Influence of Culture Factors on the English Language Learning文化对英语写作的影响.doc

Influence of Culture Factors on the English Language Learning Websters new world dictionary offers several most frequently used senses of the word “language”, namely 1 (a) human speech; (b) the ability to communicate by this means; (c) a system of vocal sounds and combinations of such sounds to which meaning is attributed, used for the expression or communication of thoughts and feelings; (d) the written representation of such a system; 2 (a) any means of expressing or communicating, as gestures, signs, or animas sounds; (b) a special set of symbols, letters, numerals, rules etc. used for the transmission of information, as in a computer; however, to give the barest of definition, language is a means of verbal communication. It is instrumental in that communicating by speaking or writing is a purposeful act. It is social and conventional in that language is a social semiotic and communication can only take place effectively if all the users share a broad understanding of human interaction including such associated factors as nonverbal cues, motivation, and socia-cultural roles. Concerning culture, one of the best early definitions was given by E.B Taylor, who defined culture as “that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society.” Since then, hundreds of definitions have emerged with the booming of culture studies. In general, the word “culture” seems to have been used in the following three categories of reference: In the first category, culture is technically used by ethnologists and historians to cover a socially inherited element in the life of human beings, which can be both material and spiritual. In this case, culture possesses the same elements as the “civilization” of human being, for example, “human culture”. The second application of the term “culture is more personal. It refers to “a rather ideal of individual refinement, built up on a certain degree of assimilated knowledge and experience but made up chiefly of a set of typical reactions that have the permit of a class and of a tradition of standing”. In such a sense, we have "cultural manner" and "cultural man". Culture in the third sense shares with our first technical conception an emphasis on the spiritual possessions of the group rather of the individual. This conception is employed by some researchers to refer to the “national civilization”, for example, “Chinese culture”. From the authors observation, in spite of the differences in their perspectives, there are general agreements among anthropologists as well as other culture researchers on the common characters as follows. Firstly, culture is not innate, but acquired; hence, it allows human beings to adapt themselves to their natural and social settings. Concerning this, American anthologist Duranti has the following account: about culture, there is common view, ie, it is of something learned, transmitted, passed down from one generation to the next, through human activities, often in the form of face-to-face interaction, and, of course, through linguistic communication. With this view, it can be explained why a human child, regardless of his genetic heritage, will grow up to follow the cultural patterns of the people who raised him. A child separated from his blood relatives and brought up in a society different from the one in which he was born will grow up to be a member of the culture of his adoptive parents. The second general agreement among culture researchers is the view that all aspects of a culture are interwoven, thus one cannot touch only one aspect of a culture without touching the other aspects. Thirdly, culture is shared by one group of people. Hence it virtually draws boundaries between different groups of people. Then what are the culture factors in the process of English language learning? As a matter of fact, in the English language learning, culture is the history, geography, local conditions and customs, traditions, living style, art, literature, code and values of the English-spoken countries.Language and culture in relation In considering the relationship between language and culture, I am of the opinion that language is not simply a part of culture, but a very particular part of culture.There is also no doubt the view that language is a part of culture. However, there have been debates on what role language plays in culture, and we have read a lot of about persistent argument about “Spir-Whorf Hypothesis”, of which the “weak version” that holds language influences culture but not determines culture is generally accepted.But I think the significance of “Spir-Whorf Hypothesis” lies so much in presenting accurate and determining statements on the relationship between language and culture as in drawing peoples attention to the particular role of language playing in culture. Researchers often quote the following account from Spir concerning the relationship between language and culture: Human beings do not live in the objective world alone, nor alone in the world of social activity as ordinarily understand, but are very much at the mercy of the particular language which has become the medium of expression for their societythe fact of the matter is that the real world is to a large extent unconsciously built up on the language habits of the group. No two languages are ever sufficiently similar to be considered as representing the same social reality. In considering the above account made by Spir, I want to stress the following points by saying that language is a particular component of culture: firstly, language penetrates into every level of culture and the linguistic system interpenetrates all other systems within culture. Secondly, language is the most important means by which culture is transmitted, such as music, drawing, etc, yet no other systems are so comprehensive and powerful as language. Furthermore, language is also the most important medium through which culture actively, but not passively, language can, in a sense, create culture by constructing a symbolic world and by reinforcing, preserving and transmitting cultural heritage. Last but not least, “language is a great force of socialization,” It is largely through language socialization that an individual will acquire the culture of the people he or she lives with. With he view that language is a particular part of culture, we can see that language can never be free of its cultural background, and “ there is no natural language that can be used as a pure international language”. Therefore, learning a language naturally involves learning its culture.The English Language Acquisition and the English Culture Acquisition in relation It is a common view that foreign language learners necessarily become learners of the foreign language culture, and it is now an increasing consensus that language and culture learning cannot realistically separated. One of the well-known characteristics of modern approaches to the English language studies and the English language teaching is the successful second language acquisition is accompanied by foreign culture acquisition. For example, it seems clear that a learners acquisition of communicative competence must involve more than the command of its phonology and vocabulary; the learner must also acquire new cultural knowledge and a set of