| Motion event is one of the important research orientation in cognitive semantics.According to different lexicalization patterns of motion paths,Talmy(2000)divides the languages of the world into two categories: satellite-framed language and verb-framed language.Then Slobin et al.(2004)put forward that Chinese and other serial-verb-construction languages belong to a third type of language:equipollently-framed language;this view is supported in Kan Zhehua's(2010)research and further defined as “broad equipollently-framed language”.This research uses the lexicalization-based language typology of Slobin's“tripartite typology” and “thinking-for-speaking” hypothesis as theoretical basis,and adopts the wordless story book “Frog,Where Are You?” as experimental material,selecting students from a class of grade three in a high school in Shaoguan,Guangdong Province as the research subjects,to investigate their English coding features of motion manners and motion paths in motion events,so as to infer the English coding characteristics of motion events by Chinese English learners of high school(short for “CELHS”),and whether the typological features of Chinese have any influences on their English expression and what are the influences.The thesis focuses on the analysis of motion event coding characteristics of CELHS from four aspects: types of motion verbs,ground information of motion events,physical settingdescriptions and constructions of motion verbs.It attempts to answer three questions:(1)What are the characteristics of English motion event coding for CELHS?(2)What is the linguistic typology of CELHS' English?(3)For CELHS,does Chinese(mother tongue)have any influences on their English(second language)expression and what are the effects?The research finds that the English motion event coding of Chinese English learners of high school has the following characteristics:(1)Chinese English learners of high school tend to highlight motion paths when expressing English motion events,they prefer to use path verbs and neutral verbs,and caused motion events' own motion features cannot be fully expressed by English manner verbs;they rarely use more fine-grained motion verbs in their expressions,but overuse basic-level category vocabularies;(2)Chinese English learners of high school can produce a similar number of plus-ground clause and ground elements to native speakers;(3)Chinese English learners of high school are similar to Chinese native speakers,and they all focus on static physical scenes and dynamic motions.Therefore,the combination of static physical scenes and dynamic motions are also reflected in the coding of English motion events;(4)In the choice of motion verb constructions,Chinese English learners of high school tend to use the structure of “path verb + path verb(deictic path verbs)”.Based on the above characteristics,that is,Chinese has many influences on CELHS' English expression,the present study believes that due to the influence of Chinese's(mother tongue)typological characteristics,Chinese English learners of high school have a certain degree of conceptual transfer in the process of English learning,which leads to their lack of authenticity in the acquisition and use of manner verbs and path verbs in English motion events,so their English presents many characteristics of “broad equipollently-framed language”,which is similar to Chinese.This conclusion supports Slobin's “thinking-speaking hypothesis” to a certain extent,that is,the specific lexicalization mode of a language,which largely determines that native speakers will pay attention to certain aspects of experience and narrate them ina specific way of the language,making it difficult for learners to avoid certain stages during second language learning process. |
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