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Licensed Unlicensed Requires Authentication Published by De Gruyter April 14, 2015

‘Chinese English or English Chinese?’

中式英语还是英式中文?
  • Andy Kirkpatrick

    Andy Kirkpatrick is Professor in the Department of Languages and Linguistics at Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia. He has lived and worked in many countries in East and Southeast Asia, including China, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Myanmar and Singapore. His most recent books are English as an Asian Language: Implications for Language Education, co-edited with Roly Sussex and published by Springer, and Chinese Rhetoric and Writing, co-authored with Xu Zhichang and published by Parlor Press. He is founding and chief editor of the journal and book series Multilingual Education, published by Springer, and has recently been appointed editor-in-chief of the Asia Journal of TEFL. He is Director of the Asian Corpus of English (ACE) project.

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From the journal Global Chinese

Abstract

A question which is frequently asked in discussions about the future roles of English and Chinese (Modern Standard Chinese or Putonghua and often also referred to as Mandarin) in the Asia-Pacific region is whether Chinese will replace English as the primary regional language or lingua franca. In this article, I shall first consider the roles that each language is playing in China itself and within the Asia-Pacific region. I shall argue that it is important to take these languages together, as the combination of Modern Standard Chinese and English is threatening regional languages, including other major Chinese languages such as Cantonese. In dealing with these two major languages in combination, I shall also consider how each language has influenced and continues to influence the other linguistically, illustrating this with examples at the levels of lexis, syntax, rhetoric and pragmatic norms. I shall conclude by tentatively suggesting how the roles of these two languages may develop in future, and the potential sociolinguistic consequences of this.

摘要

在讨论亚太地区英语和汉语未来角色时,一个最常涉及的问题是汉语是否会取代英语成为这个区域的主要语言或共同语。本文首先探讨汉语和英语在中国和亚太区域内的角色。在此,重要的是将英语和标准汉语同时考虑,两者在一起威胁区域其他语言,包括其他主要的汉语方言,如粤方言。其次在把汉语和英语看成是一个整体考察的同时,我们要考量英语和汉语各自对区域其他语言已产生的影响和未来将要产生的影响,并以词汇、句法、修辞及语用等层面的例子加以说明。最后,我们尝试性地预测这两种语言未来角色的发展趋势,及其潜在的社会语言影响。

About the authors

Andy Kirkpatrick

Andy Kirkpatrick is Professor in the Department of Languages and Linguistics at Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia. He has lived and worked in many countries in East and Southeast Asia, including China, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Myanmar and Singapore. His most recent books are English as an Asian Language: Implications for Language Education, co-edited with Roly Sussex and published by Springer, and Chinese Rhetoric and Writing, co-authored with Xu Zhichang and published by Parlor Press. He is founding and chief editor of the journal and book series Multilingual Education, published by Springer, and has recently been appointed editor-in-chief of the Asia Journal of TEFL. He is Director of the Asian Corpus of English (ACE) project.

柯安竹是澳大利亚布里斯班市格里菲斯大学语言和语言学系教授。他曾在东亚与东南亚很多国家与地区工作生活,包括中国、中国香港、马来西亚、缅甸和新加坡。他的新作有:《英语作为一门亚洲语言:语言教育的启示》,此书为他与若利·苏塞克斯共同编写,并由施普林格出版;《汉语修辞与写作》,与徐志长共同撰写,帕勒出版社出版。他是多语教育系列杂志与书籍的创办人与主编,该系列杂志和书籍由施普林格出版。他最近被任命为《亚洲作为外语的英语教学杂志》主编。他也是亚洲英语语料库(ACE)项目的主持人。

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1 Chinese Synopsis (中文简介)

中式英语还是英式汉语?

