Research in Chinese as a Second Language 9781614512554, 9781614513148

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Istvan Kecskes (Ed.) Research in Chinese as a Second Language

Trends in Applied Linguistics

Edited by Ulrike Jessner Claire Kramsch

Volume 9

Research in Chinese as a Second Language Edited by Istvan Kecskes

DE GRUYTER MOUTON

ISBN 978-1-61451-314-8 e-ISBN 978-1-61451-255-4 ISSN 1868-6362 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the Library of Congress Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available in the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2013 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Boston/Berlin Cover image: Roswitha Schacht/morguefile.com Typesetting: RoyalStandard, Hong Kong Printing: Hubert & Co. GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen ♾ Printed on acid-free paper Printed in Germany www.degruyter.com

Table of contents Contributors to the volume Introduction

Chapter 1:

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1

Research base for practice

Jane Orton Developing Chinese oral skills – A research base for practice

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Ping Yang Asymmetric style of communication in Mandarin Chinese talk-in-interaction 33 Wang Chen Learning tones cooperatively in the CSL classroom: A proposal

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Chapter 2: Integrating culture and language Ned Danison Integrating culture and language in the Chinese as a foreign language classroom: A view from the bottom up 81 Xiaolu Wang and Tingting Ma Analysis of pragmatic functions of Chinese cultural markers Chun-Mei Chen Gestures as tone markers in multilingual communication

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Ying Liu The collaborative construction of culture knowledge in a Chinese movie class 169

Chapter 3: Acquisition of language structures Wen Xiong The acquisition of Chinese modal auxiliary Neng Verb Group (NVG): A case study of an English L2 learner of Chinese 187

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Yi Xu Acquisition of Chinese relative clauses at the initial stage

215

Zi-Yu Lin Conceptual similarities in languages – Evidence from English “be going to” and its Chinese counterparts 235 Helen Charters SLA of Mandarin nominal syntax: Emergence order in the early stages Index

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Contributors to the volume Chun-Mei Chen is Associate Professor of Linguistics at the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures, National Chung Hsing University, Taiwan. She received her Ph.D. in Linguistics from The University of Texas at Austin, specializing in phonetics, phonology, prosody, and Austronesian languages. Her current research interests include teaching and learning Chinese in a global context, phonetics and phonology of Chinese as a second language, and pragmatics of L2 learners’ interlanguage. Wang Chen studied English education in Beijing and developed a strong interest in TCFL from helping her non-Chinese colleagues learn her mother tongue. She then became a professional Chinese teacher. This experience broadened her horizons and brought her to Germany to continue studying foreign language teaching methodology. She is now working on the adaptation of western results for language acquisition to Chinese. Helen Charters teaches General Linguistics and Formal Syntax at the University of Auckland, NZ. Her research interests include the Second Language Acquisition of Syntax in Mandarin, and in other lesser-studied languages; syntactic analysis mainly in an LFG framework; natural language processing, and the relationships between discourse structure and syntax. Ned Danison is a doctoral student at The University at Albany, New York. He has taught English as a Second language for 20 years. His research interests are intercultural communication and the teaching and learning of Chinese language and culture. Zi-yu Lin has an M.A. in English from Boston University, an M.A. and a Ph.D. in Linguistics, and an MLS from the University at Buffalo. He earned his tenure at Seton Hall University, New Jersey in 2000. Since 2004, he has been the Library Director and Professor of Languages and Translation of Macao Polytechnic Institute, Macao. His research interests include linguistics, translation studies and library science. Ying Liu got her M.A. degree in Chinese pedagogy at the Ohio State University in 2008, and is currently a Ph.D. candidate at the Ohio State University. Her research has focused on Chinese pedagogy, and she has a special interest in the role of culture in a language program.

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Tingting Ma received her B.A. degree in teaching Chinese as a second language from Shanxi Normal University, China in 2009 and received her Master degree in teaching Chinese to speakers of other languages from Zhejiang University, China in 2011. She is currently working on Chinese Teaching as a second language. Her research interests include Chinese teaching and pragmatics. Jane Orton is Director of the Chinese Teacher Training Centre in the Melbourne Graduate School of Education, where she coordinated modern languages education for twenty years. Her research interests are intercultural communication and nonverbal communication. Recent publications include: The Current State of Chinese Language Education in Australian Schools, 3rd edn. Melbourne: Asia Education Foundation, 2010; Educating Chinese Language Teachers – Some Fundamentals, in Linda H. Tsung and Ken Cruikshank, Teaching and Learning Chinese in Global Contexts. London, UK: Continuum, 2010; and 3 chapters (English and the Chinese Quest; ‘Just a tool’: the role of English in the curriculum; East Goes West) in China and English: Globalization and Dilemmas of Identity, Clevedon: Multilingual Matters, 2009, which she co-edited with Joseph Lo Bianco and Yihong Gao. Xiaolu Wang is Professor of Linguistics at School of International Studies (SIS), Zhejiang University, China, where she teaches both graduate and undergraduate courses in psycholinguistics, and TEFL/TESL and TCFL/TCSL. Her main academic interest lies in neuro-mechanism of Chinese metaphorical cognition, on which she is now conducting a China national project. Her book Chinese Metaphorical Cognition & Its ERP Imaging (2009) has become well-known both in China and abroad. Wen Xiong is an Assistant Professor of Chinese at the University of Rhode Island, U.S.A. She earned her Ph.D. from La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australia. Prior to her time in Australia, Dr. Xiong had been an Associate Professor of Chinese Language and Literature at Shanghai University. Dr. Xiong’s research interests focus on the learning and teaching of Chinese as a second or foreign language and the acquisition of Chinese language and culture. Her publications address the following research areas: second language acquisition, Chinese linguistics, language contrast, language teaching and curriculum design, and Chinese cultural studies. Yi Xu is an Assistant Professor in Chinese Language and Linguistics at the University of Pittsburgh, U.S.A. Her research directions include Chinese language grammar, psycholinguistic aspects of second language acquisition, corpus linguistics and computer-assisted language learning. She has published three single-

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authored papers focusing on Chinese linguistics, ESL and second language acquisition in journals, books, and proceedings, and has two other articles forthcoming. Ping Yang received a Ph.D. in linguistics from Macquarie University and is a lecturer in linguistics at the University of Western Sydney. His teaching areas include linguistics, translation and TESOL. His research areas include intercultural communication, nonverbal communication, gesture and culture, crosscultural perspectives of language teaching and learning. He has published in Chinese Language and Discourse, Journal of Intercultural Communication, Text & Talk, and Semiotica.

Introduction In August 2010 the CASLAR (Chinese as a Second Language Research) movement was launched with the first conference at Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China. The main idea behind the movement was that Chinese language teaching needs a strong research base, which currently it seems to lack. The fact of the matter is that the rapidly growing interest in Chinese language teaching has not resulted in the development of a strong research background for the discipline. There are several reasons that has led to the present status quo, let me mention at least three of them. First of all, there is no publication outlet out there that would serve as a central forum to bring together research in Chinese as a Second Language from all over the world. That is why scholars whose interest is in Chinese as a Second Language Research publish in a variety of different journals (Discourse Studies, Applied Linguistics, Journal of Pragmatics, Studies in Second Language Acquisition, Intercultural Pragmatics, Multilingua, Journal of Chinese Language and Discourse, etc.) The problem with this is that good ideas are scattered around in different journals so they may not be available to all members of the CASLAR research community. There is a need for a journal that, to some extent, centralizes research efforts in the field. Another problem is that the field badly needs a conference on Chinese as a Second Language Research. There are several excellent conferences held all over the world about Chinese language teaching. However, we also need a bi-annual meeting that brings together scholars from all over the world. The third issue is language. A huge number of scholars speak only Chinese, may be able to read in English but cannot produce papers in English. They mainly work in Mainland China. They should not be excluded. Actually, they should be brought together with scholars and teachers of Chinese whose first language is other than Chinese. Besides, scholars are well aware of the fact that if they want their ideas be recognized by the global community they must present them in English. Consequently, the field needs a bilingual journal and a bilingual conference where people and ideas can meet. This has led to the launch of the CASLAR movement that aims to provide all this. As the first step in the CASLAR movement the 1st International Conference on Chinese as a Second Language was held on August 27–29, 2010 at Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China with the generous support of Zhejiang University which is China’s third best university. The conference was a great success and as a consequence the second conference will be held in Taipei on August 19–21, 2012. This collection of papers was selected from the materials of the first conference in 2010. Our goal is to show what issues researchers focus on in the field not only in the Chinese speaking countries but also in some other countries such

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as the U.S., Germany, Australia, and New Zealand. The book consists of three chapters. Each chapter represents a topic that both researchers and language teachers will be likely to be interested in because they bring together theory and practice. Chapter I. Research Base for Practice contains three papers, each of which uses research findings as basis for solving issues connected with practical language teaching. Ellis (2005) and Lightbown (2000, 2003) emphasized that research provides a broad basis for ‘evidence-based practice’. However, Ellis added that research does not provide a definitive account of how to ensure successful language teaching. In spite of this nobody denies the importance of research for practice. Toward the goal of creating a research base for developing oral skills in Chinese, Jane Orton’s paper “Developing Chinese Oral Skills – a Research Base for Practice” synthesizes recent research findings and established knowledge in the fields of language, cognition, Chinese phonology, language learning, tone acquisition, and pedagogical principles and practices. The pedagogical base for oral skills, Orton posits, comprises the comprehensive set of features of actual speech, and the demands these make on learners guide content and practices. Ping Yang’s paper “Asymmetric Style of Communication in Mandarin Chinese Talkin-Interaction” undertakes a fine-grained examination of audio and video data collected from Mandarin Chinese talk-in-interaction providing empirical evidence of verbal and nonverbal asymmetries. Status, power distance, verbal and nonverbal dominance and asymmetrical style of talk-in-interaction between teachers and students who speak Mandarin Chinese are discussed. Yang summarizes the features of communication characteristic of high-context and low-context cultures and draws implications for Chinese language educational professionals in teaching Chinese to speakers of other languages. The last paper in Chapter I. is Wang Chen Learning Tones Cooperatively in the CSL Classroom: A Proposal. This paper takes the learner’s perspective, showing the need for new teaching methods for tones in the Chinese as a Second Language classroom. Wang Chen proposes a new social approach in which individual learners form a cooperative team when learning Mandarin tones in the classroom. Students learn together via cooperative activities such as mini teaching tasks and mutual learning tips, which involve the learner in the learning process more responsibly. Chapter II: Integrating Culture and Language is about one of the most intriguing topics of current language-oriented research: how to integrate culture into the process of language teaching. Kramsch (1993: 8) argued against those who regard cultural knowledge as ‘an educational objective’ in itself that is separate from language. She said if we regard language as a social practice, culture becomes the core of language teaching. She further claimed that “culture awareness must be viewed both as enabling language proficiency and as being the outcome of reflection on language proficiency.” This statement seems to support

Introduction

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the idea that students with better linguistic competence appear to have more cultural knowledge and vice versa. Ned Danison’s paper Integrating Culture and Language in the Chinese as a Foreign Language Classroom: A View from the Bottom Up strongly supports this assumption. His qualitative study explores the perceptions of Chinese culture that learners of Chinese as a foreign language develop via their interaction with the linguistic code. Ned Danison studied the role of the target language and the native-speaker teacher in learners’ experience of Chinese culture. Suggestions for how a native-speaker CFL teacher may prepare him- or herself for teaching culture with language in a foreign language classroom setting are offered. Xiaolu Wang and Tingting Ma’s article Analysis of Pragmatic Functions of Chinese Cultural Markers: Acquisition of Language Structures examined discourse markers in Chinese, terming them Chinese Cultural Markers (CCMs), i.e., discourse markers that trigger Chinese culture and display the distinctive way in which Chinese communicate. In Chinese conversation, the authors claim, CCMs have strong pragmatic complexity because their pragmatic functions are implicit rather than explicit. The authors probe pragmatic functions by way of New Intention and New Common Ground Theory. A logical analysis is undertaken, and five particular roles of CCMs are posited. Chun-Mei Chen’s article Gestures as Tone Markers in Multilingual Communication investigates the use of gestures in Chinese as a Second Language classroom discourse to support the argument that visual cues exploited in multilingual contexts can be expressive and effective in language learning and communication. Chun-Mei Chen observes that tonal values are too abstract for language learners without tonal backgrounds. In this study, a large sample of learners is quantitatively and qualitatively analyzed, with the conclusion that learners exposed to gestural tone markers have significantly superior communication skills. The paper The Collaborative Construction of Culture Knowledge in a Chinese Movie Class by Ying Liu examines how classroom activities help students at the L2 level acquire and share cultural knowledge that allows them to form a context for new conversations and activities in their L2 environment. Liu examines the process by which target culture contexts are constructed in a second year Chinese movie class, taking the movie as shared context. Related pedagogical implications are discussed. Chapter III: Acquisition of Language Structures consists of studies that investigate the acquisition of certain grammatical structures in Chinese. There are very little number of papers in the literature on this issue so the papers included in this chapter are especially important for further research. In his paper The Acquisition of Chinese Modal Auxiliary Neng Verb Group (NVG): A Case Study of an English L2 Learner of Chinese Wen Xiong undertakes a longitudinal case study to investigate the process of how the Chinese modal auxiliary Neng Verb

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Introduction

Group is acquired by an English L2 learner of Chinese. This case study provides a view inside the strategies and the thinking of a particular learner, revealing the way processes change in the acquisition of Chinese as a second language. The study also contributes to SLA methodology by introducing an analysis of speech production in the aspects of both quantity and quality. Yi Xu’s article Acquisition of Chinese Relative Clauses at the Initial Stage examines the initial acquisition of Chinese relative clauses (RCs) by learners of Chinese as a Foreign Language as measured by way of a Listening Comprehension Task. Yi Xu suggests that there is a slight preference for the Subject relativization structure of Chinese RCs; furthermore, learners rely on semantic knowledge to process RC structures, and the use of nonreversible RCs could help facilitate their comprehension. Teaching methods that could be informed by the evidence in this study are discussed. Zi-yu Lin’ article Conceptual Similarities in languages – Evidence from English “be going to” and its Chinese counterparts is a study of the grammatical and semantic behavior of English “be going to” and its Chinese counterparts. It attempts to open up a cognitive and comparative perspective in Chinese language pedagogy and Chinese/English translation education. Zi-yu Lin applies grammaticalization principles to the explanation of the relationship between be going to and its Chinese grammatical equals. It is argued that English and Chinese native speakers share many conceptual similarities in the development of future and modality grams. The revelation of these commonalities contributes to the study of language universals as well as the pedagogy of the Chinese language. In her paper SLA of Mandarin Nominal Syntax: Emergence Order in the Early Stages Helen Charters demonstrates in this analysis that principles of universal grammar developed with reference to a number of typologically distinct languages can be applied effectively to account for acquisition order of nominal structures in Mandarin, an isolating Sinitic language. It is argued that an acquisition theory based on notions of universal grammar can effectively account for observed emergence order of nominal structures in the spontaneous speech of second language learners of Mandarin. The author notes that particular attention must be paid to developments in word order and collocation constraints, and the syntactic relationships they encode, rather than to the morphological changes that typically mark development in inflectional languages.

References Ellis, R. 2005. Instructed Second Language Acquisition: A literature review. Wellington: Ministry of Education New Zealand.

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Kramsch, Claire. 1993. Context and culture in language teaching. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. Kramsch, C. 1998. Language and culture. Oxford, UK: University Press. Lightbown, P. M. 2000. Anniversary Article: Classroom and SLA and Second Language Teaching Applied Linguistics 21/4: 431–462. Lightbown, P. M. 2003. SLA in the classroom/SLA research for the classroom Language Learning Journal Winter 2003 No. 28: 4–13.

Chapter 1 Research base for practice

Jane Orton

Developing Chinese oral skills – A research base for practice Abstract: Mastering the phonological challenges of Chinese is vital for foreign learners’ practical success in processing Chinese spoken at normal speed and being understood themselves, achievements which, in turn, maintain motivation. Yet developing these skills presents significant challenges that often remain unmet well into later years of study. This is hardly surprising when Chinese teaching and resources are limited, as they presently are, to providing linguistic information and exercises on only a narrow range of phonological features, principally static pronunciation, and have almost nothing to say about the learning task and processes needed to achieve mastery. To be successful, teaching and learning Chinese oral skills needs to comprise the comprehensive set of features of actual speech, and use content and practices focused on the demands these make on learners, grounded in a base of integrated language and learning theory. To create such a base, this paper presents a synthesis of recent research findings and established knowledge in the fields of language, cognition, Chinese phonology, language learning, tone acquisition, and pedagogical principles, and practices. While research into the acquisition of oral Chinese is still sparse and fragmented, the result provides a considerably broader and more coherently integrated base for practice than is currently available.

