运动事件中的概念性迁移方向与迁移域

Directions and domains of conceptual transfer:Evidence from motion events

本文运用概念性迁移假说区分概念和概念化,基于31个短视频产出的2005个运动事件描述,综合考察中国英语学习者对汉英运动事件焦点、路径及背景的识解,分析概念性迁移产生的方向及迁移域。结果显示:1)汉英焦点表达无显著差异,但在冠词使用上存在系统性偏误;2)英语路径表达中,路径附加语产出过度;3)汉语背景起点表达显著较多,虽然汉英均显著较多地表达背景终点。研究表明,母语-目标语之间双向概念性迁移的方向及迁移域存在差异:母语对目标语的迁移易发生在语法、词汇层面,目标语对母语的反向迁移则易发生在句法层面。最后,本文溯源运动事件语义元素识解,提出迁移方向和迁移域是母语-目标语概念特征和思维范式双重作用下的动态现象。

Using Conceptual Transfer Hypothesis to distinguish concepts and conceptualization, this study investigates the directions and domains of conceptual transfer through 2005 bilingual construals, of the figure, path and background of motion events drawn from 31 short video clips of Chinese EFL learners. It was found that 1) there were systematic errors in the learners’ use of articles without significant frequency differences in their expressions of figure;2) path satellites were significantly over used in the English expressions of path;and 3) there were much more source information expressions in Chinese than in English though the goal was expressed more than the source in both Chinese and English ground expressions. The results mirror predicted bidirectional transfer with different directions and domains in the motion domain: L1 transfer may occur more likely in lexical and grammatical domains whereas the target language’s reverse transfer may occur more likely in the syntactic domain. Finally, it traces the origin of the semantic elements construal of motion events, proposing that the conceptual transfer directions and domains are dynamic phenomena under the dual effects of the first and the target language conceptual features and thinking paradigms.