A View On China English Variety English Language Essay

There are several researches of assortments of universe English, one of the celebrated bookmans is Krachu deserving mentioning. He put frontward the impression of World Englishes in 1970s. And in 1985 he proposed the three concentric circles to see the assortments of English in which the inner circle refers to the conventional civilization and lingual bases of English. It includes the USA, Canada UK, Australia, Ireland and New Zealand with population about 320- 380 million. The outer or drawn-out circle stands for the institutionalised non-native assortments. It involves the earlier periods of the enlargement of English in non-native environments, where English plays a important `Second Language ‘ map in a multilingual environment and it has become portion of a state ‘s establishments as good. The states are, India, Singapore, Bangladesh, Malawi, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Malaysia, Pakistan, Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, Zambia with population about 100-350 million. The spread outing circle includes the parts where the public presentation assortments of the linguistic communication are used basically in EFL contexts, as in China, Japan, Korea, Iran, Greece, etc. with approximately over 750 million ( Kachru 1985, 1992 ) . There are about 75 states and districts in which English has remained or kept on staying a peculiar place, as a portion of either the outer or inner circles ( Crystal, 2001: 53 ) .

A historical position of China English

The development of English in China is a procedure of lingual and cultural regeneration of English in Chinese civilization. Smith ( 1983 ) points out that linguistic communication and civilization are closely related to each other, but no linguistic communication in the universe is doomed to incorporate itself with merely one civilization. The nativization of English in China is the procedure of integrating of the English linguistic communication and Chinese civilization.

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Harmonizing to the talk note, the Europeans have contacted with the Chinese since the thirteenth century, so British people and Chinese people have experienced about four hundred old ages since the first Englishman, Captain John Weddell, arrived in Macao in 1637. In early 18th the British set up regular trade in Canton, after that in early 19th, trade exchange between India and China was established by the universe ‘s biggest company at that clip the English East India Corporation. English instruction and acquisition has besides grown up since the English founded their trade. A batch of Christian mission schools every bit good as Christian universities and colleges were set up in Hong Kong, Canton, Shanghai and other port metropoliss during that clip. So, the history of English in China is about every bit long as that of American English. Chinese English or China English is non an wholly new phenomenon, and Pidgin had its ain beginning.

Pidgin English and China English

A Pidgin is a lingua franca that comes up in order to do communicating easy among different linguistic communication talkers in some fortunes such as plantation or trade state of affairss where they suffer in traffics with each other ( William, 1992: 224 ) . Actually, Pidgin English in China originated from Pidgin Portuguese when the earliest Westerners who came to China were the Portuguese in the sixteenth century. Pidgin Portuguese did non vanish until nineteenth century when the English settlers came to South China to widen trade. With the addition of trade volume of Britain in China, a new Pidgin, Canton English, emerged as the times demanded. Many English words bit by bit replaced those Lusitanian words. Pidgin Portuguese had a great consequence on late Canton English, now known technically as Chinese Pidgin English.

The formation of China English

The identifiable features of a nativized English exist in any combination of phonological, lexical, semantic, syntactic or discourse characteristics. The nativization of English in China appears to be most obvious at the phonological degree, nevertheless, the assorted speech patterns and idioms of Chinese makes it hard for us to hold a elaborate generalisation to back up. So, here are some characteristics of China English:

1. Lexical degree

At the lexical degree, Kachru ( 1982 ) has pointed out that a portion of the vocabulary is nativized in two ways. On one manus, native points are used in localised registries and manners in order to contextualize the linguistic communication. On the other manus, English lexical points may get extended or restricted semantic markers. During the procedure of the nativization of English in China, the former is called “ cultural words ” , the latter, “ semantic displacement ” . There is a great difference between Chinese and English civilization, many a clip we ca n’t happen tantamount English looks to convey curious things in Chinese civilization. Under this state of affairs, people will use different interlingual rendition schemes, such as domesticating and foreignizing interlingual renditions, actual and free interlingual renditions, to construe Chinese words of stuff and religious civilizations into English. Domesticating interlingual rendition references to the attack of interlingual rendition in which a smooth, obvious signifier is accepted that lessen the oddness of a certain linguistic communication text for its mark linguistic communication readers. Meanwhile, foreignizing interlingual rendition indicates the interlingual rendition method in which a mark text deliberately cracks mark traditional manners by maintaining something foreign to the original. Wordss and phrases in China English are the chief manifestations of the nativization of English in China. They get into English through the undermentioned ways.

1.1 Transliteration

Many Pinyin words have straight entered English because of lingual relativity and intranslatability of the applied linguistic communication. Transliterated looks in Pinyin can be considered a most conspicuous characteristic of China English with the technique of actual interlingual rendition and the schemes of foreignizing interlingual rendition. Chinese personal and geographical names and even some other China-unique facts can be romanized in Chinese Pinyin either in completeness ( e.g. Wen Jiabao ; Shanghai ) or in portion ( e.g. Maotai Liquor ) .

Actually, transliterated words from Chinese into English originated in the early nineteenth century. At that clip, tonss of Chinese personal names and geographical names were translated into English, harmonizing to Wade-giles system, the phonic system called Wade System, “ a system of Romanization of Chinese ” ( hypertext transfer protocol: //dictionary.reference.com ) widely used in stand foring Chinese words and names in English, peculiarly before being adopted as Pinyin. It is besides called Wade-Giles with some features of English spelling, but it did n’t lodge to the rules of English spelling to the full. And in the early times there were some transliterations from Guangdong idioms and Southern Fujian idioms, such as tea ( cha ) ; chowmei ( chao mian ) ; won ton ( huntun ) cheongsam ( qipao ) and so on.