1 1 背景

1.1 汉语共同语的发展

中国政府将普通话作为民族共同语并加以推广的政策取得了成功,至少普通话在全国范围内是广泛通用的。自 1949 年中国共产党执政以来,语言改革一直是一项主要任务,其目的在于让广大人民群众能看、能读、能认。语言改革运动的一大重点是简化汉字,这使得中国大陆采用简体字,而台湾、香港则依然沿用繁体字。

改革的另一重点是在汉语共同语的基础上制定汉语拼音方案。值得指出的是,汉语拼音不是为了取代汉字,而是为了在小学语文教育阶段和对外汉语课堂中作为一种辅助汉语学习的手段(Pine, Yu 2012)。

普通话已成为越来越多年轻人的第一语言,使用人数也在不断增加。从小学三年级开始,所有中国孩子在学校里都要学习英语。那么我们不妨先从英语在中国的推广说起。

1.2 初来乍到的英语

有关英语在中国传播的最全面的研究要数 Bolton 在 2003 年写的《中国各体英语》, 该书追溯了自第一批英国商人到达中国大陆以来的英语和汉语的接触历程。Adamson (2002, 2004)则以下表说明中国英语教育的发展过程:

表一 中国英语教育的发展过程

1911–23 思想改革,服务于哲学观念的英语

1923–49 务于外交和交流的英语

1949–60 服务于科技的英语

1961–66 第一次复兴——服务于现代化和国际交流的英语

1966–76 文化大革命,不主张学习英语

1976–82 缓慢恢复,服务于现代化的英语

1982–至今 英语需求空前高涨,并在学校课程中不断强化

(adamson 2002: 232)

实际上,上表中还应该加上英语在高等教育领域的推广,因为越来越多的高校开设了中级英语课程(kirkpatrick 2014)。

2 2 英语对汉语的影响

就 “接触引发的演变” 而言,任何讨论的前提都是语言演变的复杂性以及诱因的多样性。正如 Thomason(2010: 31)指出,这 “是因为在多数情况下,任何一种原因都不是百分之百确定的,特定演变都是多重原因共同作用的结果”。她实际强调的是 “我们还没能全面解释众多已知的语言演变现象”。当牢记这点时,我们就可以讨论英语在词汇、句法、语言类型、篇章、修辞等层面影响汉语的现象了。

2.1 词汇和句法

语言间常见的一种借用就是词汇的借用,它常根据借入语的音系规则进行相应的调整。在一种语言中,一个词会被用来描写本族文化不具备的概念,比如英语里的 “sofa” 就成为普通话中的新词 “沙发”。

新词还可以采用混合代码或者混合形式,也就是说新词的组成中包含了其他语言的形式。比如在汉语的网络交际用语中,人们用 “3Q” 表示一个话轮的结束,意思是“谢谢”(英语为 thank you)。这里 “3” 的发音是普通话的 “san”,与英语字母 “Q” 合在一起,发音近似 “thank you”。从 “Q” 还发展出了另一个特殊的新词,意思是 “有嚼头的”,比如 “很Q的饺子”(很好吃的饺子),其中 “Q” 后还附加了助词 “的” 以符合汉语的句法规则。

2.2 词序

一般来说,不同语言在类型学上的差别越小,语言接触引发的演变就越可能发生。然而, Thomason 却认为类型学上的距离并不是绝对的,“在密切接触的情况下,一种语言的任何特征都可能植入到另一种语言中”(2010: 41)。这种 “密切接触” 使得二十世纪初印欧语系语言的特征大量借入到汉语。其中除了词语的借用外,借入的特征还包括句子变长(王 1992)和主从复句的增加。借入的 “主从型” 复句使得汉语中连接词增加,复句采用先从句后主句的语序(Xie 1998: 75)。换句话说,汉语中 “连接两个地位不平等的成分” 的 “主从型” 复句的使用在增加,而 “连接两个地位平等成分” “并列型” 复句的使用在下降(Halliday 1985: 198)。