1 Introduction Both spoken and written Chinese language present the Western learner with significant challenges involving the very core of competence in oracy and literacy. The challenges are there from the start and for many otherwise successful learners they remain central even after years of effort. For a great many more, constant difficulties in making even basic progress lead to quitting Chinese after a year or two. Those concerned to improve this situation quickly discover that to date Chinese language acquisition has been a comparatively narrow and sparse field of research, especially in relation to classroom teaching and learning. For learning below tertiary level the field is effectively barren. Studies that have been done have largely prioritized the written language, but even there it is only relatively recently (e.g. Zhang 1998) that new work has appeared considering the task of early Chinese literacy development outside a

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Chinese society, and appreciating it as very different from the task faced by fiveyear olds in China. The result has been some fundamentally new analysis and re-classification of characters and new teaching resources designed accordingly. The area of oral development in Chinese has yet to benefit from similar new light. Instead, examination of classroom resources aimed at teaching spoken Chinese reveal presentation over and over again of the same limited information about the nature of standard Chinese pronunciation: a list of the segmental sounds of the Beijing dialect; a chart of nearly 400 segmental syllables without tones, to be used also as a means of introducing the Pinyin romanization system; a diagram showing the pitch entry and contour lines of the four tones; and three notes concerning the most common occurrences of tone sandhi. In some cases there may be a diagram showing placement of the tongue for making certain sounds, or descriptions of production in comparison to English sounds. Other factors integral to spoken language, such as prosodic features, are usually completely ignored. The information is provided once, at the beginning of the course or textbook, and even the most generous of these focus work on oral skill development for only two or three weeks. In virtually all cases, even when there are audio files for continuing practice, oral development work involves only listening and repeating tonal syllables, often monosyllables, with the occasional row of bisyllables. The alternatives are dense phonological studies, suitable for separate, specialist study. However, even these only provide more elaborate descriptions of the language and a greater volume of listen and repeat exercises. Nowhere in resources for any level is information presented on the techniques foreign students might use, and the processes they might follow, in order to learn to hear and produce the described linguistic features correctly and fluently. Despite requiring re-education of the body for entering a new way of speaking, developing oral proficiency in Chinese is treated primarily as an intellectual exercise, and presented as an adjunct to the acquisition of new words and grammatical structures, rather than as a complex system in its own right, and the base for acquiring the linguistic forms. The limited and even inaccurate information on the phonological system of modern spoken Chinese, and the suggested few weeks spent on learning it provided in most Chinese courses, lack adequate language and learning theories, both essential for a sound base of pedagogy aimed at developing learners’ spoken Chinese. The result of this is that even so-called successful students have handicapped, error-riddled hearing and speaking well beyond the beginner weeks of study. Among the few studies available, Miracle (1989), for example, found 43% of the tones produced by second year American tertiary students were incorrect, and Hsieh (1990) reported similar levels of perception errors in tone identification after a semester of tertiary study. Too often the teacher’s response to the

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poor oral skills of classroom learners is to yield to defeat: it is taken as being beyond students’ capability. Native speaking teachers will even protest that attending to correct tones is irrelevant given Chinese regional tone variations, while others claim it is not a problem that can be fixed in the classroom. Hence the oral language standard of those reported above has become the accepted norm, and so has the fact that they have been passed in first year Chinese despite such poor competence (an unlikely result if the same 43% error rate had been found in their vocabulary, grammar or characters). The scarcity of studies of the problem is further indication of its acceptance. Creating a soundly theorized base from current research findings to support developing oral skills begins with the stance taken here that mastery of this domain is vital for being able to process Chinese spoken at normal speed, and for being understood, and also for the learner’s psychological comfort, a significant factor in maintaining the motivation to continue. Hence the phonological challenges of Chinese for the Western language-speaking learner must be tackled from the start, and constantly attended to thereafter. Furthermore, while there is an urgent need for much greater understanding of the task and the means to accomplish it, as this article shows, there are already research findings which provide the basis of a theoretically sound, coherent, and efficient line of pedagogical practice for successfully developing Chinese oral skills to well beyond what is currently considered normal. To construct such a line of practice, a selective examination and synthesis of the findings of new research and existing knowledge in the following four major fields have been undertaken: – the nature of spoken language – the nature of spoken Chinese – the nature of the learning task – pedagogical principles and practices. Selection of what to consider and present here has been guided by the goal of identifying the primary factors in perceiving and producing oral language, considering the second language learning implications of these specifically for Chinese, and from these, deriving teaching implications. To keep volume manageable, there is a privileging of significant knowledge that has been overlooked or less considered in the field of Chinese as a Second Language.

2 The nature of spoken language Beyond the individual segmental sounds presented in pronunciation guides, three essentials emerge from consideration of research into the nature of oral

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language: prosody as an integral factor, intonation as a feature conveying meaning, and the norm of vocalic-kinesic synchrony.

2.1 Prosody In addition to sound production, but integrated with it, what is said and heard in language use involves the prosodic features of pitch, amplitude, and duration. Furthermore, these features generally extend over stretches of utterance, not just over one syllable or word, and so may not become evident in isolated syllables and words. Prosodic features also alter the production of the individual words in an utterance, which means that pronunciation guides of single sounds and syllables are not only inadequate, but in reality, often also incorrect. Used together, one effect of prosodic features is to give prominence to some syllables in the utterance when compared to others. This prominence, or stress, exists at both sentence level, where prominence is given to certain words and not others, and at word level, where prominence is given to some syllables and not others. While words provide the basic meaning of an utterance, it is through the increased prominence of particular words achieved by manipulating the prosodic features that the speaker’s meaning is conveyed, as for example: I don’t like apples vs. I don’t like apples. Thus also a change in intonation from a determined You’re going home now! to an incredulous You’re going home no-ow? expresses a very different speaker meaning, although the words are the same in both utterances. Even in ordinary speech, stress derives from and signals some emotional involvement, although this is not necessarily dramatic. It is achieved by increased muscular tension, opening and closing the glottis to regulate airflows over the vocal folds and change pitch, for example, or squeezing out more air from the lungs to give greater breath force for a longer sound, both signals that the word carries importance to the speaker. In normal speech, primary word stress falls on one syllable of the key lexical items in the utterance. The lexical items are sequenced in the typical grammatical patterns of the language (e.g. adjective + noun + verb + adverb) and so the typical speed, duration, pause and tempo of stress and unstress placement over utterances also occurs in patterns. These patterns comprise the rhythm of the language and are closely related to grammatical patterns.

2.2 Intonation The rhythm of language is also the base of intonation, which is perceived as recurring patterns of pitch – rising, falling or both, in either order – providing both prominence and relatively consistent recognized meaning beyond that

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(Cruttenden 1997: 7). Thus the stress on “home” in the examples above is communicating not only “attend to this word”, but also “note my state about it”. The state of speaker incredulity is understood by the hearer in the second example due to both perception of the pitch being heightened, and to recognition of the emotion that is expressed by using a pitch well above that needed simply to express inquiry. In addition to indicating the speaker’s attitude to what is being said, intonation is also used as a discourse signal to regulate turn taking in conversation.

2.3 Kinesics Having established the segmental sounds, prosodic features and intonation patterns of a language, a great many studies of speech have taken one of two paths. The first examines the relationship of vocalic features, co-occurring lexicogrammatical choices, and the social context of interactions. The findings of these studies continue to enrich the teaching and learning of what it means to speak appropriately in a specific language and society. These studies are still sparse in Chinese as a Second Language but, anyway, are not the focus here. The second line of research has examined the vocalic features more closely, establishing the tiny variations in production and reception as these elements occur in different combinations and are spoken by different people in different circumstances. These studies rely on extremely fine laboratory equipment and for the most part their findings involve changes beyond conscious control and hence are rarely usable in classroom second language learning. The field of research into oral proficiency has only very occasionally looked horizontally beyond the verbal and vocalic to the third constant feature of production and reception: the kinesic. And this is despite evidence published over decades that in conversation the speaker sends and the hearer receives signals from “every method by which one person means something for another, regardless of the instrument – voice, hands, arms, face, eyes or body” (Clark 1996: 188), that these are produced and interpreted “in relation to one another, not in isolation” (Arndt and Janney 1987: 5), and that their realisation varies from one culture and language to another (Davis 1982). The very particular and fundamental relationship between the kinesic and vocalic in spoken language has also long been known: “the body of the speaker dances in time with his speech” (Condon and Ogston 1966: 338). That is, in normal behavior, a speaker’s speech and body motions are precisely and rhythmically synchronized. Furthermore, as the same two American psychologists also discovered, in conversation, “the body of the listener dances in rhythm

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with that of the speaker!” (Condon and Ogston 1966: 338). That is, the hearer also moves in synchrony with the speaker. These discoveries of Condon and Ogston are critically important in understanding the nature of spoken language. They show, firstly, that competent speech production comprises intrapersonal synchrony between the speaker’s vocalic and kinesic expression; secondly, because patterns of vocalic stress fall on key lexical items arranged in grammatical patterns, the discoveries reveal the integration of a speaker’s semantic, syntactic, vocalic, and kinesic expression that is achieved through this synchronous coordination of voice and body; and, thirdly, they make apparent the significant role of speech rhythm in the psychological integration of participants in social interaction. Together these understandings both extend and unify the concepts of language production and communication.

2.4 Learning to speak Studies of babies show that making the vocalic-kinesic link is the first step in language development, followed by mastery of sounds and rhythmic patterns. Thus newly born babies tune in to the rhythm of speech in their environment between one and 14 days after birth: when their mother (carer) speaks, not only does the infant listen, but it moves its body (e.g. shoulder turn, blink) in time with the stresses in the mother’s speech (Condon and Sander 1974). Around the age of seven or eight months, babies begin to babble, playing with their vocal folds, breath and mouth to express a wide range of sounds and strings of sounds. These flows include the common rhythmic patterns of their mother tongue and its intonation patterns, and in Chinese, its tonal system (Levitt and Wang 1991; Cruttenden 1997; Gopnik et al 1998). Condon and Sander proposed that because of this preparatory work internalizing the form and structure of their language system and culture, babies may acquire “a multiplicity of interlocking aspects: rhythmic and syntactic ‘hierarchies’, suprasegmental features, and paralinguistic nuances, not to mention body motion styles and rhythms that enable them to pick up its syntactic structures so easily” (1974: 101).

2.5 Gesture in learning In the years since Condon and Ogston’s discoveries, the field of gesture studies has pursued intra- and inter- personal synchrony and has made considerable discoveries about the role of gesture in first and competent second language

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speaker use (e.g. Birdwhistell, 1970), and in the process of learning first and later languages (e.g. McNeill 1992; Kendon, 2004; McCafferty and Stam 2008). Summing up these findings Kelly, McDevitt, and Esch (2009: 313) write: “Recent research in psychology and neuroscience has demonstrated that co-speech gestures are semantically integrated with speech during language comprehension and development.” In the past decade also, there has been a proliferation of studies in the field of gesture and cognition across a wide range of learning areas (Roth 2001), including mathematics (Goldin-Meadow 2003; Cook, Mitchell, and Goldin-Meadow 2007), computer sciences (Roth 2004), reading (Minogue and Jones 2006), as well as second language (Church, Ayman-Nolley, and Mahootian 2004; Gullberg 2006; Tellier 2008). Findings show unequivocally the powerful role gestures that accompany discourse play in deep learning processes: “Discourse with gestures produced better recollection of conceptual information, and a greater number of discourse-based inferences drawn from the information explicitly stated in the discourse” (Cutica and Bucciarelli 2008: 930). There was also “poorer recognition of the verbatim of the discourse” (2008: 921), showing the learner had integrated the information rather than simply remembered the words. In sum, studies of learning show that as babies we acquire the complex, complementary aspects of our mother tongue from what is provided in the environment, beginning with recognition of prosody as a kinesic phenomenon and synchronizing body and speech rhythm, then adding flows of pitch (and tone) manipulation, and finally narrowing preferences to just the sounds of our own language(s), to the point of distorting what is heard to fit with it. Only then are the words tackled. In all learning from then on, engaging the kinesic domain is shown to be the most powerful way to bring about comprehension, retention, and integration of knowledge and skills.

3 The nature of spoken Chinese 3.1 Sounds Debates about the sounds of Modern Standard Chinese these days are more often conducted by scholars in the field of computerized speech than in the area of Chinese language teaching, where the sounds to be learned have been fairly definitely established for some decades. Nonetheless, important modifications continue to be made as new technology reveals new results which are of possible value in teaching. Feng (2004: 5–6), for example, has presented claims that medial segments /i/, /u/ and /ü/ in syllables like piào, l uàn and j üàn, belong to

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the initial of the syllable (thus /pi/ /a/ /o/, not /p/ /i/ /a/ /o/); and nasals like /n/ are part of the nucleus, not part of the coda, thus the syllable structure of sàn, for example, is /s/ /an/, not /s/ /a/ /n/; and that a monophthong in Chinese has the same length as a diphthong in an identical prosodic context, thus when said in such a context, má and mái are the same length. While the absolute truth of these claims are disputed by some phonologists, teachers may find that the information provides clues as to why learners sound wrong and how to assist them effectively to polish their production. Another result of relevance to language teaching is the interpretation of the apical vowel in words like chi and shi as a syllabic consonant, rather than a consonant plus vowel. In language learning texts it is most common to find Chinese sounds written using Pinyin, the orthodox system of romanized orthography, a representation that suggests pronunciation in common with the sounds in a range of European languages. However, at best the roman letters give only an approximation of the actual Chinese sound represented. Furthermore, in some obvious cases, such as q, c and x, roman letters are quite misleading as to sound, and the letters e and i, are each used to represent three totally different sounds.

3.2 Tones A syllable without a tone is a purely abstract unit in Chinese as spoken syllables cannot be divorced from tones. Indeed, psycholinguistic research on the brain of native Chinese speakers shows that they process tone with the sounds. Tone is the most salient feature of oral Chinese and the most researched. A tone consists of two elements: commencing pitch and contour. These are usually presented in textbooks by a graph showing the relative pitch entry point of each tone on a descending 5-point scale and the contour of the tone as a straight line heading across, up or down, or in the case of Tone 3, down then sharply up. In a more recent diagram, third tone pronunciation may extend the low point of the pitch before rising, producing a ‘tub’ shaped contour – on the 5-point scale 2-1-1-4 (Cao 2002: 94). Co-articulated tones follow particular patterns and extensive fine studies show minute changes are made to tones according to meaning, syllable position in the sentence, and the nature of the co-articulated tone. Most textbooks for foreign learners list only three such environments, all where tone sandhi is obligatory: when two third-tones follow one another, the first is usually pronounced in the second tone; when a third tone is followed by any other tone, it is pronounced as a half third tone (2-1 on the graph); and when yī 一 or bù 不 are followed by a fourth tone, depending on the speaker’s state, it changes to

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the second tone, (e.g. bù 不 shì 是 becomes búshì), or to the neutral tone (e.g. bushì).

3.3 Stress The pitch range of Modern Standard Chinese is 1.5 times that of English. Tone precludes the full range of pitch variation available in English to produce stress in Chinese, and as a result stress in Chinese speech is realized largely by holding the syllable longer and on occasion also saying it more loudly than other syllables. As reported by Triskova (2008) and Sarevok (2009), from decades of phonetic studies Švarny (e.g. 1974, 1991a, 1991b) produced up to seven levels of syllable prominence in normal Chinese speech within a stress group, ranging from full tone syllables which are very strongly stressed, through tonally fuller or weaker syllables which may be stressed or unstressed, to atonic syllables, some of which can recover their original tone and some of which are always pronounced without tone. The most common of the unstressed morphemes have been set out by Triskova (2008: 529–530), and extracted here: Firstly, there are obligatory atonic syllables in a certain number of disyllabic words such as dōngxi 东西. Secondly, there are regularly unstressed morphemes called clitics – monosyllabic function words and sentence particles without a lexical tone, e.g. le 了, de 的, ba 吧, etc. Thirdly, there are words which possess lexical tone but in connected speech are typically unstressed, for example, personal pronouns (wǒ 我, nǐ 你 etc.), demonstratives such as zhè 这 and nà 那, classifiers such as gè 个, adverbs such as jiù 就 and hěn 很, prepositions such as zài 在, bǎ 把 and bǐ 比, postpositions such as shàng 上 and xià 下, verbs such as yǒu 有, zài 在 and shì 是, auxiliary verbs such as yào 要 and huì 会.

Triskova (2008) has created the term cliticoids for this third type of morpheme. A typical example is the personal pronoun tā 他, which is very often unstressed in, for example, sentences such as, Wǒmen bù rènshi tā 我们不认识她 and Tā chūqu le 他出去. However, it can be stressed in certain contexts: Bù shì tā, shì wǒ! 不是他, 是我! Both clitics and cliticoids are extremely frequent in spoken language. In a string of otherwise equal syllables, the strongest stress in Chinese falls on the last syllable, the second strongest on the first syllable, and the weakest comes out as a neutral tone on the syllables in between. Thus in a system where the numeral 1 represents the most prominent syllable and 3 the least prominent (usually falling under the category of ‘weakened’ or ‘atonic’ syllable), disyllabic Chinese words are commonly pronounced 2-1, with the second syllable more prominent than the first; trisyllabic words are pronounced 2-3-1; and quadrisyllabic words follow a pattern of 2-3-3-1 (Švarny, 1991, in Sarevok 2009).

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Fast casual Chinese has a noticeable rhythm in which toneless syllables (whether always neutralized or neutralized in a specific utterance) and weakened syllables make up almost 50% of the flow. Much of this is due to the high frequency of the clitic and cliticoid morphemes listed above. Although there are arguments still as to whether Chinese can be considered a so-called stress-timed language (like English, for example) or a syllable-timed language (like French, for example), some scholars agree that in spontaneous speech it exhibits clear features of a stress-timed language (Triskova 2008), where unstressed syllables are reduced and hence weak or atonal, in order to allow stresses to fall at essentially even intervals, irrespective of the number of syllables occurring between stresses.

3.4 Intonation Tones are realized through the pitch patterns of individual syllables, and the need to vary these from word to word does to an extent reduce the possibilities for using intonation in Chinese. However, there is still some superimposed intonation in Chinese realized through pitch, so that the pitch of a given tone will rise or fall in absolute terms, but its position relative to other syllables in the phrase will remain constant. Intonation also has an effect on tonal values, commonly making the contours at the end of an utterance flatter rather than finishing with a slight rise or fall in pitch. With limited options for intonation, the emotional coloring of speaker meaning in Chinese must be further signaled by the use of sentence particles. There are three basic intonation patterns in Standard Chinese: Pattern 1 for statements, Pattern 2 for yes-no questions, whether marked by 吗 or not, and Pattern 3 for alternative questions, Wh-questions, and A-not-A questions. Pattern 1 starts with a mid key, while Patterns 2 and 3 start with a mid-high key. Patterns 1 and 3 end low, while Pattern 2 ends high or mid-high (Triskova 2008: 527). In sum, examination of the key elements of spoken Chinese reveals that within a common linguistic framework, the language presents several very particular features, which extend or differ from the manifestation of those same features in European languages.

4 The nature of the learning task The learning task discussed here refers to that faced by a native English speaker, but much of what is presented will hold true for speakers of at least other European languages.

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4.1 Challenges Drawing on the information set out in the preceding sections, it is possible to predict that the foreign learner will face some major challenges to master the sounds and prosodic features of oral Chinese, key among which will be:

4.1.1 Perception – – – –

–

distinguishing between certain sets of similar sounds, such as /sh/ and /x/ perceiving tone embedded in the segmental sounds of a syllable distinguishing among tones on the basis of commencing pitch and contour noticing length, expanded pitch range, and possibly loudness, as the major contributors to prominence and hence signaling words of significance to the speaker noticing modal particles as bearers of affective messages.

4.1.2 Production – –

– – – – – –

producing the retroflex and palatal consonants modifying habituated ways of making diphthongs (length) and certain consonants (e.g. /t/ and /m/), and producing the apical vowel as a consonant only, thus avoiding producing a schwa final placing primary stress more often on the second syllable of disyllabic words (more commonly on the first syllable in English) extending pitch range by 50% in order to use full Chinese tonal range identifying suitable commencing pitch to produce each tone, especially in connected speech producing duration and contour to express a tone controlling the production of tone depending on the significance of the word in the utterance controlling the habit to use intonation alone to express the full range of emotion.

