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1、Analysis of Chinese Cultures Impact on Oral English Communication BarriersAbstractWith Chinas entry into WTO, Chinese are paying more attention to the ability of speaking oral English. However, people still have some problems as to how to overcome the barriers in oral communication. This paper attem
2、pts to assess English teaching situation in junior middle schools and senior middle schools in China from the following perspectives: the classroom environment, the family background, the class activities in language learning, teaching methods, teaching syllabus, with a view to reveal the potential
3、disadvantages of the oral English teaching practice in junior middle school and senior high schools English circumstances. The author tries to explore the barriers in oral English teaching and learning through the instruments of questionnaire, interview and class observation. With a combined analysi
4、s of the environment of learning spoken English, the data collected in the interview and the scores of the spoken English tests, the author found out some possible reasons for learners silence in language class such as dissatisfaction with the teaching methods, fear of losing “face”, stress caused b
5、y parents expectation, etc.In order to promote English learning on an overall scale, students affective demands should be identified, and language teachers should pay enough attention to heuristic teaching method. The author suggests that the language teachers should play the role of resource provid
6、er and activity organizer instead of being the dominant figure in class. Besides, it is also suggested that students take initiatives to overcome the anxiety in using a foreign language and throw away the false concepts such as fear of losing face; transform the idea of competition to the spirit of
7、cooperation; reduce the stress caused by the authoritarian figures in Chinese culture.Key words: Chinese culture; communication barriers; oral English中国文化对英语口语交流障碍的分析摘要随着中国加入世贸组织以来，我国越来越重视英语口语的交流。但是，在影响口语能力提高的因素的问题上，虽然学界做过一些讨论，但一直没有形成统一的看法。本文对初中高中英语教学的环境及家庭环境的各个侧面，诸如教学大纲、教材、中国的应试教育的影响以及学生的焦虑心理等等进行分析
8、，从中分析口语教学的所面临的不利因素。作者通过对学生的问卷调查，访谈，观察课堂等形式，探索初高中英语课堂口语教学中教师和学生在教与学中遇到的具体障碍。并且结合面谈和对学生平时练习口语的环境包括平时口语考试成绩的综合分析了解到学生较为集中地倾向于用以下原因解释其在英语课上的缄默，即陈旧的英语课教学方法，英语教师对个别学生的偏爱，怕丢“面子”，谦逊、避免张扬维护集体和睦，父母的过高期望造成的学习压力等。同时文章重点分析了受中西不同思维模式对英语口语交流障碍的影响。作者建议在素质教育模式的引导下，语言教师、外语学习者共同努力，重视影响我国外语学习者语言焦虑的文化因素，减轻其对学生情感的负面影响，提高
9、学习效果。从教师来说，语言教师充分认识学生的情感需要，将课堂竞争变为课堂合作学习；教师应与学生普遍进行思想交流；教师之间多进行教学法交流探讨，引导学生认识到语言焦虑对外语学习的负面影响，帮助学生积极主动地克服焦虑。同时教师应引导学生在口语交流时应注意中西思维模式的转换。此外，对学习者而言，外语学习者应积极从自身克服障碍，摒弃“面子第一”的错误思想，摒弃认为积极主动参与外语课堂活动便是张扬、炫耀的传统观念，把竞争意识转变为交流、合作学习意识。从家庭的角度看，建议学生主动与教师和家长沟通思想，与父母和教师做朋友，减轻传统观念中教师和父母权威地位对自己外语学习的负面影响，建议学生克服怕出错的心理碍。
10、关键词:中国文化；交流障碍；英语口语ContentsAbstractI摘要IIChapter 1 Introduction11.1 Problem Statement11.2 Purpose of the Research21.3 Significance of the Study21.4 The Overall Frame of the Paper2Chapter 2 Literature Review32.1 Language and Culture32.2 Oral English Communication Barriers3Chapter 3 Factors Affecting La
11、nguage Communication Barriers43.1 Detouring round the Cultural Barriers43.2 Chinese and Western Language Habits and Ways of Thinking63.3 Analysis of the Teaching Methods and Chinese Students Learning Circumstances of Middle School and High School73.4 Analysis of Exam-oriented Education in China93.5
12、The Students Seven Factors of Anxiety103.6 Summary11Chapter 4 Finding Analysis134.1 An Investigation into the Juniors and Seniors on Oral English Communication Barriers134.2 An Investigation of the English Teachers in Middle School144.3 Summary15Chapter 5 Conclusion165.1 The Significance and Suggest
13、ion for Students Spoken English165.2 Suggestion for Teachers17Works Cited19Analysis of Chinese Cultures Impact on Oral English Communication BarriersChapter 1 Introduction1.1 Problem StatementRight now in China, much importance is given to English learning. Since the third grade in the primary schoo
14、l, all pupils have to learn English. English language is one of the basic courses along with Chinese language and mathematics in junior and senior middle school. In universities, English course is for all students. Undoubtedly, English enjoys high popularity owing to its status as lingua franca of w
15、orld. But English education in China has received a lot of criticism as high scores and low abilities, dumb English, low efficiency and time consuming, for many college students can pass CET 4-band or CET 6-band tests but cannot express themselves in English. The poor communicative competence of mos
16、t English learners remains the main problem challenging English teachers and researchers in China.Since 1980s, when Krashens Input Hypothesis (1985) was introduced into China, foreign language teachers and experts in China seemed to have found the right theory to promote their foreign language teach
