China English From The Perspective Of Social Culture And Pragmatic Cognition

The phenomenon of Englishes spreading in the world indicates that English is ameans for international communication. English does not belong to certain nationsexclusively, but is a neutral communication medium. British English and AmericanEnglish are not regarded as the only two existing standard Englishes, but just as thetwo English varieties. Globalization has led the English language to localization ornativization. People from different countries use English in their specific ways.Englishes bear imprint of different cultures, thus making English more diversified,more variable and more flexible, and also making the “absolutely standard” Englishmore relatively correct.Through descriptions and explanations as well as theoretical interpretations anddata analysis, the thesis makes a comprehensive and systematic study of China Englishunder the framework of the theories of social culture and pragmatic cognition.On the basis of theories of language motivation and pragmatic adaptation, thethesis makes a further exploration into the definition of China English and Chinglish.China English is a performance variation with Chinese features, which originates fromadapting English to Chinese social culture, way of thinking and language structure.Chinglish is wrongly-used English, which is in violation of the fundamental rules ofEnglish grammar, the semantic meaning and pragmatic application. The motivation ofChina English is analyzed from three aspects: Chinese thinking, cultural identity andlanguage variation. The study makes the theoretical interpretation of China Englishunder the framework of the theories of interlanguage, language transfer and languageadaptation. The realistic significance of China English is presented through the factthat China English is a powerful complement to and enrichment of world Englishes. From the perspective of social culture and pragmatic cognition, the thesisdescribes and analyzes the linguistic (phonological, lexical, syntactic, textual anddiscourse) features of China English, aiming at establishing a research system of ChinaEnglish at the linguistic levels.The thesis，based on the theory of language commonness and cognitive thinkingin the mother tongue, holds that China English has some implication for Englishteaching in China. Through a study of English teaching development and the currentsituation of English teaching in China, the author points out that China English is notan accidental language phenomenon but an objective reality after a long time ofdevelopment and usage in China. Some methods are suggested from the angle of ChinaEnglish to improve English teaching in China.