4.2 Errors There has not been a great deal of research into learner errors in spoken Chinese, but what there is confirms the above as sources of difficulty. Results show that the specific difficulties with perception and acquisition can vary

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according to listeners’ native language experience with intonational as well as tone categories, as for example Francis, Ciocca, Ma, and Fenn’s (2008) study of French and Japanese learners of Cantonese. They also show a great deal of commonality in the difficulties experienced by first language speakers of West European languages when they come to study Chinese. Thus Ding, Jokisch, and Hoffmann’s (2010) study of German learners’ perception and production difficulties with Chinese pitch range matches work by Hsieh (1990), Wang, Jongman, and Sereno (2006), and Triskova (2008) showing English speakers experience the following difficulties in learning Chinese:

4.2.1 Perception errors – – – – –

cannot hear tones do not notice tones, separate them from segmentals [as would be done in English] often mishear a 4th Tone for a 1st Tone, because both begin with a high pitch [and do not listen to the rest] do not find the four tones equally challenging rarely notice modal particles, and even more rarely perceive their message.

4.2.2 Production errors – – – – – – –

start at the wrong commencing pitch point produce syllables so short they are effectively atonal to Chinese hearers more likely to say a 4th tone wrongly than all the other tones put together, then 3rd tone say 3rd tone constantly as V-shaped not tub-shaped = rise too quickly rarely produce Chinese rhythm across phrases [too many stresses + overstress] do not control full and reduced tonal value to express intended prominence rarely use modal particles to express emotional message.

4.3 Tones As can be seen in the lists above, the English speaking learner has a great deal of difficulty even getting started in spoken Chinese. The heart of the problem lies in the tones and this immediately raises two practical questions, the first of which is: Do poor tones really matter? If foreign learners find them difficult, and people from different parts of China use tone differently, perhaps tonal

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errors can just be ignored, as some Chinese teachers propose. From the point of view of sound teaching-learning, this suggestion needs to be rejected. Poor tones do matter, for four good reasons. (i) From a learning point of view, not reliably being able to hear tonal differences makes it very difficult to understand anything spoken at normal speed except very simple Chinese. If shī, shí, shǐ and shì, or yī, yí, yǐ and yì, jī, jí, jǐ and jì, and so on, are all collapsed into the single syllable: shi or yi or ji, it makes it extremely difficult to grasp the content of rapid spoken language. (ii) Not attending to tone makes it much harder to retain Chinese vocabulary, as the syllable pool is effectively reduced fourfold. This shifts an already difficult task to close to impossible, especially with already overloaded syllables like the examples given, where even in the one tone, yì for instance, there may already be as many as 50 different meanings and characters for the syllable. (iii) Tones matter from a communicative perspective: being incompetent producing tone can make a learner’s spoken Chinese difficult to understand, confusing, unintelligible, even absurd or offensive. These results are all major communication failures and highly undesirable. (iv) A final consideration, and one suggested strongly from the anecdotal experience of many learners, is that not being able to handle tone leaves them feeling miserable: they know Chinese has tones, they know they have not mastered the system and that they sound wrong or bad, but they feel helpless to improve: the teacher doesn’t seem to care, or can’t provide a solution. For many, the one way out is to give up. The second question to ask about the situation is: Can anything more be done about it than is commonly tried at present? The encouraging answer from research and practice is that oral skills are poorly mastered not only because they are challenging, but also because they are poorly taught – indeed, very often hardly taught at all. The major emphasis is only on isolated tones and they are largely taught only by modeling. Analysis of the learning task shows that just being asked to listen and repeat is very unlikely to be of great help to students whose pitch range is 30% short of what is required, who are habituated to ignore pitch variation in identifying primary message, and the tonal value of even the same word can alter constantly. On the biological side, while it is true that our capacity to make all the sounds of a new language reduces as we grow, it does not disappear. It can be revived, at least to a very great extent, as immigrants of all ages, educational backgrounds, and mother tongues constantly show when they move to their new country and learn its language. Recent psycholinguistic laboratory studies of phonological processing in the brain confirm

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this plasticity of the adult production and perceptual systems (Gullberg and Dienstfrey 2006). When it comes to improving the teaching of tones, studies have shown that training does improve production (e.g. He and Wayland, 2010), and training in production aids perception as well as production, and vice versa: work on perception aids production as well as improves perception. Furthermore, improvement in perception and production of tones is retained over months (Wang, Jongman, and Sereno 2006).

4.4 The standard As Erving Goffman (1959: 1) said 50 years ago, when we speak we aim “to call forth a desired response”. It is suggested that the fundamental spoken norm for Chinese learners should be based on this functional criterion. Viewed in this way, not all errors are equally important. An error that does matter is one that calls forth an undesired response, of which there are two main kinds. The first is that the speaker cannot be understood: what is said is unintelligible and the person being spoken to is at a loss to respond. Similarly, the hearer may find more than one possible meaning for what is said, and so be confused about how to respond. These are clearly errors that matter. The second significant undesirable response is that the speaker arouses irritation in the interlocutor. Irritation may occur instantaneously, or develop after frequent exposure. Indeed, it is not uncommon for an error that provokes this kind of response to be at first perceived as quaint or even charming, and only over time become a source of irritation. Alternatively the whole interaction may become irritating when the hearer has to work hard to achieve understanding. A certain level of competence in coordinating the range of phonological features is essential if learners are to have success with the content of what they are saying and also have adequate success in creating and maintaining relationships as they would like. The goal to set for learners is that they can understand what they want to understand, and that their own speech falls within an acceptable range, defined as matching native speaker accuracy on the top end, and being comprehensible and acceptable at the time and over time on the lower end.

5 Pedagogical principles and practices 5.1 Principles Drawing on the evidence set out so far in this article about the nature of the learning task, and working from the primary pedagogical principle that effective learning tasks must match the skills they are intended to develop, the following

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are the key design principles for a research-based approach to teaching oral skill development in Chinese as a second language. Using spoken language is a psychosomatic act involving knowledge of the language components and using the body in new ways. Successful teaching will, thus, firstly require learning activities for acquiring knowledge. These will entail telling and showing, allowing students to develop metacognitive awareness of the nature of spoken Chinese. In practice doing this would comprise teaching which provided (i) comparative, descriptive information about sounds, tones, intonation, and rhythm; (ii) information about the use of sentence particles for expressing speaker meaning; (iii) analysis of utterances in terms of what is being heard and what that means; (iv) error analysis by students of their own efforts. Successful teaching will also require learning tasks for re-training the body. In practice this would comprise providing regular exercises over time in (i) listening while attending to, and coming to hear, tonal pitch, duration, and contour; (ii) producing specific sounds, commencing pitch, and contour; (iii) controlling modulation of length, loudness, and varied pitch placement to achieve desired patterns of prominence in speech flow; (iv) achieving breath control to permit placement of a modal particle at the end of an utterance. In content, the work involves establishing in auditory memory and productive repertoire the set of tonal prosodic patterns which make up the rhythm of the language and structure the message, and the sounds that make up the set of tonal syllables of Modern Standard Chinese, separately, and in their various combinations.

5.2 Practices 5.2.1 Sounds There is a great deal available in print and on audio recording explaining the formation of Chinese sounds and providing at least limited exercises in hearing and uttering them, and this work will not be duplicated here. Instead, before addressing the more fundamental matter of prosody, just two points about

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teaching the sound system will be made that are important but less commonly met in resources. Firstly, the following significant learning information has been published recently correcting or suggesting refined understanding of how certain sounds are normally made in orthodox speech: (i) pronounce medial segments /i/, /u/ and /ü/ very short and in a tight connection to the preceding initial and with their preceding initial; (ii) produce monophthongs and diphthongs of the same length; (iii) reshape 3rd tone to tub contour in many cases; (iv) conceptualize the apical vowels as syllabic consonants; (v) learn the difference between the alveolo-palatals j, q, x and the retroflex zh, ch and sh using minimal pairs not based on these two categories, but rather on each of them in contrast to the dentals z, c, s. [This has proved more effective because learners can feel how they need to move their tongue from behind the teeth for z and c to the flat alveolo-palatal position for j, q, x, or back from the alveolar ridge for the retroflex zh, ch and sh. (Lin 2007; Triskova 2008)] Secondly, disyllabic tonal combinations need to become a crucial focus of study. Tones affect each other and tonal co-articulation involves various phenomena such as peak delay, carryover variations, and anticipatory variations. As Hsieh (1990) and Triskova (2008: 518) point out, the correct perception and production of Chinese disyllables, with due recognition and control of the pitch movements, are fundamental problems for learners, but they can be developed. To achieve mastery requires regular, systematic practice in listening to, identifying, and producing each of the twenty possible combinations.

5.2.2 Prosody Research into the nature of spoken language shows how inadequate it is to teach only the static sound system of a language if students are intending to be able to take part in real life interaction using the target language. Research has also shown how integral the rhythm of language is to our initiation into language as babies, and suggests that babies’ thorough grasp of the prosodic features of the language and its sounds before tackling its actual words and structures may hold the key to our universally successful, rapid, and evidently stress-free acquisition of grammar and vocabulary. Prosody must be studied and this demands an elevated role for listening, especially listening to flows of spontaneous connected speech in the target

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language in order to build an auditory memory of its rhythmic structures, i.e. listening without having to understand what is being heard, or reproduce it, or respond to it. Just as new Chinese pedagogy for literacy emphasizes a preliminary phase of engaging with the fundamentals of character formation, in oral skill development learners would benefit greatly from entry to the spoken language through such surrender listening exercises before beginning to explore the sound system, and continuing with them concurrently once the sounds are being tackled. Developing perceptual strength like babies through exercises in noticing pitch variation in tone and tonal flows, while ignoring component sounds, will be necessary and needed for a much longer period than is normally provided at present. On the productive side, a result of not including the study of prosody concurrently with the learning of sounds is that learners constantly over-produce tonal syllables (both in what should be de-stressed positions in the particular sentence as well as in atonal words such as those listed earlier in the article). The result makes for very difficult comprehension due to too many prominent syllables in the utterance. The key is to chunk the phrase according to prosodic patterns, attaching the de-stressed syllables tightly to their co-occurring stressed syllable. To be able do this, learners need to know the rules and to practice switching between stressed and de-stressed syllables of all tonal combinations within rhythmic patterns they have established in their somatic system. The base for this ability is practicing hearing – noticing and recognizing – prosodic features.

5.2.3 Kinesics Considering the task of re-training the body to establish the tonal prosodic patterns of Chinese in learners’ auditory memory and productive repertoire in light of research examined, the powerful role of kinesics in successful learning stands out as an underutilized resource. Evidence from the numerous studies cited shows movement by both teacher and student aids grasp of the new and its retention and application. Movement is also the means of entry into the prosody of our first language and the mirror of the voice in speech. Yet despite being integrally involved in language use and astonishingly effective in learning, the kinesic domain has been largely ignored in the practice of language teaching – although not entirely so. Studies fifty years ago by the speech therapist Paul Guberina combined with the discovery of speaker self-synchrony in kinesic and vocalic expression, led to the creation of a teaching practice in which exercises in the kinesic domain became a powerful new route to vocalic modification. Guberina’s strategies

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included having learners walk, tap, and hum in time to a prosodic pattern while speaking, and the remediation of specific pronunciation, intonation, and stress problems using improvised gestures which matched the tension, voice contour, and length of the target sound or phrase (Guberina 1970). The structural-global, audio-visual language pedagogy (SGAV) which developed in the decade following (Renard 1975; Menot 1986) emphasized the integrated, multi-channeled nature of perception and expression, and its scaffolded listening-moving, moving-speaking techniques became widely used and valued in the teaching of English and French as second languages. In this century there has been a resurgence of gesture-based language teaching, notably the Accelerated Integrative Method (AIM), developed in Canada by Maxwell (2002), and The Narrative Format Approach, developed in five languages for the European Union’s Socrates Lingua program by Taeschner and colleagues at the University of Rome (2004). Taught by well trained teachers, both approaches are producing impressive results and causing a rapid rethink of what classroom language learning can achieve, including in the learning of Chinese by primary and secondary students. In summary, the fundamental pedagogical strategy for teacher and students suggested by research into the power of kinesics in learning is simply: move. Results shows that for both reception and production of sound, and the comprehension and recall of form and meaning, teacher and students using movement – typically gestures, but also stepping – is highly effective, if done so that: – movement and speech are synchronized – the communicative norms of eye contact and turn taking are maintained while using movement with speech – the tension, length, and contour of gesture or other movement matches the vocalic tension, length, and contour (Taeschner 2007) – the form of a gesture matches the meaning (Macedonia, Mülleer, and Friederici 2009). The phenomenon of synchrony of voice and movement in natural speech also makes gesture and movement particularly successful as a means of remediating errors in the whole range of vocalic features of expression: stress, pitch, volume, pace, chunking, intonation, specific sound articulation, and fluency (e.g. Orton, Swart, Isaac, and Thompson 2004).

5.2.4 Content Among the many resources and techniques developed for dedicated work on rhythm and fluency, learning to recite verse, action sequences, and interactive

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scenarios from models has proven highly effective. These are briefly described here and some Chinese samples provided. (1)

Verse learned initially accompanied by movement, culminating in a formal recitation. Even linguistically simple poems make usefully different phonological demands on learners, juxtaposing the full range of co-tones, and varying from a simple regular beat to quite complex phrasing. Well chosen, they are also worth learning thanks to their cultural interest. For example, the lines from the first poem below, though not great art, were written by the Emperor Qian Long, and the second were written by Mao Zedong during the Long March. a. 《咏雪》乾隆帝 yī pian liǎng pian sān sì piàn 一 片 两 片 三 四 片， wǔ piàn liù piàn qī bā piàn 五 片 六 片 七 八 片。 b. 《大柏地 》毛泽东 chì chéng huáng lǜ qīng lán zǐ 赤 橙 黄 绿 青 蓝 紫， shéi chí cǎi liàn dāng kōng wǔ 谁 持 彩 练 当 空 舞？

(2)

Sequences of action (e.g. making paper cuts, operating an ICT application) spoken aloud while being performed. For example

做小船步骤 a. bǎ zhǐ duì zhé 把 纸 对 折 b. liǎng biān xiàng zhōng xīn zhé 两 边 向 中 心 折 etc. (3)

Watching and then acting out scenarios from television dramas. The speed required to utter short dialogues such as this angry outburst below from the soap opera Wōjū, its lines frequently ending in a modal particle, proves demanding for learners, while the content makes a good basis for understanding tensions in contemporary Chinese life.

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《蜗居》片断 苏淳：海平，不就是一块钱嘛！ 海平：对，就是一块钱。 苏淳：它已经丢了。你总不能让我去死吧。 海平：你去给我弄回来。 苏淳：你为什么总是没完没了呢？

5.2.5 Time on task As stated at the beginning of this article, work on the foundations of speaking Chinese needs to begin at the start of learning and be continued at a regular pace thereafter. The practices and content outlined above should be an integral part of any program, with regular periods dedicated to listening and production, as well as to metalinguistic discussion of the features of oral Chinese and the process and techniques of mastering them. At tertiary level the dedicated period would take an hour week, at secondary and elementary level, one 45–60 minute period, or one 20–30 minute period, per two weeks, respectively. In all such programs the work in these periods would be systematically scaffolded in complexity. At the same time, all classes throughout the week would include a few minutes of oral work at the beginning, such as reciting one or two verses of a rhyme or short address on an appropriate topic (e.g. My Family, Our School, Sharing a Room in College) that has been worked on in the dedicated oral skills period. Two minutes of surrender listening can also be used to start a class. Without being the primary focus, techniques learned in the dedicated periods to chunk language and establish rhythm can be referred to in other classes and called on when students are reading, even silently, and when speaking. Cumulatively, regularly keeping students attending to listening and practicing will maintain and extend the value of the dedicated work.

6 Conclusion Examining the nature of spoken language and spoken Chinese reveals both new and old knowledge, including some long discovered but neglected facts, which can support the creation of sound pedagogy in developing the oral skills of second language users. In particular, it shows the centrality of prosody in the production and perception of spoken language, a fact understood by linguists and some educators in other languages, but yet to be appreciated in the resources and practices employed as the norm in teaching Chinese. Where mastering the

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new language poses the challenges Chinese does, teaching the rhythm of the language as the basis of oral proficiency (not individual syllables and tones) is essential. A second matter to be recognized from the research is how overlooked the learning task and processes have been in current practice and resources. What they present instead are descriptions of the language – and even these are shown here to be limited in range and depth. Teaching which derives from understanding learning seeks to create an auditory and felt image from hearing flows of spontaneous speech and develops mastery of the sequence of stressed and unstressed tonal syllables linked into intonational patterns by using movement and gesture to support comprehension and acquisition, correcting the voice through the body by relying on the natural synchrony of body and voice. To date, most of this work has been entirely neglected. At the same time, learners’ metacognitive awareness of what they are engaged in must be developed through a considerably wider variety of exercises than are usually presented. Finally, it should be remembered that the research is comfortingly clear that the results of work on oral skill development generated from such an understanding of learning are both positive and lasting.

Acknowledgement The author thanks Hana Triskova for her comments on several of the phonological and phonetic points raised in the article.

References Arndt, Horst and Richard Janney. 1987. InterGrammar. Toward an integrative model of verbal, prosodic and kinesic choices in speech. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Birdwhistell, Ray. 1970. Kinesics and context: essays on body motion communication. Pennsylvania: University of Pennsylvania Press. Cao, Wen. 2002. 汉语语音教程 Hanyu yuyin jiaocheng. [A course in Chinese pronunciation]. Beijing: Beijing Yuyan Wenhua Daxue Chubanshe [BLCU Press]. Church, Ruth B., Saba Ayman-Nolley and Shahrzad Mahootian. 2004. The role of gesture in bilingual education: Does gesture enhance learning? Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 7 (4): 303–317. Clark, Herbert. 1996. Using language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Cook, Susan W., Zachary Mitchell and Susan Goldin-Meadow. 2007. Gesturing makes learning last. Cognition, 106 (2): 1047–1058.

