The Study Of The English Explanation Of TCSL Textbook Vocabulary

Vocabulary is important in any language, and Chinese is no exception.Vocabulary teaching is usually the starting point of second language teaching, and this is no less true in Chinese language teaching.Most of the vocabulary in the TCSL textbooks is translated into English, so the English explanations directly influence the quality of vocabulary teaching. English vocabulary combines both the translation and the explanation. Editors of TCSL textbooks are not simply translating Chinese words into English; they are also offering explanations of these words. Sometime editors are providing cultural explanations and/or common collocations, etc. so that students are better able to accurately use these words.Using six TCSL comprehensive textbooks as research material, this dissertation focuses on the English explanations of vocabulary and summarizes the problems of vocabulary English explanations. There are mainly six kinds of problems: the part of speech of the word in the explanation is different from the Chinese word in the text;An insufficient knowledge of whether the word is complimentary, neutral or derogatory in its meaning; Inaccurate explanations; Two Chinese words are both translated into only one English word; Inaccurate cultural terms; Inaccurate measure words.Based on the analysis of the questionnaire and the HSK Dynamic database, this dissertation first lists the mistakes that students made as a result of the above mentioned problems. Second this dissertation offers suggestions to overcome the problems and improve the English explanations of Chinese vocabulary. The suggestions are: editors must correctly identify which part of speech the new word belongs to; If it is difficult to identify the exact meaning of a given word, further explanations can be provided in brackets; It is important for students to know whether the given word is commendatory, neutral or derogatory in meaning; Editors could offer explanations for how to use the measure word, for example putting the nouns that collocate with the measure word in brackets after the measure word.