不过,需要指出的是,尽管古汉语中主要采用的是 “并列复句”,但是 “主从型” 复句也存在,而且连接词也是存在的。

2.3 修辞和语用规则

就修辞风格而言,大量研究证据表明,在传统上,汉语修辞更倾向于间接的风格(比如 Jullien 2004;高辛勇 1985)。

在之后的几十年里,这种观点被中国学者不断完善,也就是高辛勇所说的 “间接批评的艺术”(1985:121)。进而,建立了一套用于表达间接批评的修辞和立论风格,其中包括连锁推理分析、相似推理以及像八股文那样的语篇结构。(具体可参见 Kirkpatrick & Xu 2012

Kirkpatrick & Xu(2012)提出了 “间接批评的艺术” 在当代中国消失的几个原因。一是中国追求现代化的意愿之强烈,使得 20 世纪以来涌入了大量的国外思潮。二是文化大革命给传统的汉语修辞敲响了丧钟,让汉语的修辞风格从本来的 “以和为贵” 变成了 “咄咄逼人”。

导致传统汉语修辞和 “间接批评的艺术” 消失的第三个原因是当代汉语教材中的中文写作部分深受美国教材的影响(Kirkpatrick 2002;Kirkpatrick & Xu 2012)。

3 3 汉语对英语的影响

如果要找一个受母语影响最显著的英语变体,那当属中式英语。尽管就中式英语本身是否算得上是国别变体还存在争议,但 Xu(2010a,2010b)描写了一套语言特征,足以证明中式英语变体的确存在。

Xu(2010b)讨论了中式英语的词汇特征。他从自己建立的中式英语语料库中选取了一些来源于当代汉语的词汇例证,这些词在中式英语中表达的是汉语的概念。

其中一个例子是 “fuye(副业)”,记者解释是兼职工作(Xu 2010b: 286)。徐则认为,“副业” 本来指的是人们在本职工作以外从事的工作,目的是为了生存,这份工作不能让别人知道,因为这是明令禁止的。但当前这个词在意思上的变化为老百姓从事受到鼓励的 “副业”。

中国人在发展英语新词上表现出了极强的创造力。李嵬(2014)通过 “超语言” 视角考察了中式英语。这里,“超语言视角” 指的是 “双语者策略性选择一种语言的特征用于有效交际”(Gracia & Li 2014:22)。其中一些例子是汉语母语者用戏谑的方式给英语词赋予了汉语特征,比如 “goveruption”。

4 4 汉语和英语:对其他语言的影响

据不完全统计,在中国,学英语的人超过了4亿人(Bolton & Graddol 2012)。普通话和英语在中国学校中的地位使得其他语言的地位受到了冲击和威胁。在这种情况下,汉语和英语的相互影响就以牺牲其他语言为代价(Feng 2012)。

在今后的几十年里,汉语和英语间的相互影响还会继续,而且这种影响会体现在诸多方面。那么,当我们研究这些新型的汉英语言杂糅的变体时,就需要考虑 “语言多能力中的语言结构复杂性和认知复杂性;此外还有相关的历史、政治因素以及意识形态和中式英语的冲击”(Li 2014,未刊)。

5 5 结语

本文略述了英语在中国的发展和作为汉语标准语的普通话在中国的发展。文章描写并阐述了一种语言影响另一种语言的方式,强调语言演变在成因上的复杂性以及我们不能简单地将所有演变都归结于单一的 “接触引发的演变” 。文章指出,当汉、英两种语言在一个时期内持续地相互影响时,二者的合力就会对亚洲地区的很多本土语言构成威胁。英语和普通话的未来是一条光明坦途,而许多亚洲本土语言的前路崎岖且有诸多未知数。对此,我们有必要在三个领域进行实证性研究,一是对英语或其他主要通用语对亚洲诸语言的影响进行研究;二是对中国的语言使用、语言维护和语言退化等层面的研究,这其中也包括汉语本身;三是对正在蓬勃发展的汉语和英语的超语言变体进行研究。

Published Online: 2015-4-14
Published in Print: 2015-4-1

©2015 by De Gruyter Mouton

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