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Condon, William. S. and William D. Ogston. 1966. Sound film analysis of normal and pathological behaviour patterns. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 143 (4): 338–347. Condon, William. S. and Louis W. Sander. 1974. Neonate movement is synchronized with adult speech: interactional participation and language acquisition. Science, 183: 99–101. Cruttenden, Allen. 1997. Intonation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Cutica, Illaria and Monica Bucciarelli. 2008. The deep versus the shallow: effects of co-speech gestures in learning from discourse. Cognitive Science, 32 (5): 921–935. Davis, Mary. 1982. Interaction rhythms: periodicity in communicative behaviour. New York: Human Sciences Press, Inc. Ding, Hongwei, Oliver Jokisch and Rüdiger Hoffmann. 2010. Perception and production of Mandarin tones by German speakers. Dresden University of Technology Laboratory of Acoustics and Speech Communication. aune.lpl.univaix.fr/~sprosig/sp2010/papers/ 100153.pdf (accessed 13 November 2010). Feng, Shengli. 2004. Prosodic structure and its implications for teaching Chinese as a second language. Journal of the Chinese Language Teachers Association. 39 (1): 1–24. Francis, Alexander L., Valter Ciocca, Lian Ma and Kimberley Fenn. 2008. Perceptual learning of Cantonese lexical tones by tone and non-tone language speakers. Journal of Phonetics, 36 (2): 268–294. Goffman, Erving. 1959. The presentation of self in everyday life. New York: Anchor Books. Goldin-Meadow, Susan. 2003. How our hands help us think. Cambridge, Mass: The Belknap Press of Harvard University. Gopnik, Alison, Andrew Melztoff and Patricia Kuhl. 1998. How babies think the science of childhood. London: Weidenfeld and Nicoloson. Guberina, Paul. 1970. Phonetic rhythms in the verbo-tonal system. Révue de Phonétique Appliquée, 16: 3–13. Gullberg, Marianne. 2006. Some reasons for studying gesture and second language acquisition. International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching, 44 (2): 103–124. Gullberg, Marianne and Peter Indefrey (eds.). 2006. The cognitive neuroscience of second language learning. Maldon, MA & Oxford: Blackwell. He, Yunjuan and Ratree Wayland. 2010. The production of Mandarin coarticulated tones by inexperienced and experienced English speakers of Mandarin. Paper presented at the Speech Prosody Conference, Chicago, 11–14 May. http://speechprosody2010.illinois.edu/ program.php#C1 (accessed 30 October 2010). Hsieh, Daphne. 1990. Perception of Mandarin tones by adult Australian students. Paper presented at the 8th Biennial ASAA Conference, Griffith University, Queensland, Australia, 2–5 July. Kelly, Spencer D., Tara McDevitt and Megan Esch. 2009. Brief training with co-speech gesture lends a hand to word learning in a foreign language. Language and Cognitive Processes, 24 (2): 313–334. Kendon Adam. 2004. Gesture: visible action as utterance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Levitt, Andrea G. and Qi Wang. 1991. Evidence for language-specific rhythmic influences in the reduplicative babbling of French-and English-learning Infants. Language and Speech, 34 (3): 235–249. Lin, Yen-Hwei. 2007. The sounds of Chinese. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Macedonia, Manuela, Karsten Mülleer and Angela D. Friederici. 2010. The impact of motor learning of foreign language vocabulary on memory and its neural substrate. Human Brain Mapping 000:000000 (2010), Wiley-Liss, Inc. Maxwell, Wendy. 2005. Evaluating the effectiveness of the accelerative integrated method for teaching French as a second language [microform]. Ann Arbor, Mich.: UMI. McCafferty, Steven and Gale Stam (eds.). 2008. Gesture Second language acquisition and classroom research. New York and London: Routledge. McNeill, David. 1992. Hand and mind. Chicago: Chicago University Press. Menot, Odile. L. 1986. Les rapports ‘gestes-paroles’ et les montages vidéo comme outils de recherche et de formation. Geste et Image, 6–7: 159, 183. Minogue, James and Gail. N. Jones. 2006. Haptics in education: exploring an untapped sensory modality. Review of Educational Research, 76 (3): 317–34. Miracle, W. Charles. 1989. Tone production of American students of Chinese: A preliminary acoustic study. Journal of Chinese Language Teachers Association, 24: 49–65. Orton, Jane, Ricci Swart, Anne Isaac and Celia Thompson. 2004. (DVD version). The rhythm of language. The University of Melbourne, Australia. Renard, Raymond. 1975. Introduction to the verbo-tonal method of phonetic correction (Bernadette Morris Trans.). Paris: Didier. Roth, Wolff-Michael. 2001. Gestures: their role in teaching and learning. Review of Educational Research, 71 (3): 365–392. Roth, Wolff-Michael. 2004. Emergence of graphing practices in scientific research. Journal of Cognition and Culture, 4: 595–627. Sarevok. 2009. Web Forum Post #53, posted 28 December 2009. http://www.chinese-forums. com/index.php?/topic/23430-learning-chinese-a-roller-coaster/page_st_40 (accessed 30 October, 2010). Svarny, Oldrich. 1974. Variability of tone prominence in Chinese (Pekinese). In: Ludek Hrebicek (ed). Asian and African languages in social context. Dissertationes Orientales, 34: 127– 186. Švarný, Oldřich. 1991a. The functioning of the prosodic features in Chinese (Pekinese). Archív Orientální, No. 2, s. 208–216. Švarný, Oldřich. 1991b. Prosodic features in Chinese (Pekinese): prosodic transcription and statistical tables. Archív Orientální, No. 3, s. 234–254. Taeschner, Traute. 2005. The magic teacher. London: CILT. Tellier, Marion. 2008. The effect of gestures on second language memorisation by young children. Gesture, 8 (2): 218–235. Triskova, Hana. 2008. The sounds of Chinese and how to teach them. Review of Yen-hwei Lin, The Sounds of Chinese, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007. Archiv Orientalni, 76 (4): 509–544. http://scholar.google.com.au/scholar?q=triskova%2C+hana&hl= en&btnG=Search&as_sdt=2001&as_sdtp=on (accessed 20 April 2010). Wang, Yue, Allard Jongman and Joan A. Sereno. 2006. L2 Acquisition and processing of Mandarin tone. In: Ping Li, Lihai Tan, Elizabeth Bates and Ovid J. L. Tzeng (eds.), 2006. The handbook of Asian psycholinguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Zhang, Pengpeng. 1998. Rapid literacy in Chinese. Beijing: Sinolingua.

Ping Yang

Asymmetrical style of communication in Mandarin Chinese talk-in-interaction: Pedagogical implications for TCSOL professionals Abstract: The paper gives a fine-grained examination of audio and video data collected from Mandarin Chinese talk-in-interaction providing empirical evidence of verbal and nonverbal asymmetries. Status, power distance, verbal and nonverbal dominance and asymmetrical style of talk-in-interaction between teachers and students who speak Mandarin Chinese are discussed. The paper summarizes the features of communication characteristic of high-context and low-context cultures and draws implications for Chinese language educational professionals in teaching Chinese to speakers of other languages.

1 Introduction When contrasting different features between institutional talk and mundane talk, some researchers claim that ordinary everyday conversation displays symmetrical roles while institutional interaction may display asymmetrical roles (Drew and Heritage 1992: 47; Heritage 1997: 176–177). It may be the case that conversation participants in the West contribute equally to talk in progress in ordinary interaction and unequally in some institutional contexts, however, the former does not necessarily apply to Mandarin Chinese talk-in-interaction. A fine-grained examination of audio and video data collected from Mandarin Chinese talk-ininteraction provides empirical evidence which shows signs of verbal and nonverbal asymmetries. In this paper, the author will discuss status, power distance, verbal and nonverbal dominance and asymmetrical style of talk-in-interaction between teachers and students who speak Mandarin Chinese. Further he will examine nonverbal cues displayed by Mandarin speakers of different status as in the case of teacher-student interaction and by those of equal status such as peer (studentstudent) interaction. Finally he will summarize the features of communication characteristic of high-context and low-context cultures, and draw implications for Chinese language educational professionals in their teaching Chinese to speakers of other languages (TCSOL).

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2 Asymmetrical communication in Mandarin Chinese talk-in-interaction 2.1 Status Status is “a person’s social ranking relative to others, one’s position in a hierarchy” (Henley 1995: 28) and is broadly determined by “social stratification” (Foley 1997: 307) depending on categories like “occupation and income, housing and educational level”. Foley (1997: 309) defines status as “the hierarchical ranking of individuals along a dimension of social prestige” and maintains that “because status refers to a position on a hierarchical scale of social prestige, people are often highly attuned to their relative ranking vis-á-vis someone else in any interaction.” Status imbalances between teachers and students in China find the teacher credited with the dual tasks of Jiāoshū yùrén ‘imparting knowledge and educating people’, which entrusts teachers with power and authority in their interaction with their students (Li 2000). As teachers are responsible for students’ academic growth and moral education, they must set themselves as good examples for their students to follow. Despite the power distance and status difference in China, social and group harmony (Chang 2001; Li et al. 2001) is maintained via extensive interpersonal connections, particularly indirect and high-context communication strategies and nonverbal behaviors. As a Chinese saying goes, 恩威相施, 宽猛相济 (Enwēi xiāngshī, kuānměng xiāngjì ‘Make a combined use of favour and disfavour, and alternate leniency with severity’). This is especially true in teacher-student interaction. Chinese speakers are particularly aware of the status of the participants present in interaction, status identification will guide them to behave in socially appropriate ways. They are interested in approaching others, superiors in particular, with appropriate address terms (Gilsdorf 1997), so protecting other-miànzi and self-miànzi (Gao 1996), and denigrating themselves and elevating others (especially those with some status [Gu 1990]). Strongly influenced by Confucian philosophy, especially《五论》[Wŭ Lùn ‘The Five Cardinal Relationships’] Chinese speakers consciously observe role and hierarchy in relationships. What Confucius advocates in《五论》[Wŭ Lùn ‘The Five Cardinal Relationship’] involves solidarity between rulers and subjects, fathers and sons, husbands and wives, older brothers and younger brothers, friends and friends. This is typical of a hierarchical structure built into the Chinese society and culture, in which each person is supposed to play his/her role entitled. When asked how to govern a country, Confucius (1994: 215) said, “君臣父子要各守其礼” [ Jūnchén fùzĭ yào gē shŏu qí lĭ ‘Rulers, subjects, fathers, and sons should observe their respective rites’]. It is the

Asymmetrical style of communication in Mandarin Chinese talk-in-interaction

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people’s awareness of their social roles and understanding of the etiquette that have supported and enriched the Chinese history and culture for thousands of years. Confucius stressed the observance of social rites on the part of the subjects and the loyalty of lower-rank people to those of higher rank. Zilu (Confucius 1994: 353–355), one of Confucius’ disciples, says, “长幼之节, 不可废也; 君臣之仪, 如之何其废之?” [zhǎngyòu zhījié, bùkĕ fèiyĕ; jūnchén zhīyì, rúzhí héqí fèizhī? ‘Since the etiquette of the old and young should not be abandoned, then there is no question of abandoning the loyalty of the ministers to the ruler’]. As Scollon, Scollon and Jones (2012: 98) point out: The carry-over from Confucianism means that, even today, many people in places like China, Japan, Thailand, and Vietnam are quite conscious in any interaction who is older and who is younger, who has a higher level of education, who has a lower level, who is in a higher institutional or economic position and who is lower, or who is teacher and who is student.

Awareness and understanding of such relationships are necessary in Chinese interpersonal communication and their communication strategies are organized and regulated accordingly. High-status participants and low-status participants use different strategies to communicate with each other, and these strategies need to be socially appropriate with respect to age and status so that their social roles and relationships are properly maintained.

2.1.1 High status and low status This study limits the concept of status variation between conversation participants to the level of academic position of conversation participants within university institutions. Thus the term “high-status participants” in this paper refers to those who have a higher level of academic position while the term “lower-status participants” refers to those who have a lower level of education experience and academic position. Although social recognition in China is not limited to high level of education and extends to a wide range of social life, the teachers’ status is higher than that of students because teachers are well-educated experts who impart knowledge and skills to students. The Chinese saying 为人师表 [Wéirén shībiaŏ ‘be worthy of the name of teacher; be a paragon of virtue and learning’] (A Chinese-English Dictionary 1997: 1284) reflects this cultural value, as does the motto of Beijing Teachers University, one of the leading teacher-training universities in China, 学为人师, 行为示范 [Xuéwéi rénshī, xíngwéi shìfàn ‘Study hard to teach others and do your best to set a good example’]. As teachers play an important role in the younger generation’s academic and personal growth, and

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development of social values and moral judgment, they must present themselves as models worthy of public (especially parental) trust (Li 2000). It is true that Chinese parents not only wish their child to live up to their expectations (Wu 1996), but also advise him/her to listen to his/her teachers at school and accept their instructions (Li 2000). In the Chinese context, a teacher must act in accordance with his/her academic expertise and professional expectations in and out of class. Whether his/her status is valued or not is largely determined by his/her academic achievement, professionalism and moral behaviour. Low-status participants are obliged to address high-status participants and those of equal or lower status in a proper manner. “Inferiors must address superiors by title and last name . . . or by other polite address, such as ‘sir,’ or polite second-person forms . . . in languages which have them” (Henley 1977: 4, 189). Similarly, low status people in Chinese interaction always address high status people by their last name and job title, such as 杨教授 [Yáng jiàoshòu ‘Professor Yáng’], 王经理 [Wáng jīnglĭ ‘Manager Wáng’] or 先生 [Xiānshēng ‘Sir/Mr’]. Apart from verbal politeness, there are also significant nonverbal ways to express relative status, as illustrated in Fragment 1. Fragment 1: (G9; 98/12; BUAA; M/M) Situation: Zhào (student) is talking with Wáng (teacher) in the office. 1a. Zhào: &________________________________________________________________& 1b. Zhào: Glances at ashtray as does Wáng

"

1c. Zhào: ___________________________________________. . . . . . x _____________ ! 1. Zhào: Nèigē. . Wáng lăoshī, jīntiān wănshàng nàgē (0.9), bù zhīdào nín = that Wáng teacher today night that NEG know you “Er, Mr. (Teacher) Wáng, I wonder whether you are going to. . . .”

"

1d. Wáng: _______________________________________. . . . . . x ________________ 1e. Wáng: Glances at the ashtray as he taps cigarette ash into it

2a. 2b. 2c. 2.

Zhào: Zhào: Zhào: Zhào:

&________________________________________ __& E ___________________E _______________________________________________ = qù bú qù, nàge:, tā nàgē: yánjiăng[de nàge: go not go that it that speech that “and watch um. a speech . . um. tonight.”

2d. Wáng: _______________________________________________

Asymmetrical style of communication in Mandarin Chinese talk-in-interaction

3a. Wáng: 3. Wáng:

________________ [yánjiăng bĭsài= speech competition “Speech competition.”

3b. Zhào: 3c. Zhào:

_________________ & ____________&

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4a. Zhào: & ___________________________& 4b. Zhào: E____________________________ E qù yī xià. ! 4. Zhào: = nín: nàgē. zuìhăo 2-sg that had better go just a moment “You um, ‘d better go.” 4c. Wáng: ________________________________ Symbols used in this fragment: E pointing at the recipient with his index finger. & leaning forward

In this conversation, Zhào suggests that Wáng go to observe a student speech competition. As a student, Zhào is aware that his status is lower than his teacher’s and he has an obligation to employ indirect strategies in making his suggestion and maintaining the current student-teacher working relationship. Zhào opens his turn by identifying the student-teacher role and addressing the recipient 王老师 [Wáng lăoshī ‘Mr Wáng’ – his last name and title] commonly used by students to acknowledge their relationship with their teachers. Later, such evidence can be found in Lines 1 and 18 where Zhào uses polite form nín “you”. Chinese personal pronominal use, especially first person singular (1ps) and second person singular (2ps), also mirrors social distance and status hierarchy. Kashima and Kashima (1998) describe a relationship between the speaker and the speech context, such as the speech event, the participants and the setting. To achieve appropriateness in relation to the other party in talk-ininteraction, the speaker has to be clear in mind about his/her interpersonal relationships with the person addressed. Having claimed that people tend to be conscious of status difference or social distance if they use a language with multiple yous1, Kashima and Kashima (1998: 467) continue: 1 Multiple yous refer to the fact that the linguistic form of second-person singular deictic pronoun changes from person to person in question, especially in some eastern languages like Chinese and Japanese. It all depends upon the relationships between the participants involved. The linguistic phenomenon of multiple yous mirrors the social distance and cultural values of the people in their communication process.

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Thus, a language with multiple 2ps pronouns implies, relative to a language with only one 2ps pronoun, a conception of the self-other relationship that is structured by social distance, such as power differentiation (i.e. status hierarchy) and ingroup-outgroup differentiation (i.e., differentiating between insiders who are close and outsiders who are distant).

It is true that people from the high-context culture (E. T. Hall 1976; Kim et al. 1998; Yang 1994) are more concerned with social role relationships and aware of social hierarchy and thus multiple 2ps pronouns are frequently used in highcontext culture, such as China. For example, there are basically two forms of 2ps pronouns in written Chinese. They are nĭ and nín, and people can disclose their social role relationships and maintain social appropriateness by using nĭ or nín in talk-in-interaction. Their appropriate use in Chinese context is set out in Table 1 below. Forms

Context of Use

Nĭ

Nín

Addresser

Addressee

Addresser

Addressee

Peers

Peers

Nil

Nil

Persons of senior age

Persons of junior age

Persons of junior age

Persons of senior age

Persons of higher status/rank

Persons of lower status/rank

Persons of lower status/rank

Persons of higher status/rank

Table 1: The use of Nĭ and Nín in Chinese context

The choice of nĭ or nín by speakers is context-dependent. It depends on the social status and age difference between the participants and represents the social power and distance between them. There are alternative ways in which one party shows respect and deference towards the other party. Kashima and Kashima (1998: 465) propose that the linguistic practice of pronoun drop, particularly the omission of the first-person singular pronoun (e.g., ‘I’ in English), is linked to the psychological differentiation between the speaker and the context of speech, including the conversational partner. . . . Its absence reduces the prominence of the speaker’s person, thus reducing the figure-ground differentiation.

Chinese is typical of this linguistic practice of pronoun drop, but the presence of 1ps may help the speaker reduce the prominence of his/her person, thus deprecating himself or herself and elevating the other party (Yang 2011).

