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A Study Of Chinese-English Code-Switching In Chinese Business Discourse

Posted on:2010-08-05Degree:MasterType:Thesis
Country:ChinaCandidate:S LuFull Text:PDF
GTID:2155360275489365Subject:Foreign Linguistics and Applied Linguistics
Abstract/Summary:PDF Full Text Request
Sapir·Edward said "Language, like culture, can seldom supply itself." Indeed language as one essential part of culture reflects social development. Code-switching is one of common results of language contact, and also supplementary from other language. With the opening-up of China, the communication between China and the world surges. At the same time, language contact is inevitable, which leads to interaction of languages and code-switching.Code-switching is a significant topic in linguistics, and it is paid extensive attention to since it has been put forward in 1970s. Foreign linguists incline to investigate the code-switching in pre-colonial area; while domestic scholars emphasize their study on dialects switching in China. However, code-switching between English and Chinese becomes very popular as the opening-up of China and by the gradual influence of English. This linguistic phenomenon first appears in Hong Kong and Taiwan, then expends to mainland China. We can observe it from some Chinese official newspapers, magazines and TV programs. Besides, it is prevailing in business field, but the study on code-switching in business discourse in China is very few. Business discourse as a typical one with special features has significant academic value. This thesis studied code-switching in three types of typical business discourses through sample collection and analysis.Ten representative TV commercials with English-Chinese code-switching from year 2008 to 2009 were collected; as well, E-mails and conversations from two international Chinese companies were gathered as language samples in the study. They were analyzed from distribution, using frequency, part of speech, and functions. It is found that in the business discourse containing English code-switching, Chinese still functions as main vehicle in expression; while English is embedded language which does not play key syntactic role. Among the switching, nouns and noun phrases and simple sentences are with the most switching frequency; while the using frequency of other parts of speech, especially functional words, is much less.In addition, the thesis summarized the functions of English code-switching in Chinese business discourses from two points. One point is for communication effectiveness, and the other point is marketing-oriented. From function analysis, we can see the significance of code-switching in business discourse with disproving the talk of "language invasion" and "language misapplication". It is expression diversification and expansion. As the globalization, influence between languages is ineluctable. We should regard it in a rational way, and learn how to apply it correctly.
Keywords/Search Tags:Business discourse, Chinese-English Code-switching, Language contact, Globalization
PDF Full Text Request
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