17、ing community. Language input theories had become the horn of foreign language teaching. Yet in actual practice, there have emerged some problems, for example, EFL in China consumes a considerable amount of time, but produces little desirable result. According to the English Course syllabus issued b
18、y the Chinese State Ministry of Education in 2001, the situation of the current English education in China has not been adapted to the need for economic construction and social development, and there exists a distance between the reality and the requirement for the progress of the times. In order to
19、 solve those problems, Swains output hypothesis theories (1985) were introduced into China and arouse intense interest of teachers and scholars in EFL field. Though a lot of studies have been done for the significance and application of the output theory in the real English learning process, for ins
20、tance, in the classroom setting, teachers have long been puzzled by students inactive participation and poor communicative competence which is incongruous with their grammar and vocabulary level. Hence, the applicability of those popular models still calls for some adaptation before we employ them i
21、n our practice.1.2 Purpose of the ResearchAlthough there has been much research on output theory, those researches remain limited in their discussion on the significance and application of Swains output theories. Besides, there has been little research on the cultural implication of the output theor
22、y in Chinese cultural contexts.It is hypothesized that output theory is general principle and in non-western cultural context it may have specific implication.(Gao 2008) This paper tried to explore possible barriers in oral English output, based on a combination of qualitative and quantitative metho
23、ds. It is assumed that besides those linguistic issues, cultural barriers should be taken into account. 1.3 Significance of the StudyThe increased scrutiny has been placed on the social environment of learners. Learners do not learn in isolation but rather in a social environment. There are cultural
24、 and social influences that can affect individuals perceptions and expectations of the future.1.4 The Overall Frame of the PaperThe whole paper is divided into 5 parts. Chapter 1 is an introduction to the topic. In Chapter 2, the concepts of text, theme will be introduced and explained. Chapter 3 wi
25、ll introduce some factors that may affect language communication barriers. Chapter 4 is an investigation of the juniors and seniors on oral English communication barriers. Chapter 5 is the conclusion section of the paper.Chapter Two Literature Review2.1 Language and CultureCulture is a pattern of id
26、eologies and practices that have been established for a long time, which has an effect on all aspects in daily life. In other words, thought is determined by culture. Language is no exception. For example, if you are a Chinese and a beginner in a foreign language, when you want to make up a sentence
27、 in that language, you will probably think of the Chinese meaning firstly, and then translate them into English. This process is called cultural transformation. We usually say that language is an expression of peoples minds. Therefore, different languages embody different culture backgrounds. 2.2 Or
28、al English Communication BarriersThese researches didnt recognize the factor of Chinese Culture which can cause some troubles in communication. Sometimes, native speakers of English cant understand what the Chinese people are talking about. Also, Chinese people cant understand others if they share d
29、ifferent cultural knowledge.Chapter 3 Factors Affecting Language Communication BarriersChinese cultural factors are as follows: Firstly, Chinese and Westerners ways of thinking; secondly, the traditional Chinese educational conception; thirdly, the exam- oriented education system operated in China r
30、ight now; fourthly, the teaching methods employed in language teaching.3.1 Detouring round the Cultural BarriersAnother problem that influences oral output is vocabulary. I think enlarging the vocabulary is not omnipotent. As far as the college students are concerned, English is just one of their co
31、urses, which means they cant devote most of their time into English. Even under this situation, college English study has been criticized for taking up too much of non-major college students study time. Students need to indulge in their own major instead of English! Furthermore, Chinese students are
32、 likely to encounter more difficulties when dealing with language output. In order to show the difficulties more clearly, I resort to a paper entitled the name of Sentence and Word Alignment in the CRATER Project in the field of corpus-based research. The first column of table 4.3 is language pairs