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In Fragment 1, the use of a couple of strategies are observed. Zhào strategically uses yī xià “just a moment” (Line 4) to achieve other-miànzi-softening effect. It is commonly used after a verb in spoken Mandarin, indicating a quick and brief action indicated by the verb. It functions pragmatically in mitigating a loss of other-miànzi, especially in making an other-miànzi threatening act (OMTA) request (Yang 2010) or suggestion. In this context, Zhào uses yī xià “just a moment” to mean that Wáng’s observation of the speech competition, even for a moment, is significant because it demonstrates to the students including those not participating in the competition that the teachers in the university care about and support the speech competition. To make a suggestion to his teacher, Zhào has to rely on yī xià “just a moment” to make a request mild (see discussion in Fragment-2). As another point, Zhào produces a hesitant suggestion. He is obviously aware that his suggestion is an OMTA as it could impose on Wáng’s freedom of choice (to go and observe or not to go and observe the speech competition). In this situation, Zhào would only add to OMTA and make Wáng feel a loss of miànzi, which is not a lĭmào act, if he opted for a determined tone and a fluent style of talk. Instead, he uses pause fillers nàgē “that” (an indicative pronoun used as a linking filler) intermittently six times and chooses the consultative wording zuìhăo qù yī xià “had better go and observe” in making the proposal. Chinese rarely use assertive speech because it sounds arrogant, complacent and inconsiderate, and instead choose a hesitant style of talking and employ hedging devices so that their speech is miànzi-softening and free from imposition. Even if Zhào used a finger point for emphasizing his own expression of qù (go), his constant use of fillers, selected wording and hesitant flow of utterance at this point, in contrast to his later fluent speech, all work together to show his efforts to be other-miànzi friendly and lessen any OMTAs possibly imposed on the other party. Further, Zhào’s verbal actions with other-miànzi orientation are strengthened by his nonverbal counterpart. Zhào, a student, is physically attentive to Wáng, a teacher, that is, he has a steady forward upper body lean toward Wáng throughout the fragment. While reporting to his teacher, Zhào, a student of low status, is found gazing at Wáng watching for the best moment to bring forward his OMT suggestion. Further, his persistent forward body lean seems to be in agreement with Richmond, McCroskey and Payne’s (1987: 229) claim that low status people tend to make forward body lean while talking to people of high status that normally lean backward (see Figure 1 and the following for further discussion). Zhào successfully employs the nonverbal cues to deliver the implicit and friendly message that he has done his best to save his teacher’s miànzi.

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Figure 1: Zhào (left) leans forward while Wáng (right) backward

This is only one side of the picture, that is the display of status awareness by the student, which is guided by “symmetrical familiarity” (Henley 1977: 4). The other side of the picture is that the verbal and nonverbal behaviors of high status people are guided by asymmetrical unfamiliarity. Different from the Western asymmetrical relations (e.g. in a hospital), in which the superordinates (doctors) have the right to exercise certain familiarity, like calling the subordinates (nurses) by their first names (Henley 1977: 4), the Chinese asymmetrical interactions demonstrates a different practice. Chinese superordinates (teachers) call their subordinates (students) by their full names. This practice is demonstrated in Fragment 2 below. Fragment 2: (G7; 98/12; BUAA; M/M) Situation: In the office of English department, Wáng, the teacher, asks Zhào, the student, to shut the door. → 1. Wáng: XIAO ZHAO . . nĭ bă mén guān yī xià, hăo: ma? little name 2sg BA door shut one CL, good Q ‘Xiăo Zhào, can you shut the door?’ → 2. Wáng: (0.1) XIAO ZHAO != little name ‘Xiăo Zhào.’ 3. Zhào:

= Ai. Yes. “Yes”

4. Wáng: bă mén guān yī xià. BA door shut one CL. ‘Shut the door.’

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5. Zhào: (0.1) shénme? what ‘Pardon?’ 6a. Wáng: E__E 6. Wáng: mén. Door “The door.” 7. Zhào: ài, ài. yes, yes. ‘Yes, yes.’ Symbols used in this fragment: E Finger-pointing to an object.

Figure 2: Wáng’s finger-pointing as instructions

Where nonverbal actions accompany talk, they add to the method of expression by supporting, specifying or emphasizing the message conveyed verbally. In Fragment 2, Wáng executes zhīdiăn “pointing” to accompany the verbal actions to achieve the purpose of requesting. It plays a supporting role in the speaker’s emphasis of an object and helps the addressee identify the referent verbally referred to in the talk. In contrast to Fragment-1, the teacher makes the request and his use of address terms before asking his student for a favor shows the status difference and power distance between the two. Here the teacher addresses his student using Xiăo Zhào (little Zhào) his last name, not the first

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name2, which sounds too intimate for the teacher-student relationship. In and outside the classroom situation, teachers display little verbal or nonverbal immediacy behavior (Myers, Zhong, and Guan 1998). The teacher also executes an impressive finger-point (Line 7c) which is more like an order than a request. Apart from its illustrative function relating current speech to what is intended in the talk (Yang 2003), the teacher’s finger-point sends a message that the door must be shut by the student; that is, there is no choice. Leffler, Gillespie and Conaty (1982: 154–155) term this type of gesture as “symbolic intrusive behavior”, and maintain that it demonstrates direct authority or power “by controlling others from a distance”. The teacher’s persistence in this implementation can be seen in his use of same gesture after his verbal requests are not heard (he calls the student twice and makes his verbal requests twice). The teacher’s finger-point, accompanied by a verbal message, produces an immediate effect on the recipient, who shuts the door accordingly with a verbal expression of willingness. This finger-pointing is different from that executed by Zhào (see Lines 2b and 4b in Fragment 1) who is simply emphasizing the point he is making with his finger, which does not represent any sign of power or status. The fingerpointing in the current fragment, however, is executed by the teacher who, with a higher status than the student, has the power of direction and claims dominant control of the interaction. Henley (1975: 197) claims that pointing, like staring and touching, is a dominant gesture. The teacher performs his finger-pointing without leaving his seat, which also marks a superior-inferior relationship in the Chinese education setting. Even if the teacher uses words like yī xià “once” (Lines 1 and 5) and hăo:ma “OK?” (Line 1), his finger-pointing gesture is still an OMTA. However, its OMT effect is reduced to the minimum due to the topdown hierarchy between the teacher and student (Lu 1997) and this superior and inferior relationship has been taken for granted. Status difference often produces interaction with a transactional goal rather than with an interactional goal (Cheepen 1988: 23–24). This is evident in this corpus, in which the student tends to raise more questions when they talk with their teachers than with their peers. By engaging themselves in a studentquestion and teacher-answer talk pattern, students project an image that they are always ready to seek advice from an academic superior who is in the position to give instructions or advice and place themselves in a position as student2 Using the first name is popular in the West regardless of status differences on most occasions. According to a report by Blake (2002: 19), NSW Premier Bob Carr’s high school teacher Doris Allen, who retired in her mid-70s, said, “At school, he was definitely known as Robert. Sometimes I call him Bob now, but I would never call him Mr Carr.”

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ship, an academically lower status compared with that of a teacher. It is commonly understood that a student who places himself/herself in an equal position or above is disqualified as a good student in the Chinese context.

2.1.2 Transactional and interactional goals While a teacher’s status is higher than a student’s in teacher-student interactions, the status between student peers3 is equal. Although Cheepen (1988: 23– 24) distinguishes between talk with a transactional goal (e.g. a teacher’s lecturing and a student’s learning) and talk with an interactional goal (e.g. a teacher’s and a student’s exchange of greetings), he points out that both components may be functional in an encounter, with one being dominant and the other being subordinate. Cheepen (1988: 23) also argues that “status functions in this area to link the talk of the encounter with the cultural events and institutions of the society within which the encounter occurs”. According to this argument, a tutorial, for example, must involve a teacher and a student, and each party must carry his/her official status (either as a tutor or as a student) into the encounter and their status plays an essential role in the nature of a transactional goal. Cheepen (1988: 23) also insists that “similarly, if the encounter is to be a chat, then the speakers must relinquish their official status, and any status differential which exists between them in the outside world.” However, his later argument does not seem to fit what happens in Chinese teacher-student talk-in-interaction. “Teachers authority is an ever-present feature of classroom interaction” and “teaching nearly always involves unequal power relations” (Buzzelli and Johnston 2001: 873) between the teachers and the students, but Mandarin-speaking students tend to carry their low-status delineation into any interaction with teachers (Myers et al. 1998). Even if engaged in a chat after class, students cannot ignore the cultural and social fact that their teacher is an academic superior who deserves attention and respect because of his/her formal learning and education4 experience and recognised teaching profile. 3 Peers mentioned here refer basically to student-student relationship excluding that between teachers. Video data in this project are only concerned with student-student interaction and teacher-student interaction. 4 Education has been greatly valued in China and this can be seen in Confucius’ belief “万般 皆下品, 唯有读书高” (Wàn bān jiē xià pĭn, wéi yŏu dú shū gāo/The worth of other pursuits is small, the study of books excels them all) (A Chinese-English Dictionary, 1997, pp. 1275). Teachers are gaining more social respect. Since 1978, when China began to implement its economic reform and open-door policy, education and higher education in particular, has been very popular among people of all walks of life.

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2.2 Power distance Power distance may be involved when two parties of different status interact with each other. Power distance refers to the status differentiation of the members of the same cultural group and indicates “the extent to which the people in a society accept the fact that power in institutions and organizations is distributed unequally among individuals” (Hu and Grove 1991: 6). When comparing the boss-subordinate relationship to the fundamental relationships of parent and child and teacher and pupil, Hofstede (1980: 70) points out: Both as bosses and as subordinates, people can be expected to carry over values and norms from their early life experiences as children and school pupils. As family and school environments differ strongly among cultures, we can expect to find the traces of these differences in the exercises of power in hierarchies.

If power refers to “the vertical disparity” that exists “between the participants in a hierarchical structure” (Scollon, Scollon, and Jones 2012: 52), then the power distance this project is concerned with indicates the degree of status difference that exists between the teachers and the students at talk. Widespread social respect towards the teachers increases the power distance between the two groups. In a hierarchical culture like China where there exists a great power distance (Hu and Grove 1991), teachers are authorized to discipline and cultivate their students so that they grow academically strong and morally healthy. Chinese values and norms of respect are strongly reflected in China’s education system. Tremendous respect is paid to the educated, especially classroom teachers (Myers et al., 1998: 243) who are regarded as academic authorities in the Chinese education institutions. Both teachers and students in the classroom setting are fully aware of their status difference and the roles which are delineated even in outside-classroom interaction. The power difference is reflected in verbal aspects like the lĭmào address terms (title-based) used by students in their interaction with teachers.

2.3 Different status, different cues Gao, Ting-Toomey and Gudykunst (1996: 285) claim that there are conditions with Chinese spoken “voice” which is recognized with reference to “one’s expertise on the subject due to years of experience, education, or a power position” and “is equated with seniority, authority, experience, knowledge, and expertise.” Teachers are generally recognized and respected more by students because they have received more and higher education and have more expertise on relevant subjects they teach. There is fundamental social recognition that “师徒如父子”

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[Shītú rú fùzĭ ‘The teacher-student relationship is like that of father and son’]. This makes the teacher’s status different from that of students and the fact that the former’s status is higher than the latter’s is taken for granted. Apart from the influence on the verbal mode of communication, this status difference impacts on the way in which they communicate with each other nonverbally. Awareness of status and power differences can also be witnessed in nonverbal behaviors they each display. In face-to-face interaction, for example, students’ persistent and direct gaze into teachers’ eyes might be taken as a display of challenge, which is discouraged in Mandarin Chinese educational and other organizational contexts. “In order to maintain the existing status and role relationships, an asymmetrical style of communication is adopted in Chinese societies” (Gao et al. 1996: 286). As an indication of their respect towards their teachers’ higher learning and expertise, students adopt the consultancy pattern (studentquestion and teacher-answer) in interactions with their teachers. Teachers have more and longer turns of talk while students have fewer and shorter turns. Further, teachers show speaking-centredness whereas students show listeningcentredness (Gao et al. 1996: 285). To add to such asymmetrical style of communication, students engage in more zhùshì “gaze” and diăntóu “head nod” activities to pay attention and respect (Yang 2010) and adopt more hesitant style of talking (Gao and Ting-Toomey 1998). This is the case not only inside the classroom where the teaching and learning activities are occurring but also outside that environment where talk between teachers and students is permeated with the dominant-submissive atmosphere. Teacher-student interaction is a typical example of the dominant-submissive relationship (Street 1990: 133) and its status difference and power distance are characteristic of Mandarin Chinese educational context. Because of the social respect toward teachers in China, students are supposed to behave politely and submissively before teachers both in and outside the classroom situation. The video data in the conversation fragments discussed here focuses on outsideclassroom interaction between teachers and students. Fragment 3: (G12; 98/12; GS; F/M) Situation: Wáng, a male student, is seeking advice from Qŭ, a female teacher at chemistry department. 1a. Qŭ: 1. Qŭ:

/_____________________________ /. . . x ___________________________________ . . . Chèn niánqīng de shíhōu duō xué yīdiăn zŏng huì hěn yŏuyòng de, when young DE time more learn a little always may very useful DE “While young, learn a little bit more and it’ll be very useful.”

1b. Wáng: \ __________ \ . . . x __________ . . .\ __________\  _________________________ 

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2a. Qŭ: 2. Qŭ:

/______________/. . . x _______________________________________ . . . /__ / lìngwài (0.4) xiànzài jìngzhēng yě hěn lìhài de, (0.3) duì bu duì= besides currently competition too very great DE right-not-right “Besides, current competition is also great, isn’t it?”

2b. Wáng: . . . x _________ . . . \ ___________________________________________\ =Shì yeah “Yes.” 2c. Wáng: [_____] 2d. Wáng: [K_____________K] 3a. Qŭ: 3. Qŭ:

/_______________________________ / . . . x ____________________ qŭde gāo xuéli de rén yě măn [duō de (0.5) = get high qualification DE person too very many DE “There are many people with higher degree qualifications.”

3b. Wáng: \ ________________________________________________________\ 4.

Wáng:

[Duì heh heh right laughter “Yeah.”

4a. Wáng: 4b. Wáng:

K_______ K ________ 

5a. Qŭ: 5. Qŭ:

_______________________________________________________________ zhè duì nĭ lái shuō, yě shì hěn dà de yālì, (0.4) shì bā. this for you come talk too be very big DE stress be PAR “It means a lot of stress for you, doesn’t it?”

5b. Wáng: \ ____________________________________________________________\ 5c. Wáng: _________________________________________________ 5d. Wáng: K ____________________________________________________K Symbols used in this fragment: /__ / looking into the space to the right in relation to oneself \ __\ looking into the space to the left in relation to oneself  nodding his/her head K smiling

Both Qŭ and Wáng are aware of their roles in this conversation. Qŭ, in particular, projects the dominant image of a teacher who is able to provide advice and guidance. While Qŭ has more and longer turns (Lines 1, 2, 3 to 5), Wáng has

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fewer and shorter turns (Lines 2b and 4). The way she talks and the words and expressions she uses are characteristic of a teacher who is able to advise the students on their learning style and displays conversational dominance (Itakura, 2001). Although both parties execute biānshì “gaze-away” while engaged in talking, Qŭ directs her zhùshì “gaze” towards Wáng for a longer period of time. On the other hand, Wáng seeks advice from a supervising person and plays the role of a good listener, which is observed as a model learning style in Chinese context (Gao et al. 1996: 285). Wáng’s listening style is evidenced in his use of affiliative interactional devices like diăntóu “head nod” (Lines 1b, 2c, 4b and 5c) and wēi xiào “gentle smiling” (see Lines 2d, 4a and 5d). His zhùshì “gaze” at Qŭ is basically brief and he manages to avoid níngshì “long gaze” with his teacher. However, to indicate that he has been listening to her attentively, he uses diăntóu “head nods”, which not only represents his nonverbal affiliation (acknowledgement and agreement) (Yang 2007) with the teacher but also demonstrates his full attention to what she is talking about. In the following conversation between a student and a teacher, however, although the former’s status is lower than the latter’s, his verbal utterance is not as submissive as his nonverbal cues in relation to the teacher. Different from Fragment 3, (in which the teacher has a dominant role in the sense that she has longer turn of talk as she is giving some advice to the student for him to plan his postgraduate studies), the student holds the floor longer but exhibits stronger body orientation and affiliation as seen in Fragment 4 below. Fragment 4: (G9; 98/12; BUAA; M/M) Situation: Zhào (student) and Wáng (teacher) are talking about speech competition.

1a. Zhào: E E 1b. Zhào: _________________ . . . x ________________________________________________ 1. Zhào: Hěn shăo yŏu lăoshī shuō bă mŏ yī gè (1.0) xuéshēng jiào very seldom have teacher say BA certain one CL student call “Seldom did any teacher ask the students” 1c. Wáng: _______________________________________________________________________ 1d. Wáng:

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2a. Zhào: __________________________________________ nénggòu jiăng, 2. Zhào: shànglái ràng tā 5 Come forward let him(her) can speak “to make presentation in the front of the classroom.” 2b. Wáng: _______________________________________ . . . 2c. Wáng:

3a. Zhào: x ___________________________________________ 3. Zhào: yī gè shì duànliàn de jī huì shăo, (2.0) one CL be practice DE chance few “One thing is that students have few chance to practice and” 3b. Wáng: 3c. Wáng:

 ________ 

4a. ____________________________ 4. Zhào: zài yī gè jiùshìshuō, another one CL that’s to say “another thing is, that is to say,” 4b. Wáng: . . . x _______________________ 4c. Wáng:

5a. Zhào: ________________________________________________________________________ 5. Zhào: kěnéng quèshí shì xuéshēng zài zhè fāngmiàn jījīxìng rènshī shăo. maybe indeed be student in this aspect initiative knowledge little “that maybe they don’t have much initiative in this.” 5b. Wáng: ________________________________________________________________________ 5c. Wáng:

Symbols used in this fragment: E pointing with his index finger.  nodding his/her head. 5 In spoken Mandarin, tā could be either he or she as they share the same pronunciation, and in this case it refers to either “him” or “her”.

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Figure 3: Wáng (right) and Zhào (left) have different posture and body orientation

Wáng and Zhào indicate the superior/subordinate relationship via their bodily cues and present the different postures that disclose such relationship in interaction (see Figure 3). Wáng crosses his legs and takes up more space with his body leaning backward. In contrast, Zhào leans forward with his hands locked together on the arm of the sofa and his legs kept together. While Wáng, with the relaxed posture and body position, is perceived as having higher status and dominance, Zhào, with somewhat a tense posture and body orientation, is perceived as being of lower status, hence submissive. Richmond, McCroskey and Payne (1987: 229) claim, If both are seated the higher status person might lean backward in the chair, whereas the lower status person leans toward the higher status person. This does not mean that the lower status person looks cowed or belittled. It only means that one assumes the role of dominance and one assumes the nonverbal behaviors of submissiveness.

