A Study Of Fossilization Of English Learners' Metaphoric Production

Learner language, i.e.,interlanguage, is one of the most prominent subfields in SLA study. In the study of interlanguage, fossilization has been emphasized by researchers in that it reveals the unique characteristics of learner language. Previous studies of fossilization center on the learner's linguistic competence and communicative competence, with the conclusions that the causes of fossilization lie in the age, motivation, communicative pressure, context of learning, the feedback, etc. These studies have had great impact on promoting the learners'accuracy and fluency, but the problem of nonnative-likeness has been persistent in the interlanguage of learners of all levels. This problem leads researchers to explore the deeper causes of fossilization.The study of metaphoric competence, which originated from the contemporary theories of metaphor and developed as the theories of metaphor came into combination with the study of SLA, offers a new perspective for the study of fossilization:the deeper causes of fossilization lie in the fossilization of the learners'metaphoric competence.Based on the researches at home and abroad, the present study analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively the fossilization in the metaphoric production of 60 English majored students in Daqing Normal University. The features of fossilization in the metaphoric production, and the causes, including the internal causes and the external causes, are illustrated through error analysis.The internal causes lie in the interference of other conceptual metaphors, and problems in cross-domain mapping. The external causes lie in the insufficient input and lack of correct feedback in the context of learning. On the basis of the analysis of errors in the metaphoric production, this study proposes some suggestions to defossilize the fossilization of metaphoric production and develop the English learners'metaphoric competence and English proficiency adequately as well as suggestions for future research.The present study offers a new perspective for the study of fossilization, thus enriching the SLA theories.In addition, it provides empirical evidence for curriculum design and English teaching on the basis of the developmental rules of the English learners'metaphoric competence.