A Corpus-based Study On Conceptual Transfer Of Temporal And Spatial Prepositions In English Writings Of Mongolian English Majors

In the field of second language acquisition,language transfer has been concerned by many scholars.Under the influence of cognitive linguistics,Pavlenko(2008)proposed conceptual transfer,which has become a new research direction of language transfer.In recent years,scholars at home and abroad have carried out a lot of research on conceptual transfer,and achieved fruitful results.However,there are few researches on the conceptual transfer of prepositions of the third language learners whose mother tongue is Mongolian at home and abroad,and most of them stay at the descriptive level.Although some studies explain the causes of conceptual transfer from a cognitive perspective,they fail to fully explain the corpus and analyze the causes of conceptual transfer from a cognitive perspective.Therefore,based on the theory of conceptual transfer,this study aims to explore the use of prepositions of Mongolian English Majors in English writings.This paper mainly answers three research questions: 1)What are frequencies of spatial and temporal prepositions use in corpus? 2)What are the features of positive and negative conceptual transfer both in terms of spatial and temporal concepts? 3)What are the causes of conceptual transfer in the use of prepositions in English writing of Mongolian English majors?In order to answer the above three questions,the author mainly uses the theory of conceptual transfer and the theory of image Schema to make a systematic study of prepositions(in,on,at)of Mongolian English majors by combining quantitative and qualitative research methods on the corpus and explains the conceptual differences in the use of English prepositions when expressing spatial and temporal concepts.The findings are as follows: First,Mongolian English learners overuse spatial and temporal concepts,which is consistent with the use of prepositions by Chinese English learners.Second,when Mongolian English learners use IN,ON and AT,there are both positive and negative conceptual transfer.In expressing spatial concepts,the use of three prepositions is characterized by first language conceptual transfer and the influence of second language conceptual transfer.In corpus,the conceptual transfer of mother tongue reflect negative conceptual transfer,while the influence of second language Chinese lies in the positive conceptual transfer of preposition ON in expressing the concept of multimedia space.In terms of temporal concept expression,the preposition IN of Mongolian third language learners only shows positive conceptual transfer,while negative conceptual transfer is not obvious.That is to say,the transfer of temporal concept shows the characteristics of positive conceptual transfer of mother tongue and second language.Because ON has no corresponding concept in both Mongolian and Chinses,it can't construct conceptual transfer.Third,this paper analyzes that Mongolian English learners' usage of prepositions is caused by the conceptual similarities and differences among Mongolian,Chinese and English.When the space-time concept category of the mother tongue is narrower than the corresponding space-time concept category of the target language,it is often conducive to the acquisition of the target language;when the space-time concept category of the mother tongue is wider than the corresponding space-time category,it is not conducive to the acquisition of the target language.Based on the results of the study,the author puts forward some suggestions for the teaching of English prepositions.Finally,it discusses the shortcomings of this study and suggestions for future research.