Display of such nonverbal dominance and submissiveness is best seen in Figure 3, in which Wáng’s backward body lean, relaxed posture and leg position project the image of a dominant person of higher status, while Zhào’s forward body lean, tense posture and the position of his hands and legs project the image of a submissive person of lower status. If people of lower status assume too relaxed and casual a posture before their superiors, the “relaxed posture can also be a sign of defiance or arrogance” (Richmond et al. 1987: 229).

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2.4 Nonverbal asymmetry Nonverbal asymmetry relates to unequal distribution of power and/or status (Street 1990: 133) through nonverbal cues displayed by interactants. Conversation participants execute nonverbal cues that can signal whether they are of higher status or lower status. For example, the favor-requesting power, whether verbal or nonverbal, is in the hands of high status people. In Chinese teacherstudent relationship, it is crucially important that both parties are aware of their status or roles, in which teachers are expected to be competent for their teaching positions and set a good example (social, moral and academic) for their students to follow and students are expected to work hard in their disciplines and show respect toward their teachers. Consequently, each party is expected to be fully conscious of what can complement other role and self role. The teacher-student relationship is based on the common belief in Confucianism prevalent in Chinese education sector. 师道尊严 (Shīdào zūnyán) advocates the dignity of the teaching profession and teachers rather than students as the centre of the teaching activities. This understanding only adds to the teacher-superior and student-inferior situation. Nonverbal asymmetrical behaviors are best displayed in interaction between teachers and students not only in classroom setting and but outside it as well.

2.5 Verbal and nonverbal dominance Verbal utterances and nonverbal cues may complement or contradict each other and the same applies to verbal dominance and nonverbal dominance displays. Verbal dominance in conversational activities is termed “conversational dominance” and is considered “a multi-dimensional construct consisting of sequential, participatory and quantitative dimensions” (Itakura 2001: 1862). As nonverbal cues are textured with their verbal counterparts, The three dimensions will be discussed in relation to both verbal utterances and nonverbal gestures respectively.

2.5.1 Sequential dominance The first dimension of the verbal utterance and nonverbal cues is sequential dominance, which refers to “one speaker’s tendency to control the other speaker with respect to the direction of the interaction and the sharing of initiating and responding roles” (Itakura 2001: 1862).

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Qŭ displayed sequential dominance while giving advice to Wáng in Fragment3 above. Qŭ executes both verbal and nonverbal dominance over Wáng. As far as verbal dominance is concerned, Qŭ demonstrates her sequential dominance to guide the direction of her interaction with Wáng when she advises him that chèn niánqīng de shíhōu, duō xué yīdiăn, zŏng huì hěn yŏuyòng de (Line 1) “While young, learn a little bit more and it’ll be very useful”. The wording itself indicates that she is senior to the addressee and that she is in a position to give advice to the other party. Not wishing to interrupt her, Wáng responds nonverbally when he initially executes a brief gaze (Line 1b) and then a couple of head nods (Line 1b) for acknowledgment. Seeing his nonverbal agreement, Qŭ continues her control of the topic shift by using lìngwài “besides” (Line 2) to indicate the topic shift and further states the need to gain more learning and skills because she believes that xiànzài jìngzhēng yě hěn lìhài de “current competition is also tense”. In addition, Qŭ displays quantitative dominance in her talk with Wáng. This is noticeable in two aspects. One is the number of words each party uses. She utters 41 words while he only speaks two. The other is the average turn length and her average turn length is absolutely longer than his. Wáng is aware that his role as a student is to seek information about his future course and Qŭ knows her role is to provide consultancy and information in response to the questions raised so that he is fully informed and her duty is fulfilled. Along with verbal dominance, conversation participants exhibit nonverbal dominance. Hess, Blairy and Kleck (2000: 268) maintain that “dominance displays serve to establish power relations between interaction partners.” This dominance is best displayed in the nonverbal cues in Mandarin-speaking teacherstudent interaction. Figure 2 presents the teacher’s nonverbal dominance in finger-pointing gesture, which has an immediately directive effect on the student concerned. The student, though engaged at that moment, is directed to carry out the task given by his teacher and this direction is conveyed with a fingerpointing gesture together with a verbal reference. The student feels obliged to stop to attend to his teacher’s direction and carry out his instructions. Further, the teacher not only executes this directional gesture, but also does it without leaving his seat, which is additional evidence of teacher-student nonverbal asymmetry and dominance.

2.5.2 Participatory dominance The second phenomenon of conversational dominance is participatory dominance. According to Itakura (2001), “participatory dominance refers to the restriction of

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speaking rights, in particular through interruption and overlap”. Although interruption and overlap in Chinese interaction do not occur as often as those in Australian conversation (Deng 1998), they do occur as a display of dominance on the part of a speaker other than the current speaker to restrain those present from participating in the ongoing interaction. Participatory dominance should be considered from the viewpoint of the addressee and the current speaker as well. First, the addressee displays his/her dominant role by succeeding in interrupting the current speaker and in taking over the floor. Itakura’s (2001) discussion is confined to the first point only and fails to include the next. Second, the current speaker does not want to be interrupted by the addressee and succeeds in keeping the speaking floor. The next fragment is concerned with this argument. Fragment 5: (G12; 98/12; GS; F/M) Situation: Wáng (left), a student, is seeking advice from Qŭ (right), a teacher at chemistry department. 1a. Wáng: __________________________________________________________________ 1. Wáng: Dìsān gè . . . shì jīchŭ fāngmiàn de yánjiū (0.5) xiàng . . zhè lèi de third CL be basic aspect DE research like this CL DE “The third paper is a study of basic topics, and is something of” 1b. Qŭ:

____________________________________________. . .\__________________\

2a. Wáng: ______________________________ 2. Wáng: xìngzhì de . . kěyĭ . . bù kěyĭ. nature DE OK not OK “such nature accepted or not?” 2b. Qŭ: 2c. Qŭ:

\_____________________________\

3a. Qŭ: 3. Qŭ:

\_______________________________\. . . x ___________________________________ Hăoxiàng nĭ zài liăng nián zhīmèi bùnéng zuò zhème duō fāngxiàng seem you in two year within cannot do that much direction “It seems that you cannot do so much research of different directions”

3b. Wáng: _______________________________________________________________________

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4a. Qŭ: 4. Qŭ:

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______________________ xìng de dōngxī ba? nature DE thing BA “within two years, can you?”

4b. Wáng: ______________________ 5a. ____________________ 5. Wáng: yī piān lùnwén . . = one CL paper “Just one research paper. . .”

→ 6a. Qŭ: 6b. Qŭ: → 6. Qŭ:

6c. Wáng: 7a. Qŭ: 7. Qŭ:

__________________________________________________ = yībān: láijiăng, dōu shì yánjiū cóng nĭ rù= generally speaking all be research since you entry “Generally speaking, as soon as you get enrolled,” __________________________________________________ ____ . . .\ ______________\ . . . x _________________________________________ = xué yĭhòu, dăoshī jiù kāishĭ gēnjù nĭ de zhuàngkuàng,= school after teacher then begin according to you DE situation “your supervisor will make you a research plan according to your situation”

7b. Wáng: ____________________________________________________________________ 8a. Qŭ: 8. Qŭ:

_____. . .\ ____________________________________\ . . . x ____________ = kètí de zhuàngkuàng, zùlĭ de zhuàngkuàng, lái gěi nĭ project DE situation group DE situation thus for you and that of the research projects and research group.

8b. Wáng: _______________________________________________________________ 9a. Qŭ: 9. Qŭ:

_____________________________________ = dìng yī gè yánjiū de fāngxiàng. make one CL research DE direction

9b. Wáng: _____________________________________

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10a. Wáng: _______________ 10. Wáng: nà jiù shì. . . that just be “That’s to say. . .” 10b. Qŭ:

_______________

11.

(0.1)

12a. Qŭ: 12. Qŭ:

________________________________________________ shĭzhōng shì wéirăo zhē zhè gè jìngxíng de. throughout be centre on this this CL carry on DE “It’s all the time carried out along this guideline.”

12b. Wáng: ________________________________________________

Symbols used in this fragment: \ _\ looking into the space to the left in relation to the addressee.

Figure 4: Before her refusal to be interrupted

Figure 5: She raised her head to indicate a refusal to be interrupted

Wáng is seeking information about thesis writing requirement from Qŭ and asks questions. In response to one of his questions, Qŭ does not give an explicit yesor-no answer, but implies that what Wáng talks about does not meet the requirement. At this moment, Wáng tries to interrupt her but fails because Qŭ refuses to be interrupted and wants to stay with her dominant role as information adviser (see Line 6).

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Here Qŭ does not only succeed in keeping her speakership, but also displays prosodic and other nonverbal cues of a dominant nature. First, she uses “typically high-pitched and more intonationally expressive” (Berryman 1980: 200) raised voice (Goddard and Wierzbicka 1997: 231; Hall 1984: 140) and “the voice conveys degrees of dominance-submission particularly well” (Hall 1984: 140). Wáng fails in his attempt to interrupt her (see Line 5) and thus puts her in a dominant position and gives her the freedom to take a long turn (Lines 6, 7, 8 and 9) to advise him of the routine procedures a supervisor adopts in planning research for the postgraduate candidates. Her advice also means to support her argument about why she does not think that he can do so much work on projects of totally different directions within a short time. Immediately after her lengthy advice, Wáng seeks to impose an interruption (Line 10) for a second time but in vain. With an instant pause (Line 11), Qŭ concludes her advice with a brief comment before giving away to Wáng. Her refusal to be interrupted is an indication of her strong sense of dominance and authority as an adviser over the student as an addressee. With respect to nonverbal cues, as Qŭ stops Wáng from interrupting in the first instance, she raises her head (see the contrast between Figure 4 and Figure 5), which has a function similar to that of the raised voice (Goddard and Wierzbicka 1997: 231) in Line 6, as a display of her determination to proceed with her advice and preference of not being interrupted. 2.5.3 Quantitative dominance Quantitative dominance refers to the level of contribution to the interaction in terms of the number of words spoken by each participant (Itakura, 2001). This may be the case with most conversations. However, we need to consider the nature of dominance displayed in interaction. The value of quantitative dominance is normally judged by the turn size and turn length, that is the number of words used to hold the speaking floor and keep the other party in the role of listener. Quantitative dominance is less significant than sequential and participatory dominance, even if its turn size is larger and its turn length is longer. In Mandarin Chinese interaction, sequential dominance and participatory dominance play a more significant role than quantitative dominance. People of low status can claim quantitative dominance by controlling larger turn size and turn length when presenting reports to people of high status. For example, Fragment 4 is a case in point. Zhào reports to Wáng and gives an account of students’ and his personal comments. While Zhào takes a position of quantitative dominance as he talks, Wáng listens and sometimes nods his head as an acknowledgment without verbal response. However, Wáng’s high status remains

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unchanged and he displays his nonverbal dominance as Zhào comments on the fact that few teachers give students opportunities to participate in classroom activities. Wáng leans back in the sofa and crosses his leg while Zhào leans forward with his locked hands on the sofa arm (see Figure 3), a typical image of a low status.

3 Implications for TCSOL The above discussion aims to inform Chinese-speaking educational professionals of asymmetrical communication style, particularly through nonverbal channel, which is characteristic of Chinese teacher-student talk-in-interaction. Having been used to such a communication style, Chinese teachers may find it challenging to interact with students from other linguistic and cultural backgrounds as teaching Chinese as a second language (CSL) or foreign language (CFL) has become all the more popular trustworthy. CSL/CFL students studying in various Chinese universities in mainland China have been increasing (see Table 2). 2008

2007

Continents

Graduates

Degrees Awarded

Graduates

Degrees Awarded

Asia Africa Europe North America South America Australia Total

34959 1516 9174 5570 856 670 52745

6374 349 402 188 43 50 7406

31776 1087 7659 4770 463 567 46322

5371 276 209 152 39 24 6071

Table 2: Information on International Students in China (2008 and 2007) Source: http://www.edu.cn/2008_9362/20100121/t20100121_441948.shtml (accessed 25 Dec 2010), http://www.edu.cn/2007_9363/20100121/t20100121_442120.shtml (accessed 6 January 2011)

The statistics in the above table shows that the second and third largest student source continents were Europe and North America after Asia. This means in 2007 and 2008 a good number of students studying in mainland China came from an individualist culture (e.g. U.K. and the USA, despite cultural differences between the two English-speaking countries) which has contrasting differences from a collectivist culture (Hofstede 2001) like China. With China’s continued economic growth and engagement in international communities, more people from individualist culture are likely to choose to study and work in Chinese-

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speaking universities (e.g. mainland China and Hong Kong). Furthermore, CSL/ CFL programs have also become more internationalised beyond the border of mainland China. An increasing number of Confucius Institutes (up to Nov 2009, 282 Confucius Institutes have been set up in 84 counties (see Table 3 for details) and up to Oct 2010, the total number has increased to 322 in 91 counties (see Table 4 for details) across the world). Continents

NO. of Country

Confucius Institutes

Europe North/South Americas Asia Africa Oceania Total

29 11 27 15 2 84

94 87 70 21 10 282

Table 3: Confucius Institutes around the world (Nov. 2009) Source: Accessed 13 January 2011 http://www.hanban.edu.cn/confuciousinstitutes/ node_10961.htm

Continents

NO. of Country

Confucius Institutes

Europe North/South Americas Asia Africa Oceania Total

31 12 30 16 2 91

105 103 81 21 12 322

Table 4: Confucius Institutes around the world (Oct. 2010) Source: Accessed 1 September 2011 http://www.hanban.edu.cn/confuciousinstitutes/ node_10961.htm

And at the same time, many devoted, qualified and experienced Chinese teachers have been sent to those countries to work cooperatively with their local counterparts to promote the teaching of the Chinese language and culture. They have also participated in designing and developing curricula and teaching/learning resources to accommodate the local learners and contributed to training local CSL/CFL teachers. This makes it all the more necessary for the Chinese educational professionals and their students to understand cross-cultural differences in order to achieve desired CSL/CFL teaching/learning outcomes through effective cross-cultural communication. CSL/CFL teachers may find themselves psychologically well-prepared when they are aware of differences in cultural values

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and communication patterns between cross-cultural interactants from low-context individualist culture and high-context collectivist culture. A few working strategies are proposed to narrow and bridge the cultural gaps between the two within the classroom environment for pedagogic purpose.

3.1 Achieving effective communication Apart from Hofstede’s (1980, 2001) research, other studies (Chiou 2001; Gao and Ting-Toomey 1998; Gao et al. 1996; Soh and Leong 2002) have also indicated that Western cultures tend to be high in horizontal relationships and low in vertical relationships while Eastern cultures appear to be high in vertical relationships and low in horizontal relationships. This can be observed, in many perspectives, in the use of pronouns, professional titles and top-down/dominant-submissive approach adopted in the conversation fragments discussed above. The dimensions of horizontal and vertical relationships contribute to the features of direct and indirect communication style in western and eastern cultures. While a single “you” is used among interactants both equal and different in ranks in the West, a multiple “yous” need to be in place when communication occurs between interactants of different ranks/ages/status, which is particularly a case in Chinese-English translation (Yang 2011). At the same time, Chinese style of communication also takes on implicitness in contrast to explicitness found in Western style of communication. It is maintained that low-context culture is verbally salient and high-context culture is nonverbally expressive (Hall 1976). In their research project, Bello, Brandau-Brown, Zhang and Ragsdale (2010) examine verbal and nonverbal methods Americans and Chinese use in expressing their appreciation in friendships and romantic relationships and find that the former choose to verbally express themselves whereas the latter prefer a nonverbal channel of expression. China is a member of high-context cultural group and the intended meaning may be indirectly expressed and implied in the context where communication occurs. While understanding can be achieved among members of high-context cultural group, it can be frustrating and unsuccessful to people from low-context cultural group that use direct and explicit style of communication. The previous discussion of nonverbal asymmetrical talk-in-interaction between Madanrin Chinese speaking teachers and students also indicate that they actively use nonverbal channel of expression (e.g. smiling, head nodding etc.) to contribute to on-going talk.

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3.2 Facilitating student learning Despite the differences discussed above, it is acknowledged that “social and economic changes have altered the traditional view of the teacher as the primary power holder in the classrooms” (Cothran and Ennis, 1997, p. 541). Equipped with effective communication, both teachers and students should use collaborative approach, working consultatively and coming to mutual agreement as to whether first-name or title-based address terms are used. It is advised that switching address terms be understood and tolerated as second language learners are acquiring linguistic skills and developing concepts of host culture through trials and errors. They engage themselves in constructing their own language and try using the new language system learned as social interaction (Emmitt, Zbaracki, Komesaroff, and Pollock, 2010). Students learn more actively with motivation when learning activities are learner-centred and relevant to their life experience. The role of CSL teachers is to facilitate their second language processes, providing individual assistance needed and allowing students to progress at varied pace. It is important to remember that communicative language teaching (CLT) approach recommends that fluency be preferred to accuracy, focusing on meaning-making and communication process rather than on language form and building second language learners’ self-confidence and self-esteem. Focus on group discussion and individual/pair presentation of language and cultural differences between L1 and L2 helps students reflect on and relate what they learn in the classroom to what they experience in everyday encounters. Student participation in active learning, critical thinking and creative writing is encouraged and student talking time (STT) is maximized while teacher talking time (TTT) is thoughtfully minimized. Apart from in-class activities and learning, CSL students can achieve successful cross-cultural communication between CSL/CFL teachers and students from different language and cultural backgrounds, and maximize student learning experience, it is important for them to understand and maintain cultural diversity and equity while engaged in both in-class teaching and learning and daily interaction. Chang (2006) demonstrates how cultural diversity can be utilised as a powerful pedagogic resource to benefit teaching-learning process and intellectual development and cross-cultural exploration and appreciation of diverse culture. Dunstan (2003) discusses how cultural diversity is integrated into every part of Australian education institutions (e.g. organizational structure, recruitment, curriculum, campus life) and what can be done to promote intercultural relationship and understanding, and internationalise Australian education. There are relevant issues that need to be addressed in pre-service teacher training programs, for example, the gap of teacher and student cultural diversity and equity

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(Causey et al. 2000), and sensitivity and awareness of cultural diversity should be incorporated into teacher training curriculum as immigration and globalisation intensify (Dooly 2007). It is important for CSL/CFL professionals to realise how awareness of cultural and equity can help language teaching and learning through successful cross-cultural communication and student-centred approach, and take action to establish and maintain intercultural affiliation with diverse students groups. This involves at least two areas CSL/CFL can make their efforts to work in to promote cultural diversity and equity. One is about curriculum-based learning tasks which can be designed to cover a range of activities relevant to this theme, such as representation of non-Chinese speaking nations and cultures in the textbooks (Kowalski, 2008), recommended readings use of multimedia resources (e.g. digitised pictures, videos, movies). Students’ voices can also be heard via online assignments in response to cultural diversity and discrimination (Zembylas, 2008). As part of course assessment components, students of diverse language and cultural background can be encouraged to team up to make paired and group presentation about their own countries. Not only do they report successful stories, but also cover current issues and challenges in the increasingly globalised village. These activities help diverse student groups work together, ask questions, think critically, communicate with awareness of cultural diversity and equity and achieve better understanding of one another. The other area is about extra-curriculum activities in which CSL/CFL teachers and students should engage themselves. They may include diverse student organizations, speech and writing competition, guest speakers from diverse cultural industries, visits to diverse communities and overseas study tour. Ramburuth and Welch (2005) look upon the diverse cultural classroom environment as the dynamic resources to develop the cross-cultural competence of future business managers and their sensitivity to intercultural diversity. Apparently CSL/CFL teachers face an exciting and challenging task of developing effective communication skills, facilitating a diverse student population and promoting cultural diversity and equity. This process will definitely benefit the teachers as well as the students when they learn as they go.