culture-specific constraints on linguistic competence should be accompanied by expansion culture commence. Then what does language acquisition and culture acquisition share in common? Both of them involve systems of internationalized knowledge, and in both cases the nature of these internationalizations must be abstract and general enough to be applicable to novel situations. As linguistics frequently point out, linguistic competence cannot simply be long enough. It seems reasonable to suppose that the same principle holds true for the nature of cultural competence in culture acquisition. Language and culture are both social phenomenon. Language has rich cultural intension, and it is an important carrier of culture and a main manifestation of culture. As an important part of national culture, language develops with the nations development. Different nations have different kinds of culture, history, costoms and local conditions, while the language shows the different culture and social costoms of different nations. Therefore, language cannot exist without culture and culture relies on language. As a kind of language learning, English language learning must go along with culture learning of English-spoken countries. Well understanding of culture of English-spoken countries does do good to English understanding and English using and do good to understand the native countrys culture and do good to develop world consciousness. So only understand relative culture knowledge can we express our ideas properly in English. In the past days of English teaching and learning, we have realized influence of native language on the English language learning and teaching, but we have not realized the influence of culture factors on the English language learning. For a long time we only laid stress on grammar and developed pure language skills, but did not pay enough attention to cultural consciousness. Therefore, we cannot understand the reading and listening materials properly because of culture difference, even we cannot speak and write in a proper way. Generally, foreigners could put up with our grammar mistakes and pronunciation mistakes, but they always take our mistakes about culture to heart, because they think the mistakes we make cannot be in keeping with their costoms and traditions, and they cannot accept those mistakes. So English learning is also English culture knowledge learning. The understanding of cultural knowledge influences ones ability to use English, even we can say using English properly must be predicated a well understanding of cultural knowledge. Therefore, when we learn the English language, we must pay much attention to learning the culture relative to the English language and the history, politics, economy, society, local conditions, traditions, religion art, technology and so on of those English-spoken countries.the following are some aspects of the influence of different culture factors on the English language learning.Titles Chinese people often address come acquaintances with the titles used between relatives. For example, youngsters often call elders “uncle” and “aunty”; and call the persons of the same generation “elder brother” or “elder sister”. However, the titles used between relatives are not extensively used in social communication in the English culture. If we call someone “uncle Wang” or “aunty brown” whose native language is English, they will be very uncomfortable, because such titles are used only under such situations that the two speakers are very close to each other, and furthermore, they only call the first name, but no family name, for example “Uncle Smith:. Chinese students always call their teachers Teacher Wang, Teacher Zhang etc.As a mater of fact, teacher is only a kind of occupation in the English language; while in the Chinese language, teacher is not only an occupation, but also a respectful form of address. Since this kind of culture difference, Chinese students always have such simple understanding: wanglaoshi is equal to Teacher Wang. In addition, they also call limishu ,fanghushi Secretary Li or Nurse Fang. But unfortunately, the people who come from English-spoken countries will feel very ridiculous, because in English culture, people call someone else always using Mr., Miss, Mrs., etc. So our teacher asks us to call him Mr. Zhang but not Teacher Zhang.Expressing appreciation “Thank you” can be not only used to express appreciation in the English language, but also can be a kind of polite language. For example, teachers always thank the students when students hand in their homework; at the end of the phone call, the two sides will also say “thank you” to each other. However, generally, Chinese people seldom say “thank you” between family members, while Americans and English say “thank you” almost on every occasion and to everyone, even “thank you” is used between parents and children, brothers and sisters. On public occasions, you will say “thanks” whatever people help you to do; as to gifts, Chinese and English also have different attitudes: Chinese always decline the gift for a while and then accept them. Furthermore, Chinese do not open the gift box in friends presence, because if they open the box, people around will think they are greedy. But in the English culture, people always open the gifts box in friends presence and express their appreciation. Westerns are very straightforward in character, so when you express your appreciation for his or her help, he will say “you are welcome”. But Chinese are very different. They always say "谢什么这是我应该做的"when other people express appreciation to them. If we translate “谢什么， 这是我应该做的”word-for-word, it is “what did you thank for? It was my duty, and I ought to do that.” Then after hearing that, Americans and English will be unhappy, because in their opinion, you are not willing to help them, but you have to help them out of duty. As a matter of fact, the answer is very simple, you can just say “it is a pleasure” or “do not mention it” or “you are welcome” or “it is nothing” or “thats OK”. When you speak highly of westerners, they will say “thank you”, which means that they encourage you to praise them more. But Chinese are very different. Here is an example: An American gentleman praises a Chinese lady at a party, “you look so beautiful today. then the lady says “where, where”. Fortunately the American gentleman knows a little about Chinese language and traditions, and ingeniously answers the lady “everywhere.” We can imagine if the American gentleman knows nothing about Chinese, then the conversation above will be a joke and he will think the Chinese language and Chinese people are very ridiculous. Here is another example. A foreign tourist says to a Chinese guide, "your English is quite fluent!" but the guide says “no, no, my English is poor.” This answer is very common in China because it is a way of showing modesty, but to westerners it is confusing. They will think they have a wrong judgment about the guides English. From these two examples we can realize that we must follow the westerners cultural traditions and just say “thank you” when they praise us.Festivals and special days China and English-spoken countries have the same festival, for example New Year” Day, besides, they have their own special days. China has Spring Festival, Lantern Festival and Mid-autumn Day etc,