Study Of Dispelling "Fossilization" In English Vocabulary Teaching On The Analysis Of Langacker's Grammar

People, who have learned English, know that vocabulary is the difficulty in learning English. The relationship between the vocabulary which the students have mastered and language ability is a direct proportion. As current teaching theory and method are backward, fossilization in learning vocabulary appears after students have mastered certain vocabulary. The problem of enlarging vocabulary and reconsidering the use of words seriously affects the whole English teaching results. Scholars have already made research on dispelling fossilization in teaching English vocabulary by using previous linguistic theory, however, the actual results are not obvious. Cognitive grammar, essentially different from the former linguistic theory, is a new linguistic theory. It could deal with the problems that dispel the fossilization in teaching English vocabulary. For this reason, there are both theoretical significance and practical significance in using cognitive grammar to do research on dispelling fossilization in teaching English vocabulary.There are seven parts on the whole:INTRODUCTION Clarify the reason,purpose,significance,content and method of this research.CHAPTER 1 GENERAL INTRODUCTION TO COGNITIVE GRAMMAR. Cognitive grammar is the theoretical basis and the key point of this research, therefore, this essay firstly gives a main description and introduction to cognitive grammar. Cognitive grammar, which consists of Lakoff's semantics and Langacker's grammar, comes into being in America and Europe in the 1980's of the last century. As the import of Lakoff's semantic theory is earlier than Langacker's grammatical theory, in China, the research on the former is more than the later and scholars already do research on how to apply the former to the English teaching. Because cognitive grammar is a new theory and is difficult to understand, the research on cognitive grammar in China is still initial and the achievement is poor. The previous linguistic theory only studies linguistic structure rather than its meaning, nevertheless, cognitive grammar only studies the later. A completely different linguistic theory applied to English teaching will certainly produce different effect. The research on how to apply cognitive grammar into dispelling fossilization in English vocabulary teaching is rare. It turns out to be pioneer in this aspect.CHAPTER 2 FOSSILISATION IN LEARNING ENGLISH. It is the prerequisite of this essay and the fundamental insurance of this research. This part aims to prove the rationality of this research. Fossilization is a phenomenon that people feels his English level stay at the current state or even regress rather than improve steadily at the initial stage when his English gets to a certain level. Fossilization could be divided into temporary fossilization and permanent fossilization according to it's characteristic. Fossilization of English learners in China, especially non-English major students, is temporary fossilization. Temporary fossilization would be dispelled if students have chance to accept the optimal input. Fossilization lies in two aspects in English vocabulary teaching: first, vocabulary is hard to enlarge; second, people can't use words freely. The former is concerned with the "quantity" and the later is concerned with "quality". The purpose of using cognitive grammar to dispel fossilization is to improve quantity and quality and aims at another leap. Since Selinker put forward fossilization for the first time, scholars have done lots of research on its cause of formation and have raised some ways to dispel fossilization. Scholars in China mainly concentrate on why fossilization appears in the course of learning rather than on how to dispel fossilization. As the previous theory plays little role in dispelling fossilization, cognitive grammar is supposed not only to be feasible, but also make up the inadequacy of research on how to dispelling fossilization.CHAPTER 3 PROBLEMS EXISTING in ENGLISH VOCABULARY TEACHING in CHINA. The main problem to be solved is found through generalizing vocabulary teaching condition of all levels of schools in China. It's made up of two parts: Problems of English vocabulary teaching in primary and middle school and at university. Problems of English vocabulary teaching in primary and middle school include that words are taught in isolation,methods of learning are not scientific,students don't keep pace with teachers,cultural backgrounds are ignored, etc. Problems of English vocabulary teaching at university mainly involve that the status and the key points of vocabulary teaching are not stressed, and the method is not diversified, etc. Many researches have been done on how to teach English vocabulary, but attentions are mainly paid to teaching objective meanings other than subjective meanings. Based on cognitive grammar, this essay aims at finding the ways to dispel fossilization by means of studying the objective and subjective meanings of English words. For this reason, to a certain degree, the research is a kind of complementary innovation.CHAPTER 4 DISPELLING OF FOSSILISATION-INSPIRATION FROM COGNITIVE GRAMMAR (一). This is the major part of the essay. It consists of the methodology of cognitive grammar and the dispelling of fossilization; the prototype theory and the determination of basic vocabulary; English vocabulary teaching under iconicity theory; and categorization,decategorization and the dynamic teaching. The first part discusses Langacker's Eclectic Methodology, which is the fundamental insurance of dispelling fossilization. The second part explains the disadvantage that words are divided into basic vocabulary and non-basic vocabulary under classic theory, and the rationality of poly-division. The third part tells how to apply iconicity theory to teaching. The last part discusses how to apply categorization and decategorization to vocabulary teaching and make students know the dynamic change of words.The first and the second parts are pioneering, and belong to original innovation category; researches in the third and forth parts are more systematic and comprehensive than that has been done in the past.CHAPTER 5 DISPELLING OF FOSSILISATION-INSPITATION FROM COGNITIVE GRAMMAR (二). It includes polysemy teaching in the light of metaphorical theory, English grammarization and Lexicalization, and vocabulary teaching under imagery meaning. The first part points out the relationship between basic meaning and non-basic meaning, how do they come into being? The second part applies grammarization and lexicalization into the teaching of empty words and compound words. In the third part, imagery meaning is subjective meaning, which is the most difficult for students to grasp and the most interesting.What has studied in the first part is deeper and further than previous study and is a kind of complementary innovation; no scholars have done research on what has studied in the second and the third parts in China, therefore, these parts are original innovation.CHAPTER 6 CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION. First of all, it is thought that the dispelling of vocabulary fossilization relies on the study of vocabulary teaching theory. Second, the dispelling of fossilization is good for improving English teaching. At last, cognitive grammar could dispel the fossilization of English vocabulary teaching and deal with the problems that unsolvable under other linguistic theories. Meanwhile, the future study is suggested: 1,Do further research on strengthening English vocabulary teaching methodology. 2,The application of cognitive grammar to teaching needs to be further studied.