such things to avoid the threat of an injunction forbidding.” not only origins the people for some mysterious power, it also embodies the people in the long-term social manners and customs.language taboo is an important component part of the taboos. crystal pointed out, in cambridge in the encyclopedia of language, that taboo is a social taboo to some of the acts and things, or relation to use to express the content of the language. taboo words in the world of the peoples and the culture standard the words. . the character of language taboosas a kind of social and cultural phenomenon, taboo words are an impersonal presence which exists commonly in china and western countries. at the same time, it is also relative and restricted by all kinds of factors. it has three obvious characters.2.1 temporal spirittaboo words have temporal spirit. some ones change with the society developing, other ones has flied low or lost the quondam meaning. it would not happened in tang or song dynasty that xu jun was killed for his poem containing “qing” and “ming” in qing dynasty. tang and song poem sentence “qing ming shi jie yu fen fen”, which means that it rains continually during the tomb-sweeping day, was chanted by ancient people from generation to generation.after may 4th movement, people still adored confucius as a great teacher and educationalist, but his name was not so mysterious any longer. common people also could talk about his contribution and comment his limitation directly. in english, the word “women” was once taboo word of british victoria time, which means fancy woman or adulteress. nowadays, it contains the original meaning no longer and becomes a common word. it is said that the word “money” was once regarded as an indelicate word and forbidden to use. when the graceful and posted briton pay his check in the restaurant, he will tell to his guest in humorous tone: “im going to do the necessary.” “money” becomes a common word now. examples and all that can not count.2.2 nationalityevery peoples cultural pattern has their own character. as a folk-custom phenomenon, taboo word is restricted consequentially by national economic life, national social structure, national beliefs and other factors. chinese people call a spade a spade to age, sometimes adding “old” especially to express the adoration. however, this kind of respect can not be accepted in u.s. in their eyes, “old” means out of date, especially, american women treat themselves age as a serious taboo.2.3 language regionthe usage of taboo words are limited by many kinds of social conditions and mental factors. the talking situation has certain extent conditionality to the usage of taboo words. in assembly, party and other serious situation, people will be careful to avoid using taboo words. a few taboo words could be allowed in private. considerable taboo words should use in the special situation in chinese, i.e. boatman bans saying “fan” or “chen”, which means sinking; bell or clock are banned to present as gift, for the pronunciation of bell or clock is similar to “end” in chinese; vinegar is banned when has meals, for vinegar is relate to envy. “nigger” is a word with racial discrimination in american english, other race people should forbid to use. otherwise, it will lead to strong people emotion. but when negro uses that word to address other negro, it would come forth to so-called strong people emotion. at the same time, different gender, age, position, stratum and other factors also affect and restrict the usage of taboo words. out of need of the psychological aspect, people will at any moment stick up for the authority and dignity of taboo words, or break through taboo words, ply taboo words. the similarities between chinese and english tabooslanguage itself is the most important communicative tool for human being. however, human being could not understand language in the ancient time, and then endowed language with the divine supernatural power. people thought that language could not only vouchsafe evangel, but also avoid tragedy. they even equaled things which language represent with language itself, that is to say, regard words expressing weal and woe as weal and woe. therefore, people are very careful to treat the words which refer to weal and woe, avoiding ruffling gods. finally, it leads to language taboos. language taboos exist in each area of people life. some chinese-english taboo words are similar to express.3.1 disease or death“death” is a typical language taboo word. in china, ancient people often substituted “wang”, “gu”, “mei”, “sang”, “zhong”, “shi”, “yun” for the taboo word “death”. “par nirvana”, “reincarnation”, “passes away in a sitting posture” and other words were substituted for the taboo word “die” in chinese buddhism. in the most situations, british and american people would rather using some more euphemistic ways to express death, such as “pass away”, “pass out”, “fall asleep”, “expire”, “pay the debt of nature”, “choose ones days”, “join the great majority”, “be no more”, “have fallen asleep”, “gone to meet their maker”, “go to a best world”, “depart to god”, “to go to heaven”, “to go to ones rest”, “to be called to go” more than eighty euphemism.taboo words exist widely in each area of society. people ban to say disease and body deformity, substituting special man for disabled man; the mobility-impaired for cripple; the hearing-impaired for deaf; the visually-impaired for blind. some diseases also have other taboo words to avoid directly talking, such as be out of sorts instead of sick; be fever instead of scarlatina; be disorder instead of disease; be accident instead of apoplexy; stomach awareness instead of nausea; lose a meal instead of disgorge; mexican toothache instead of diarrhea; breast complaint instead of phthisis; bad blood instead of syphilis; hat and cap instead of gonorrhea; social disease instead of aids. psychopath sufferers are expressed that “she/ he is a little eccentric”. pregnancy and some body apparatus are also the taboo words both in chinese-english language taboos. 