A system utilizing the Latin alphabet, called Pinyin, has been developed in China since 1950s, and it is now in common usage. Now let ‘s compare the undermentioned different transliterated words harmonizing to Jiang Yajun ( 1995: 15 ) :

In the Wade Giles system In the Pinyin system

Mao Tse Tung Mao Zedong

Peking Beijing

Taipei Taibei

With the fast increasing of promotion and exchange with the outside universe, China has been greatly impacting the universe in many different Fieldss, like political relations, economic system, civilization, instruction, scientific discipline and day-to-day life. In this instance, more and more Chinese words showing curious things in Chinese civilization have been translated into English through transliteration and have become loanwords of English. They greatly enrich English vocabulary. Let ‘s expression at some vocabularies in China English from the talk notes that are transliterated under specific historical and cultural background:

Confucius ( Kong fu zi ) ; Lao-tzu ( Lao zi ) ; Yin ( Yin ) and Yang ( Yang ) ; qipao ( qipao ) ; doufu ( doufu ) ; litchi ( lizhi ) ; wushu ( wushu ) ; quyi ( quyi ) ; kongfu ( kong fu ) , etc.

1.2 Loan interlingual renditions

When there are no transliterated adoptions, or hybridisation, loan interlingual renditions will be adopted. Many Chinese words and looks have been translated into English by borrowing English words and phrases straight. There are three signifiers of loan interlingual renditions. They are compound words, clipped words, and phrases ( Zhou & A ; Feng, 1987: 111-125 ) . The kernel of their thoughts can be summarized as follows:

Loan interlingual renditions are the signifier of compound words, like Canton ginger ( Canton is a transliteration, and ginger is a native word ) ; teacup ( from Chinese word chabei ) ; teashop ( from Chinese word chaguan ) , etc. Other illustrations of this sort of loan interlingual rendition are the English loan translation, like beancurd ( from Chinese compound word doufu ; dou=bean or soy, fu-curd ) ; ruddy bean ( from Chinese compound word chidou ; chi-red, dou=bean ) , etc.

Another signifier of loan interlingual renditions refers to English phrases translated from Chinese phrases literally. All these English phrases possess the curious features of Chinese civilization that ca n’t be found in English civilization. For illustration, things arising from the civilization of Buddhism, doctrine and Chinese ancient literature: Taoism ( Dao jiao ) ; Buddhism ( Rusijiao ) ; The Analects ( Lunyu ) ; The book of Changes ( Yijing ) and so on. Loan interlingual renditions in specific historical and cultural developing periods of China: ruddy guard ( Hongweibing ) ; one large pot ( daguofan ) ; ideological remoulding ( sixianggaizao ) ; paper tiger ( zhilaohu ) ; four modernisations ( sigexiangdaihua ) ; religious civilisation ( jingshenwenming ) ; material civilisation ( wuzhiwenming ) Three Represents ( Sangedaibiao ) ; regulation by virtuousness ( yidezhiguo ) ; etc.

2. Syntactic degree

Wordss are the smallest units of the linguistic communication. While, sentences are the grammatical units of the highest class in the linguistic communication, and they are the basic lingual units for people to interchange thoughts and communicate with each other. At the syntactic degree, China English is affected by the manner of utilizations and utilizing Chinese constructions ( Jia Delin, 1990: 93-7 ) . Let expression at some undermentioned characteristics:

1. The most important information is frequently placed at the beginning of a sentence, so modifiers one after one by English native talkers, hence a additive series with a little portion of caput and a large portion of bole is created. Chinese people do it conversely, e.g. other excess information is foremost introduced, so the chief information, for illustration:

I will follow you wherever you go.

Wherever you go, I will follow you. ( CE )

2. The illustration of the cause and consequence about a thing in Chinese is in the rearward way to that in English. In general, the consequence in English is foremost given and so the cause, which is opposite to Chinese word order. The undermentioned sentences can break represent this instance.

The isolation of the rural universe is compounded because of the dearth of information media.

Because there are non adequate information media, the isolation of the rural universe is compounded. ( CE )

3. In English, there are many English sentences with pronoun “ it ” as empty topics, but this sort of pronoun does non be in Chinese. Let ‘s compare several braces of sentences below in order to place the features of China English more closely:

It is Monday today.

Today is Monday. ( CE )

Who is it?

Who are you? ( CE )

4. There are some differences bing in the places of questions, in reacting to negative questions.

I do n’t believe you are right making like that.

I think you are non right making like that. ( CE )

5. Different cultural background cognition in Chinese and English besides leads to different apprehension in interlingual rendition. For illustration:

Good fortune!

Travel to work merrily, and come back safely! ( CE )

From the above illustrations, we find the chief difference between English and Chinese is that English is a linguistic communication of hypotaxis while Chinese is a linguistic communication of parataxis. Hypotaxis refers to that the sentences are organized by the grammatical dealingss. But parataxis means the sentences are structured by the logic dealingss. Therefore, English sentences are good knitted, and Chinese sentences are crisp and lucid.

Decision

There is a turning consciousness that English has become an international communicating tool and a impersonal information medium across the universe. China English, as an English assortment developed in Chinese civilization, is certain to transport Chinese norms and behaviour. So its fluctuations are sensible during the practical applications, and there should be no differentiation of right and incorrect or good and bad. For communicating is the intent of the linguistic communication. And this will be the tendency of China English development.

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