The Cognitive Linguistic Study Of Ellipsis And Its Teaching In Translation

Ellipsis is ubiquitous in natural language. The study of ellipsis has a long history in the philosophy of language, syntax, semantics, pragmatics, rhetoric, psychology, etc. Ellipsis plays different functions in different texts, such as grammatical function, rhetorical function, cohesive function, etc. The study of ellipsis has become a big problem for the teachers and students for a long time, especially in the teaching of translation of week ellipsis. It is under the influence of traditional linguistic study, the interpretation of ellipsis has become one-sided, people stick to the model of one-to-one semantic gap filling and fail to set up a convincing scientific classification system by which the teaching in translation of ellipsis in the texts can be guided.The cognitive linguistic research on ellipsis has suggested that:1) the nature of ellipsis is the salience of new information. According to the theory of figure-ground, the known information is viewed as ground and the new information as figure, and in this way known information is omitted and new information is highlighted; 2) ellipsis is closely related to perspective, the decategorization of ellipsis is ubiquitous; 3) the presupposition of ellipsis is the docking of background knowledge between the speaker and the hearer; 4) ideal cognitive models(ICMs) are the theoretical bases of meanings in the gap in the process of searching, locating, filtering and matching.With the construal theory in cognitive linguistics as the theoretical ground the present dissertation attempts to analyse the text of ellipsis and its searching, locating, filtering and matching location of the meanings in the gap, and puts the achievements of the research into the teaching of ellipsis text translation. The questions will be discussed as follows:1) the nature of ellipsis; 2) the principles of ellipsis; 3) the theoretical basis of the cognitive study of ellipsis; 4) the categorization and decategorization of ellipsis; 5) the construal of ellipsis; 6) the teaching in translation of the ellipsis text.With the careful study we came up with the following findings:1) with the view of cognitive linguistics ellipsis is the salience of new information; 2) elipsis is closely related to perspective, the decategorization of ellipsis is ubiquitous; 3) ellipsis is presupposition. The success of ellipsis in communication is decided by the successful docking of background knowledge between the speaker and the hearer; 4) ellipsis is a semantic gap; 5) meanings in the gap have got the nature of probability; 6) adding translation is an important way in the realization of equivalent translation between Chinese and English ellipsis in the texts.This dissertation consists of seven chapters:Chapter 1 serves as the introduction. In this chapter, the author briefly discusses the notion, feature, criterion and position of ellipsis, the present research at home and abroard, and the research design and the structure of this dissertation.Chapter 2 deals with the principles of ellipsis:1) coding principle of information validity. It emphasizes conciseness and efficiency of words when ellipsis is used in the course of coding; 2) the principle of least effort. In the communication both the speaker and the hearer hopes not only the success of communication but also the least effort in coding; 3) cooperative principle. According to the principle the speaker should consider the knowledge reserve of the hearer and the context carefully in the communication by using ellipsis in the texts; 4) the principle of relevance. It deals with the reasoning according to the relevance of context in order to find the best relevance between the topic and the context and fill the semantic gap correctly.Chapter 3 comments on the theoretical basis of cognitive linguistics in the study of ellipsis:1) the basis of physiology. It means the neural network of human brains; 2) the basis of psychology. It refers to the network of collectionism, and the function of form neurons. Form neurons connect each other through the imput of weight. When the sum of weight is greater than the threshold the neuron is activated, thus comes the connection; 3) the basis of linguistics, i.e. the lexcical network in the semantic field and semantic associative field. It deals with the semantic relations between words and phrases.The semantic relations are the bases of semantic association which can make a text. The basis of physiology, psychology and linguistics forms a semantic associative cyclic model, namely, the neural network→collectionism→the semantic field and semantic associative field. The model is the theoretical basis of the cognitive study of ellipsis.Chapter 4 discusses the categorization and decategorization of ellipsis.The study can give a strong support to the classification of ellipsis.Categorization serves as the theoretical basis of strong and weak ellipsis and decategorization as the change sources of weak ellipsis. The study of categorization shows that ellipsis has the features of changeability and continuity, and it is in the state of continuum. Ellipsis has the difference of typicality and atypicality. The meanings in the gap of typical ellipsis can be searched and located rapidly from the semantic network and grammatical structure of the words exchanged directly, nevertheless, the atypical ellipsis can only be associated and reasoned from the context. Typical ellipsis is called strong ellipsis and atypical ellipsis weak ellipsis.They have the family resemblance. The study of decategorization shows that ambiguity of ellipsis is the premise of decategorization, and association is its starting point.Chapter 5 deals with the construal of ellipsis. Salience and perspective can help interpret the text of ellipsis.The hearer should choose different ways of construal, perspective and reference points of cognition, try to search and locate the meanings in the gap through some psychological paths, and find some units of natural meanings to fill the gap so that cohesion and coherence of the the ellipsis text can be achieved. It meets people's custom to construal the ellipsis in the text in the view of salience and perspective. In a familiar context people only pay attention to the salience of new information when analyzing the semantic gaps of ellipsis because the known information in the gaps has been put into people's cognitive models and used as ground in the text of ellipsis. That is the reason why ellipsis has come into being.Chapter 6 is on the teaching of ellipsis translation in the text. In this chapter transformation of meanings in the gap has been discussed in the theory of ICMs. The application of ICMs can help to interpret, search, locate, filter and match the information in the text of ellipsis. ICMs can also help to fill the semantic gap in the view of cognition, such as in the transformation of subject awareness, object awareness, action awareness, character awareness, and structure awareness. In the teaching of translating the ellipsis text, teachers should pay attention to the four points mentioned below:1) to know how the brain works, and the process of weight adding study of neurons is the one that weight is increased. In the course of teaching teachers should encourage their students to master basic knowledge and improve the semantic associative skills. Teachers should also help the students to understand the meanings in the gap, activate the neurons quickly in the construal of ellipsis texts and lay a good foundation in the translation in this respect; 2) to create schema teachers should help their students to broaden their knowledge, and pay attention to the meanings in the gap in the context of culture which is based on certain culture, the way of thought and behaviour, and values etc.; 3) to teach the students to make a contrastive study about the texts of ellipsis, such as subject awareness in Chinese, and the predicate verb which is very rich in inflective forms in English because frequency of ellipsis of those elements is very high; 4) to make a research about the models of thought between English and Chinese. Teachers should teach their students the similarities and differences about the models of cognition between the two nationalities.Chapter 7 serves as the conclusion and discussion. The major findings and limitations are summarized, and several points in the translation of ellipsis in the texts are mentioned, and suggestions for future research are offered as well.