3.2 sexual discrimination the unreasonable phenomenon of sexual discrimination to female exists commonly on the society, which reflected linguistically sexual discrimination words. in the strict hierarchical and endless feudalistic chinese society, which means liegeman obedience to monarch; son obedience to father; wife obedience to husband, females society status was low and belonged to male, and male reigned female. hence, sexual discrimination to female accumulated, women suffering the situation of sexual discrimination reflected inescapably in chinese. for instance, “womens advice is fool”, “women have long hair, whereas their insight is short”, “women are often yenta” and other parlances reflected the contemptuous attitude to women. the address to women, like “limmer”, “vixen”, “tigress”, “hag”, “hussy”, “virago” contains contemptuous meaning. even the cussword is often related to female, such as “son of a bitch” and other words. many chinese words reflected sexual discrimination and some pejorative meaning chinese words part is with “nv”, such as “wang”, “du”, “jian”, “lan”, “biao”, “ping”, “ji”. with increasing of chinese female status, these parlances are hardly used in the recent decades. it often incurs dissatisfaction and comment to deride or look down on women in public.it also exist many sexual discrimination words in english. both saying and writing essay, “he” is used acquiescently to express whose gender is unknown but not use “she”. some words with contempt or affront are regarded as taboo words. such as “cow” means women has many children, “mutton” means women are profligate, “hen” means women are big mouth and yenta, “cat” means women are evil-minded, “crone” means old women are wizened, etc.3.3 human body and physical behaviorto some special human body and human physical behavior, people commonly keep a banning attitude both to chinese and western culture, especially sexual behavior and words about sexual organs. in some western countries, people still ban sex, though education about sex spread widely and people even talk about sex in some appropriate situation. chinese people ban it stricter than people in western countries.in china, heterosexual relation is usually a serious taboo. it is relevant with the great influence of confucius ethical ideology and chinese national aesthetic habit. when it is necessary to talk about sexual organs, chinese often use other words to replace. directly talking about sexual behavior is more banned, so people often substitute euphemisms for behaviors. people consider that natural physical behaviors, like human body discharge and sexual behavior, are taboo, for such behaviors are unholy or indelicate. then a series of relevant taboo words are engendered, “piss” or “shit” is substituted by “answer the call of nature”, “relieve nature”, “do ones need”; “intercourse” is substituted by “make love”; “pregnant” is substituted by “be expecting”.3.4 age and weightboth in china and western countries, taboos in the aspect of age and weight are attached importance very much. but then the degrees and conceptions exist diversity. in western countries, “fat”, “skinny”, “old”, “childish” and some other words about weight and age, people advocate beauty of health for man in the aspect of human body from of old. as we all know, the famous statue david shaped a figure of very bonny lad. what is more, people considered the beauty of female should be healthy and pulchritude in the eye of painting tradition. people think the fat means the poor and the rich are always crack, for the rich have money to invest their health. “become fatter” is expressed by “put on some weight”; “fatso” is expressed by “weight-catcher”, “heavy set”, “on the heavy side”, “plump” and “stout”. “thin” and “bony” are expressed by “lean” for male, “slender”, “willow” for female.on the beauty of flesh, chinese people once attached importance to fat as the beauty value. ancient maids of honor on paintings are with very round face. an emperors favorite concubine, concubine yang was a plump beautiful woman. people think grown male should be strong and fat, which means he must be rich. people may praise a bonny kid healthy. of course, with the development of society in china, people understand fat bring many kinds of diseases and gradually know the importance of health. hence, fat also become a taboo in chinese. the government started to advocate civil exercises.the divergences between chinese and english taboos“language is the symbol; culture is the language of the tracks” xing fuyi (1990s). a national language may reflect the ethnic characteristics of the special cultural and language taboos as part of the language, and potential of all ethnic cultures. the psychological nationalitys cultural pattern is the ecology and individuality, while eastern and western history and in social values and customs and life for many differences caused a chinese-english taboo words of the cultural differences.4.1 religion religion and religious beliefs is an important area of ban. there was a tremendous difference between chinese religious beliefs and english ones. western countries, mainly christians, and chinese main religious sects are buddhism, moslemism, and taoism. the differences between chinese religious taboos and english religious taboos reflect the different religious beliefs rightly.the british and american and other western countries believe in christianity, gods name jehovah was the most taboo word, which could not be casually mentioned or regarded as blaspheming. the old testament, exodus the god other gods must provide “the ten commandments”, the third of which claimed “thou shalt not speak my name in vain.” the american linguists bloomfield in reference to language taboos said, english religions words, such as god, devil, heaven, hell, christ, jesus, damn for words in serious use of his speech is suitable. violation of this regulation will be blamed or were evading (bloomfield 1933, and 155). so in usual, people avoid using these words as possible, and started to use golly, gosh instead of god; 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