4 Conclusion Chinese interpersonal relationships are characterized by the vertical structures, large power distance and interactional dominance. Participants display verbal and nonverbal dominance in talk-in-interaction. As Chinese are strongly aware

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of status difference and power distance, they are particular about using appropriate address terms in greeting people. In so doing, they feel they show proper interpersonal conduct in OMSAs and SMSAs. In particular, the nonverbal cues they display in interaction indicate the unsaid messages, which are contextdependent in high-context Chinese culture. Chinese speakers value the belief that well-educated personnel like teachers can guide young people for their future life and thus deserve respect and trust on the part of general public. Verbal and nonverbal dominance is characterized by three dimensions ― sequential, participatory and quantitative. The first two dimensions are of essential importance in dominance projection on the part of the high-status over the low-status during talk-in-interaction. The third dimension depends on the context in which talk occurs. It is the high-status person that dominates the interaction even if the low-status person contributes more to the talk activities as in reporting. The implications for CSL/CFL professionals are that they understand different communication styles of diverse cultural groups and become aware of needs to promote cultural diversity and equity, and plan to have them implemented in classroom learning activities and extra-curriculum activities as well. This is a crucial step for the Chinese language education and cultural heritage to make their way along with China’s economic success into international community.

Acknowledgement The author thanks all participants, both teachers and students, who participated in this project. The author also thanks the two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.

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Richmond, Virginia P., James C. McCroskey and Steven K. Payne. 1987. Nonverbal Behavior in Interpersonal Relations. Englewood Cliffs, N.J: Prentice-Hall Inc. Scollon, Ron and, Suzanne Wong Scollon and Rodney H. Jones. 2012. Intercultural Communication: A Discourse Approach (3rd ed.). Malden, Massachusetts: Wiley-Blackwell. Soh, Star and Frederick T. L. Leong. 2002. Validity of vertical and horizontal individualism and collectivism in Singapore: relationships with values and interests. Journal of CrossCultural Psychology 33 (1): 3–15. Street, Richard L. Jr. 1990. The communicative functions of paralanguage and prosody. In Handbook of Language and Social Psychology, Howard Giles and W. Peter Robinson (eds.), 121–140. Chichester, England: John Wiley & Sons Ltd. Wu, David Y. H. 1996. Chinese childhood socialization. In The Handbook of Chinese Psychology, Michael Harris Bond (ed.), 143–154. New York: Oxford University Press. Yang, Ping. 1994. Féiyŭyán jiāojì shùpíng (A survey of nonverbal communication). Wàiyŭ jiàoxué yŭ yánjīu (Foreign Language Teaching and Research) 27 (3): 1–6. Yang, Ping. 2003. Salience of nonverbal communication in Mandarin Chinese interactions. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Macquarie University. Yang, Ping. 2007. Nonverbal affiliative phenomena in Mandarin conversation. Journal of Intercultural Communication. Vol. 15. Available http://www.immi.se/intercultural Yang, Ping. 2011. Developing cross-cultural communication competence through translation. In Proceedings of the “Synergise!” Biennial National Conference of the Australian Institute of Interpreters and Translators: AUSIT 2010, Annamaria Arnall and Uldis Ozolins (eds.), 48– 65. Newcastle upon Tyne, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Yang, Ping. 2010a. Managing miànzi in Mandarin Chinese talk-in-interaction: A nonverbal perspective. Semiotica 181 (1/4): 77–121.

Wang Chen

Learning tones cooperatively in the CSL classroom: A proposal Abstract: It is difficult for CSL learners to remember tones. Those with a nontonal mother tongue have first of all to habituate to tones. Remembering the tone for each word is a difficult ongoing task for all learners, which they should not be left to face alone. The teacher-led method of tone training is not very successful in solving this problem. From the learner’s perspective, new teaching methods are needed in the CSL classroom to make learning more effective and efficient. A new social approach is required to form the individual learners into a cooperative team facing the same challenge and sharing a common fate. This article proposes a cooperative method, which pays more attention to the learning process. How to remember the tones better when learning vocabulary is the major concern. Through learning together cooperatively, carrying out mini teaching tasks and providing learning tips, learners involve themselves actively in the cognition process and take over more responsibilities. The role of the teacher is limited to learning partner, assistant and advisor. This cooperative tone learning process is communicative and behaviour oriented, offering increased opportunity for meaningful classroom communication.

1 Introduction Despite the common recognition of its importance, the training of tones has not received sufficient attention in the CSL classroom in China in recent years and as a consequence training has been less effective (Zhao 2006: 12). One reason is, as Song (2009: 48) and Chi (2005: 56) pointed out, that the time and effort devoted to pronunciation training in the courses provided by Chinese universities has been generally compressed to just one to two months at the beginner level. Besides, Guan (2000) argues that, in respect of teaching content, materials as well as methods, pedagogy is underdeveloped with regard to the teaching of Chinese tones. In addition to drills and phoneme discriminations, language materials which could be directly adopted in real-life communication are now more frequently used for pronunciation training. According to Song (2009: 49), the dominant form of training in the CSL classroom is, however, still the teacherled method: the teacher models and the students imitate. Sometimes hand movements are used to show the tones. The teacher then corrects students’ pronunciation when necessary. It is easy to see that the teacher-led method does not pay sufficient attention to the cognitive process of pronunciation learning,

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especially to the intake and assimilation of tones. Besides, this method is incommunicative in its form, despite the content. This is a reason why pronunciation training is seen as a time-consuming task which is not productive in improving the overall Chinese capability of the students. Teachers and students alike would rather spend time in the language class on other tasks like learning vocabulary and grammar once the student’s pronunciation has reached a certain level. Pronunciation then ceases to be a concern of textbook authors, language teachers and also the learners themselves. This attitude leads to fossilization and deterioration in the pronunciation accuracy of some intermediate and advanced learners. The acquisition and reproduction of tones is more often considered in terms of vocal production than of cognitive production. In the articles about tone acquisition I have read, most of the researchers are concerned about the sequence of acquiring tones and the accuracy of producing tones, especially the pitch of tones. None of them have examined how learners try to remember the tones when they learn a new word or a new character. That is to say, the cognitive process of remembering word tones is still not the focus of research. The strategies learners use to associate tones with word meaning and its pronunciation have yet to be investigated. Methods of how to assist and better this cognitive process in and out of the language classroom have yet to be developed. In this article, I propose a cooperative method of tone learning in the CSL classroom from the perspective of the learner. This method gives more attention to the learning process. Under this concept, the learning of tones is considered as a cognitive process that occurs throughout the whole period of Chinese learning and acquisition. How to remember the tones more efficiently in vocabulary learning is the major concern. With the importance of the teacher as modeller and monitor reduced, learners involve themselves actively in the learning process and take over more responsibilities through learning together cooperatively, providing learning tips and carrying out mini teaching tasks. The cooperative tone learning process is communicative, offering lots of opportunities for meaningful language production using the vocabulary and grammar learners have already acquired.

2 Three aspects of tone acquisition and production There are three important aspects of tone acquisition and production, which could be categorized into knowledge and skill: the knowledge of the phonetic and transcription system of the Chinese language, the knowledge of tones of each word as well as the skill of articulating different tones (cf. Figure 1).

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Figure 1: Three aspects of tone acquisition and production

First of all, two cognitive processes of information assimilation must be differentiated by the language learner: the acquisition of knowledge and the development of skills (Storch 2001: 35). People who cannot swim know the essential difference: They have seen other people swimming and probably could even picture the movement in mind. When they go into the swimming pool, however, they still fail to swim. Although non-swimmers have some knowledge of swimming, this does not automatically lead to the corresponding behaviour of swimming. Having knowledge is a prerequisite for the development of skills. Skills require sufficient exercise and are developed under the monitoring function of the relevant knowledge. Learners of Chinese as a second language, who take language courses, are introduced to the basic phonetic knowledge of tones when they start learning Chinese. They usually depend on a transcription system with marks of tones like Hanyu Pinyin to assist the learning of pronunciation. Mastering the phonetic knowledge of tones and the transcription system – one aspect of knowledge acquisition – does not guarantee the accurate articulation of the tones with the right pitch, which is a skill. This article is not, however, aimed at the issue of how to increase the skill of producing tones with accurate pitch, but proposes a teaching method to assist the memorisation of word tones – the other important aspect of knowledge, which is a crucial prerequisite of correct pronunciation in free speech.

3 The neglected cognition process of tone acquisition As Figure 2 shows, the learner has to remember the tones during the process of associating pronunciation with its meaning after receiving a visual and/or an

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aural input. It is an ongoing process which lasts throughout the whole period of Chinese learning. To pronounce the Chinese words correctly later in free speech requires not only the skill of articulating the tones with a certain pitch, but also the knowledge of the right tones for each word. As a result, the production of tones in free speech has both a vocal character and a cognitive character, which reflects two different learning processes.

Figure 2: Process of tone learning and producing

Although many teachers attend to whether learners are able to produce the tones correctly, i.e. with the right tones plus at the right pitch, they do not, in my opinion, distinguish the vocal character and the cognitive character of tone production. This leads to a lack of attention to the cognition process of tone intake and assimilation. Teachers seldom take into account how learners remember tones, why they fail to remember them, whether and which strategies they use. Furthermore, CSL textbook authors are responsible for teachers not attending continuously to the ongoing task of tone learning. Only those textbooks for total beginners or only the first chapters of such textbooks are devoted to the introduction and training of Chinese pronunciation. After that, there are no more pronunciation exercises in almost any CSL textbook. CSL classrooms are in most cases textbook-oriented. Without textbooks constantly drawing attention to tone learning, it is likely that teachers stop performing pronunciation exercises with learners. The guiding effect of the textbooks directly leads to a decrease in the amount of pronunciation training in the language class. Moreover, the textbook authors do not make any effort to promote the use of strategies for continuous tone learning. Tips on how to remember word tones effectively are nowhere to be found in the textbooks.

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Learners are left almost without support for the memorisation of tones, although this is recognized to be a difficult task. Learners have to spend lots of time and effort on their own, if at all, should they be determined to tackle this task. Some learners with non-tonal L1 also report that at the beginning it is hard to get used to paying extra attention to the tones for each word and remembering as well as vocalizing them. The transfer of their non-tonal mother tongue has a negative filtering effect on the intake and assimilation of tones. Tones are not selected for attention and consequently are not memorized. When it comes to free speech, it is likely that learners just do not know the tones and use random ones, if they do not ignore them altogether. It takes some time for these learners to become aware of how important the tones are for the Chinese language and to habituate themselves to learning and using word tones. In order to maximize the learning effect, a teaching method which could increase the awareness as well as assist the cognitive process of tone acquisition is needed in the classroom.

4 The proposal of learning tones cooperatively To reach the goal mentioned above, I would propose a cooperative method of tone learning when learners are confronted with new words.

4.1 Concept People say: Tell me and I forget; Teach me and I remember; Involve me and I learn. In terms of tone learning, simply telling learners which words carry which tones and correcting them when they make mistakes is, in many cases, far from sufficient for ensuring that this information is transferred into the learners’ long term memory. The learners should be involved in the process of finding out the knowledge, as well as spotting mistakes for themselves, so that they could remember more effectively. Furthermore, learners should not be left on their own to overcome the difficulty of remembering the tones of each word. This is particularly important when a beneficial language environment outside the classroom is missing, because the attention and feedback a learner could receive in a teacher-led classroom is extremely limited. The individuals should be brought together into a cooperating team, because of their common challenge and shared goal. In the cooperative tone learning process, learners work together in pairs or small groups supportively, paying attention to each other and providing feedback.

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They carry out mini teaching tasks. They identify and share tips for remembering the tones of certain words better. These activities increase the awareness of tones and deepen the level of cognition, thereby improving the learning effect. Through taking active part learners benefit from each other. With learners standing at the centre of attention, teachers are able to turn their roles from authority, dispenser of knowledge, monitor and controller into cooperative learning partner, assistant and advisor. After all, the learning of tones only happens in the learner’s mind. Teachers are there to offer support and to enhance their learning outcome. With the social structure in the classroom changed, learners involve themselves more actively and willingly in the learning process and take over more responsibility for their own learning outcome and that of the group as a whole. Moreover, the cooperative tone learning process is communicative and behaviour-oriented. With the learners working together, it provides lots of opportunity for meaningful language output in Chinese, which improves the overall language ability of the learner.

4.2 Didactic methods for learning tones cooperatively Two important methods should be introduced here: applying Learning by Teaching and Cooperative Learning as well as providing learning tips to enhance memorization.

4.2.1 Applying learning by teaching and cooperative learning Learning by Teaching is not an exclusively modern didactic method. One of the exemplars is Dr. Jean-Pol Martin who utilized the method in the 1980s (Skinner 1994: 38; Schelhaas 2003: 12). Dr. Martin turned the German pupils in his secondary-school French classes into teachers by assigning them small teaching tasks. This method dramatically increased the pupils’ motivation. Skinner (1994: 38) reports: “[The pupils] not only spoke far more in each class, by working together they also overcame their inhibitions more quickly. A feeling of solidarity developed, the division of the class into an authority, the teacher, and a passive audience, the students, evaporated. The teacher remained, of course, the final expert and could always interrupt and correct. The pupils assumed, however, many of the other tasks formerly routinely and unnecessarily carried out by the instructor.”

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The biggest advantage of Learning by Teaching is that it is learner-centric. Learners work on learning materials themselves (with help from the instructor) and present these materials to the others. Besides acquiring the learning content, they also learn how to learn. Through interacting with the others, their social ability improves as well (Graef and Preller 1994: 9). In a language class, learners gain more opportunities to communicate meaningfully and naturally in the target language during social interaction. Cooperative Learning is a successful teaching strategy developed from group work (Hammoud and Ratzki 2009: 5). In Cooperative Learning “small teams, each with students of different levels of ability, use a variety of learning activities to improve their understanding of a subject. Each member of a team is responsible not only for learning what is taught but also for helping teammates learn, thus creating an atmosphere of achievement. Students work through the assignment until all group members successfully understand and complete it.” (http://edtech.kennesaw.edu) Two concepts are crucial to Cooperative Learning: positive interdependence and individual accountability. According to Magee and Jacobs (2001: 62), positive interdependence exists when learners depend on each other to learn more, and individual accountability exists when each member of the group feels responsible to learn, to demonstrate their learning, and to help their groupmates learn. Hammoud and Ratzki (2009: 7–10) sum up five basic elements for Cooperative Learning: (i) direct interaction, (ii) individual responsibility, (iii) positive mutual dependence, (iv) reflection and evaluation, as well as (v) social competence. They also suggest following these four steps: think, pair, share and assess. In Cooperative Learning, individual differences in learner style, learning speed, personality, strong points and weaknesses are to be respected and celebrated. This creates an atmosphere of trust in the classroom, so that the learners are not afraid of making mistakes. They are willing to accept help from their peers and offer help in return. The Cooperative Learning method could be adopted for tone learning e.g. to test the learning result when reviewing vocabulary. Learners might be put into groups and each group receive some words. They would be in charge of testing the others’ mastery of these words using the following step, in which new groups would be formed by bringing together one individual from each of the initial groups. In this step the learners would evaluate the others and also be evaluated by the others. The two steps of grouping are shown in Figure 3. Although this process is usually based on random grouping, teachers should rearrange the groups when weaker students coincidentally come together in one group.

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Figure 3: Group work for vocabulary review

Incorporating Learning by Teaching and Cooperative Learning would break the two typical situations for pronunciation training in a teacher-led classroom: One is that all learners speak in chorus without receiving individual attention and without the individual receiving feedback; the other situation is that only one learner speaks at a time and receives the teacher’s attention and feedback, usually leaving the other learners unattended. The cooperative method of tone learning would bring the following benefits to the classroom: – More opportunities and greater efficiency: When a class is broken into groups to do pronunciation exercises, there can be more people talking at the same time. That is to say, everyone gets more time and chance to practise. While one learner is talking, the others have to listen attentively and show their attentiveness. The reduced interpersonal distance could turn one learner’s pronunciation exercise into the others’ listening exercise. The limited time for pronunciation training is used more efficiently. – More attention to the tones: Because of the limitation of working memory, learners usually only pay attention selectively to the new learning materials. Probably as a result of a filtering effect from the non-tonal mother tongue, learners, especially beginners, cannot easily pick up the tones when they hear Chinese words. Some of them report that they just don’t hear the tones or they cannot hear a difference between them. Through creating tips to help remember the tones, through listening to peers attentively and giving feedback as well as through working as a tutor, the awareness of the existence of tones would be activated, which would call for more attention to the learning and use of tones. This continuous process should be designed carefully and carried out step by step.

