基于语料库的中国传统文化ESP英语词汇教学研究——以国画英语为例

A Corpus-Based Study on Chinese Painting English Vocabulary

作为专门用途英语教学的重要方法,语料库研究方法已经广泛地应用于收集和编制专业词汇。以往的专门用途英语研究采用的词汇整理方法基本沿袭了通用英语的方法,而忽略了专业语料库的特殊性。本研究以国画语料库为例,基于研究国画语料库的特殊性,选择国画对外教学作为语料库收集的角度,采用关键词的方式编制词汇表。本文试图探讨以下三个问题:(1)专业英语语料库如何采集;(2)怎样通过语料库的方法编制词表;(3)通过语料库编制的专业英语词表与通用英语有何区别。研究发现,专业英语与通用英语从词频到词义都有较大差异,例如,“stroke”在国画语料库每百万词出现七千余次,但是在通用语料库只有29次,同时在词义上,“stroke”在国画语料库中常用作“笔画”,而在通用语料库中常作“中风”使用。因此,有意识地收集专业语料库和编制相关词汇能使英语学习者更加有针对性地进行词汇和文体学习。

As an important method in ESP teaching,corpus study has been widely used to collect ESP vocabulary.Previous ESP research has basically followed the EGP method,while neglecting the particularity of professional corpus.Taking the corpus of traditional Chinese painting as an example,this study attempts to explore the following three issues:1)How to collect ESP English corpus?2)How to collect vocabulary through the corpus?3)What is the difference between ESP vocabulary and general English vocabulary?Based on the particularity of Chinese painting,this study takes the teaching of Chinese painting to foreign students as the purpose for compiling the corpus.The study has collected the vocabulary by means of key words,which produces a high coverage of the corpus.The study reveals great differences between ESP and EGP in terms of word frequency and semantics.“Stroke”,in Chinese Painting Corpus,appears over 7,000 times,while in British National Corpus(BNC),only 29 times.Meanwhile,in Chinese Painting Corpus,“stroke”refers to“a movement of the brush,”but in BNC,it is usually used as“apoplexy.”Therefore,the distinction of ESP studies can render English learners more targeted in vocabulary and stylistic learning.