33、tested, parallel corpora between English and French, English and German, English and Polish, English and Spanish, Chinese and English. The second column is the field of terms tested, ranging from ITU to newspaper. Table shows that the language alignment between Chinese and English is less encouragin
34、g!Success rates for the Gale and Church algorithm Language pair Domain Regions tested % Correct English - French ITU corpus 100 98.0 English -German Economics 36 75.0 English- Polish Fiction School 89 100.0 English- Polish Fiction (Tigers) 132 64.4 English-Polish Medical 72 66.7 English- Polish Fina
35、nce 27 85.2 English- Spanish ITU corpus 222 93.2 Chinese- English Newspaper 171 54.5 Note 1 CRATER project means Corpus Resources and Terminology Extraction Note 2 Gale and Church is Parallel corpora for lexical acquisition system in machine translation and multilingual natural language Note 3: GB a
36、 simplified (Chinese) character computerization code Under this very severe situation, I think we need the strategy of detouring round which means getting away from some areas (just like traps) where students may have very little vocabulary to deliver a meaningful oral output. Oral output traps aris
37、ing from culture differences. As experienced teachers, they know how to lead the students to detour those unknown expressions and lead students to deliver a smoother language output. That will encourage students a lot and preserve their passion on speaking more. When getting to a specific topic, tea
38、chers should carefully guide the students to approach the topic from a certain perspective for which they know many words to express their ideas on this topic. In other words, teachers should lead the students away from thistles and thorns of cultural barriers. This may not comply with one function
39、of output the noticing/triggering function, for oral English output is to help earners to find out the gap between what they want to say and what they can say, emoting learners to get to know something new. It is supposed that if learners want to say something that they cant say, they would get to f
40、ind some aid, for example, to ask for answers from teachers or books. But it is not so practical to our students for following reasons: (1) Usually the discussion topics have close relationship with text content. The text presentations have already provided a lot of new words and expression to the s
41、tudents which are main task to remember and to use in their later exercises and language output. However the new vocabulary will never be enough to express their individual point of view when they intend to express themselves in their discussion.(2) The classes for college English are often too big;
42、 sometimes we have to handle the class of more than 100 students. It is not easy to answer the questions from students from all sides. And another reason is Chinese students are too considerate to ask questions outside the textbook. Under all these circumstances, the strategy of detouring is inevita
43、ble; however the key point is how we can practice it in real teaching practice. Needless to say, we shall analyze it from cultural perspective and find the true crux of the barriers. I shall try to analyze some real cases. During some classes, I asked students to record the sentences they want to sa
44、y but they cant say.3.2 Chinese and Western Language Habits and Ways of ThinkingCultural and societal conventions and norms do not get left behind at the classroom door. The students bring them into the classroom as they interact with each other, with the teacher, and as they carry out their learnin
45、g tasks. Confucian-based ideals have long extolled the virtues of hard work and devotion so long as there is a de-emphasizing of the individual and an emphasizing of the individual responsibilities and obligations to society at large, such as learning to work well with others. From the above investi
46、gation, three barriers protrude as the most significant reasons for Chinese students in their oral output. The first one I would like to talk about is students lack of courage to express themselves in the English classes.It has been a stubborn problem that Chinese students are reluctant to express t
47、hemselves in classroom and some of them are even feeling afraid, though the teacher try to create a relaxing learning circumstance. Admittedly, for considerable large part people, speaking in the public is most frightening, but Chinese students are extraordinarily quiet in the classroom, which cause
48、 some misunderstanding to the foreign teachers in language learning classroom. Foreign teachers felt puzzled to Chinese students silent response. They thought Chinese students may not like their teaching for being so quiet. Actually, just on the contrary, Chinese students often show their respect to the teacher for being very quiet and obedient, while to the teachers or classes they dont like, they would