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More intrinsic motivation: Playing the role of a reliable partner and a tutor, the learners have to make sure their own pronunciation is correct so that they are capable of giving advice to the others when needed. This brings a strong inner need to the learners. They then engage themselves more intensively with the learning content and take more responsibility for their own learning outcome, which in turn profits the whole group. Besides, with the steering and monitoring role of the teacher reduced the learners are more willing and ready to use the target language in the language classroom (Schwerdtfeger 1995: 207). Moreover, learning from peers is, for various reasons, preferred by learners (Storch 2001: 307). More productive performance: According to Stevick (1976: 107) two kinds of performance should be distinguished: productive and reflective. “Insofar as a student is bouncing back what the teacher is throwing at him, his performance is reflective.” A typical example is imitating the pronunciation of a teacher where the meaning is unimportant. Productive performance, on the other hand, does not start from the assigned task of following a language model but starts with something the learner “wants to say and with a person to whom he wants to say it”. To fulfil his purpose, he then “draws on the models that are available within himself ”. Equal opportunities: Group and pair work benefits the relatively shy and weak learners because it is less stressful and more natural to communicate with their classmates in a small group than with the authority in front of the whole class (Storch 2001: 307). Those learners who have better pronunciation can give advice to the others. They can then understand the pronunciation even better and get the feeling of success by helping others do a better job. More natural and meaningful communication: The social interaction creates real life communication situations in the language classroom. Learners e.g. ask for advice, provide feedback, encourage the others and show appreciation for the help. Although sometimes learners, especially beginners, have to communicate in their mother tongue or in the language of instruction instead of Chinese, they are still working intensively to learn. The higher the language level of the learner, the more the learner could communicate in Chinese. Teachers should also provide words and phrases according to the need to increase the use of Chinese. More mobility for the teacher: He/she could move around freely to get an overview of the whole group or pay targeted attention to certain learners. The cooperative method would enable the teacher to have a rounded understanding of the learning outcome, so that he/she knows what should be done next.

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4.2.2 Providing learning tips to enhance memorization Using learning strategies is one of the important aspects of the cognition process. However, not every student could find the appropriate strategy for themselves. Apart from increasing student involvement through Learning by Teaching and Cooperative Learning, providing tone learning tips in the language classroom also shows concern about the cognition process and could thus enhance the memorization of word tones. In spite of the arbitrary relationship between meaning and pronunciation, we could still find ways to make the memorization of the tones of certain words easier, although very unlikely of all. One sound could bring a large number of images with it, but most of them are unwanted. Only the desired images are sufficient for learning. Stevick (1976: 19) suggests the use of “security words” to learn foreign vocabulary. A “security word” is one example of the psychological theory “mediators”. He gives the example of associating the meaning of ‘white’ with the Spanish word blanco, which might take advantage of the English word blank, since blank sheets of paper are usually white. Based on the theory of “mediators”, some strategies could be developed to help associating tones with their meaning. Some examples are: –

Making flashcards which give a visual hint of the tones

Some pictures incorporate hints of word tones. These concrete images could portray the abstract tones. Thus, they could be used as flashcards to help remember the tones. These pictures should be remembered accurately, so that the correct hints could be correctly retrieved. There is unfortunately always the possibility that the learners cannot remember the pictures or that they remember them incorrectly. To avoid this, a vivid presentation of the picture is required. Teachers could e.g. ask the learners to detect the hints on their own. Another option is to ask them to draw pictures with hints about the tones themselves. –

Using body language duì (对 ‘yes’), shìde (是的 ‘yes’): nodding the head wòshǒu (握手 ‘to shake hands’): shaking hands with the learners exaggeratedly steadily

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Using word pairs with contrastive tones  bēizi (杯子 ‘cup’): You hold the cup evenly. bèizi (被子 ‘blanket’): You slip under the blanket.  niánjí (年级 ‘grade’): When a little boy’s grade grows, he gets taller. niánjì (年纪 ‘age’): When an old man’s age grows, he gets smaller.

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Figure 4: Concrete images portray abstract tones

Teachers could design tasks with the above strategies for learners to explore. The crucial principle is that the learners should involve themselves actively in elaborating the hints. Teachers should not simply review the answers. Teachers should have enough confidence in the learners’ imagination and creativity and should encourage them to think of their own tips and develop their own learning strategies. Teachers may give suggestions when needed.

4.3 Shortcomings Besides the benefits the cooperative method of tone learning could bring to the learner and to the classroom, there are also some potential difficulties, as follows: – This method requires a lot of time for the learners to process the information and come up with learning tips. Although paying more attention and spending more time on the learning process is one of the aims of this concept, we must also make a balance between tone learning and the other learning tasks. Besides, some students might even feel resentment at having to do what they consider the teacher’s job.

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Currently there is still no collection of materials for tone teaching and learning that has been developed in accordance with the concept in this article. There is not enough support for teachers to adopt this concept. Learners and teachers might need some time to get used to this method. Learners might not count on each other and might resist learning from each other. Teachers need to design learning activities commensurate with learners’ pronunciation proficiency and be ready to deal with conflicts. The Learning by Teaching and the Cooperative Learning methods could be applied in general. The use of learning tips is, however, only applicable for limited words. We still need to find out which strategies are suitable for which words. A collection of learning tips should be developed. There are different learner types. The visualisation of tones using pictures could be a burden for learners who have a relatively weak visual memory. The learning effect is not guaranteed. Modelling of the pronunciation is of particular importance for beginners. If they are put into groups, more equipment like CD players would be requested. Learners might also prefer having a headphone so as not to be distracted by background noise. The high demand for equipment might not be acceptable at some institutes.

5 Conclusion The modelling-imitating method of learning tones is important particularly for beginners and should not be completely replaced. The cooperative method takes the difficulty of tone learning into consideration. In this article, I tried to develop a teaching model as a solution to this problem. This concept is an attempt to make tone learning a communicative activity by creating a cooperative atmosphere in the classroom. This method aims at maximizing the involvement of learners in the cognition process; thereby increasing motivation, enhancing the learning effect and increasing meaningful and natural classroom communication. Using this method frequently over a long period, learners can be expected to get into the habit of actively adopting strategies to remember word tones. The cooperative method is, however, still a concept which requires concrete teaching plans and which must be tested through classroom practice. Teaching materials need to be developed under this concept. Research should be done (a) to compare the learning outcome of learners using the cooperative method and of those using the teacher-led method, (b) to analyse the classroom discourse, and (c) to collect feedback from learners and teachers.

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References (n.a.) (n.d.). http://edtech.kennesaw.edu/intech/cooperativelearning.htm (accessed 6 Aug 2010). Chi, Yangqin. 2005. Duiwai Hanyu Shengdiao Jiaoxue Yanjiu Pingshu [Review of studies on teaching tones in Chinese as a foreign language]. Journal of PLA University of Foreign Languages 28 (1): 55–58. http://d.wanfangdata.com.cn/periodical_jfjwgyxyxb200501012. aspx (accessed 24 July 2010). Graef, Roland and Preller, Rolf-Dieter (eds.). 1994. Lernen durch Lehren. Rimbach: Verlag im Wald. Guan, Jian. 2000. Shengdiao Jiaoxue Gaige Chutan [Research in tone teaching reform]. Language Teaching and Research 4: 51–54. Hammoud, Antje and Ratzki, Anne. 2009. Was ist kooperatives Lernen? In Fremdsprache Deutsch, 41, 5–13. Magee, Vicky Y. G. and Jacobs, George M. 2001. Comparing second language student participation under three teaching modes. Journal of the Chinese Language Teachers Association 36 (1): 61–80. Schelhaas, Christine. 2003. « Lernen durch Lehren » für einen produktions- und handlungsorientierten Fremdsprachenunterricht. Ein praktischer Leitfaden mit zahlreichen kreativen Unterrichtsideen und reichhaltiger Materialauswahl. Marburg: Tectum Verlag. Schwerdtfeger, Inge Christine. 1995. Gruppenunterricht und Partnerarbeit. In Handbuch Fremdsprachenunterricht, Karl-Richard Bausch, Herbert Christ, and Hans-Jürgen Krumm (eds.), 206–208. Tübingen: Francke. Skinner, Jody. 1994. Learning by Teaching. Zielsprache Englisch 94 (2): 38–39. Song, Yidan. 2009. Duiwai Hanyu Shengdiao Jiaoxue Celue Tansuo [Research in tone teaching strategies of CSL]. Language Teaching and Research 3: 48–53. http://www.cnki.com.cn/ Article/CJFDTotal-YYJX200903013.htm (accessed 24 July 2010). Stevick, Earl W. 1976. Memory, Meaning & Method: some psychological perspectives on language learning. Rowley: Newbury House Publishers. Storch, Günther. 2001. Deutsch als Fremdsprache: eine Didaktik. München: Fink. Zhao, Jinming. 2006. Cong Duiwai Hanyu Jiaoxue dao Hanyu Guoji Tuiguang [From TCFL to the international spread of Chinese]. In Hanyu Yuowei Di’er Yuyan de Xuexizhe Yuyan Xitong Yanjiu [Studies of the language system of learners of CSL], Jianxun Wang (ed.): 1–38. Beijing: Commercial Press.

Chapter 2 Integrating culture and language

Ned Danison

Integrating culture and language in the CFL classroom: A view from the bottom up Abstract: This qualitative study explores learners’ of Chinese as a foreign language perceptions of Chinese culture as it springs mainly from the linguistic code. The guiding questions are: When culture is not explicitly included as a component in the CFL classroom, what impressions of culture does the experience make upon the students? What role does the target language play in introducing the target culture to learners? What role does the native-speaker teacher play? The paper concludes with suggestions for how a native-speaker CFL teacher may prepare him- or herself for teaching culture with language in a foreign language classroom setting.

1 Introduction This study describes a qualitative picture of a real world situation in a college Chinese1 as a foreign language (CFL) classroom in the United States. It is an inquiry into how Chinese culture, not being specifically taught in the class under observation, is perceived by learners of the language. Students’ notions about Chinese culture, of course, spring from many sources, but the present research aims to observe and interview the teacher and students as individual “filters” of culture knowledge as it springs mainly from the linguistic code. The guiding questions are: When culture is not explicitly included as a component in the CFL classroom, what impressions of culture does the experience make upon the students? What role does the target language play in introducing the target culture to learners? What role does the native-speaker teacher play? Literature on integrating culture in the CFL classroom does not specifically address these questions taken together. In a review of literature on culture learning in language education, Paige, et al. (2003) identify “a remarkable scarcity of . . . studies dealing with the real world of the classroom” (186).

1 “Chinese language” in this paper refers only to Mandarin (普通话), and “Chinese culture” denotes a mainstream, generalized way of life conceptualized in distinction to other world cultures (especially Western cultures), as depicted in Chinese language learning texts and popular Chinese media, and as defined in scholarly works such as Hsu (1981) and Scollon and Scollon (1995).

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In the following sections, a review of literature surveys the background of the culture component in FL (foreign language) pedagogy generally and CFL specifically. A working definition of “culture” is provided. A report of the study is presented, followed by a discussion of four themes related to the definition of culture that emerge from the interview data. How these themes can inform the implementation of an integrated language and culture program (using Xing’s [2006] work as an example) is discussed. The paper concludes with suggestions for how a native-speaker CFL teacher may prepare him- or herself for teaching culture with language in a foreign language classroom setting. The claim is made that, at least in the case of CFL, culture (as it shall be defined) is already abundantly present in the linguistic code, and that efforts to bring more culture into the classroom should focus on how to get more culture from the language.

2 The culture component in FL research literature There has grown up a consensus view in FL teaching literature published in the past few decades that culture (variously defined) is an integral part of FL teaching and learning (e.g., Valdes 1986; Damen 1987; Byram and Morgan 1994; Lange and Paige 2003). The American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL 2011), for example, includes culture as a core component in language acquisition, with each of its five recommended language goals relatable to culture.2 “The current consensus”, writes Janet Xing, “appears to be that it is difficult to achieve high proficiency in any language without a concomitant awareness, indeed, almost adoption, of the culture in which the language is used” (2006: 238–239). That the interrelatedness of language and culture has become a default assumption in research and theory, however, does not mean that foreign language teachers are eager to (or willing and able to) integrate culture and language in their classrooms. Teachers often feel that research and theory in foreign language pedagogy are irrelevant to their practice (Pica 1994, 1997), and this may be especially so when it comes to culture (Wolf and Riordan 1991). In a study by Sercu (2005), about half of an international sample of FL teachers claimed they felt that teaching culture is more or less a waste of time. Culture, in the view of demurring half of the teachers surveyed, is not something that can really 2 ACTFL’s five C’s of foreign language education are: communication, culture, connections, comparisons, and communities. “Together, these elements enable the student of languages to participate in multilingual communities at home and around the world in a variety of contexts and in culturally appropriate ways” (ACTFL 2011, p. 3).

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be grasped outside the environment in which it is enacted. And given the amount of time so-called culture teaching would take away from (in their view) the more important aspects of language learning, it is not worth the effort. Crucial to the discussion of teaching culture in the FL classroom is the definition of the word culture. What makes the word notoriously slippery is that in the broadest sense, “culture” encompasses all human activity. Culture is everything human that is in contrast to nature (Kramsch 1998: 4). Thus it is understandable that foreign language teachers may feel intimidated by the word culture, which is invoked to cover an overwhelming array of concepts taken from the humanities, anthropology, sociology, politics, and other social sciences. In this light, resistance to teaching culture may in fact be a resistance to a complicated-sounding label for things that do not seem entirely relevant to teaching a language. In any case, many teachers may feel that culture is “simply too challenging,” and that incorporating culture into the FL classroom “takes the learning experience far beyond the realm of comfort, experience, and interest of both teacher and the learner” (Lange and Paige 2003: x).

2.1 Toward a working definition of culture for FL pedagogy The anthropological definition of culture distinguishes two basic interrelated aspects: A culture has visible, or explicit, patterns that correspond to invisible, implicit, underlying patterns or rules (Kroeber and Kluckhohn 1952; Hall 1959; Brooks 1968). Hofstede (1991) uses the metaphor “software of the mind” to describe the invisible aspect which underlies the visible aspect of culture. Recognizing the visible/invisible distinction is an important step toward recognizing that a foreign culture is not merely a potpourri of similarities and differences in the eyes of a foreign observer, but is a holistic, complex system of interrelated values and concepts; it is a “fuzzy set of basic assumptions and values, orientations to life. . .” (Spencer-Oatey and Franklin 2009: 15); a culture is a patterned whole. It is this complex systematicity, this imperceptibly patterned quality of culture that we as foreign observers recognize as a general flavor after a certain amount of exposure to a foreign language and culture. Adding a further distinction to the two aspects, the National Standards in Foreign Language Education Project (in Tang 2006) defines culture as encompassing products, practices, and perspectives; that is, culture is the patterned ways in which people: (1) make or use products, variously called artifacts or forms, (2) carry out practices or behavior, and (3) think, or hold meanings. Products and practices are the visible part, and perspectives are the invisible, underlying part (Moran 2001: 24).

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Moving toward an operative definition of culture relevant to FL pedagogy, we can further distinguish (at least) four senses of culture3 involved in language teaching which are useful for analyzing the ways in which the term culture is conceived. Various senses lead to various teaching approaches. The senses are: aesthetic, sociological, pragmatic, and semantic (Adaskou et al. 1990: 3–4), described as follows. The aesthetic sense of culture pertains to achievements of civilization such as art, music, and literature and the refinement of manners and formal protocol; thus it is also often called achievement culture or culture with a big C. This is in contrast to behavioral culture (little c culture), which refers to the mundane products and practices of daily life.4 The sociological (or anthropological) sense of culture covers the vast spectrum of human activity, encompassing all the various ways of making meaning linguistically, non-linguistically (i.e., in all behavior, even to the minutiae of touch, personal space, and movement [Hall 1966, 1976, 1983]), and paralinguistically (overlapping with pragmatics). It is the sociological sense of culture that virtually all academic literature on the FL culture component has been concerned with in some degree for the past several decades (e.g., Nostrand 1956; Lewald 1963; Saville-Troike 1975; Morain 1983; Kramsch 1993; Tang 2006). The pragmatic sense of culture (or “sociopragmatic”, as in Kramsch [2003]) pertains to paralinguistic rules and skills that guide language community members in appropriate use of rhetorical styles and language in interaction. In this sense, culture is manifested in implicature, speech acts, politeness, and other paralinguistic phenomena and the values that underlie them. The pragmatic sense of culture in the FL classroom is nearly coterminous with Sociolinguistics, i.e. a concern with patterns of who says what to whom in what situation (or communicative competence, as in Canale and Swain [1980]); it is “the use of language in the conduct of social life” (Hymes 1962: 13). The semantic sense of culture pertains to a culture’s conceptual system which is embodied in language, its way of linguistically “carving up reality”, given that the language code is a repository of collective historical experience. In this sense, the linguistic code is seen as a direct reflection of culture, a kind 3 It is important to note that the various aspects, facets, and senses of culture are not discrete components, but are all overlapping and interrelated by degrees. 4 This distinction arose in the mid-twentieth century as culture became more of a mainstream scientific concern, hence Kroeber and Kluckhohn’s (1952) work defining the term culture (Kuper 1999). As this shift in thinking impacted the teaching of foreign languages, Nostrand (1956: 297) called it “selling out the humanities to the social sciences”. Where the FL culture component was once primarily concerned with the finer things of civilization, it now encompassed everything from table manners to facial expressions.

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of template in which are inscribed attitudes, values, and beliefs which may be seen in rhetorical patterns (Kaplan 1966), textual clusters of semantic connections such as “cultural scripts” (Wierzbicka 1994), or as ideological positions that guide the unfolding of discourse (Scollon and Scollon 1995; Pan 2000). Whereas the aesthetic, sociological, and pragmatic senses of culture are more inclusive of explicit behaviors and products, the semantic sense is more concerned with the tacit, implicit, underlying patterns of meaning upon which the rest of the culture is based. Separating these four senses is for analytical purposes only; in practice each sense is entwined with the others.

2.2 Approaches to integrating culture into the CFL classroom The four senses of culture described above correspond to four approaches to integrating culture with language study. These approaches may be combined in various ways and degrees in CFL curricula, and presumably no program takes one approach entirely to the exclusion of the others. Yet the approaches can be conceived as a continuum of integrating culture and language less to more, from aesthetic (focused more on products and practices) to sociological to pragmatic to semantic (focused more on perspectives). The aesthetic approach is to treat target culture achievements as an adjunct to language, usually in separate courses on literature, religion, etc., or as “Chinese Culture 101” courses in East Asian Languages programs. The sociological approach covers very broad ground, and seeks to insert culture into the language classroom in the form of: cultural activities to raise awareness of cultural difference (Tomalin and Stempelski 1993), awareness of cultural values (Zhu 2008), or inclusion of cultural realia and simulations, “culture capsules” and “culture clusters” (Bonin 1982; Morain 1983). The pragmatic approach focuses on language-in-use as culture-bound acts of communication (Shih 1988; Zhang 1988; Hong 1997), often taking the form of usage explanations or “culture notes” in textbooks (e.g., Yao et al. 2005). The semantic approach manifests in “key words” studies (Wierzbicka 1997; Meyers 2000), or word studies in general, as the linguistic code reflects cultural distinctives (e.g., Hinkel 1995). There are three basic options for treating culture in the FL classroom: culture as a stand-alone subject5, culture as inserted ad hoc as needed or desired, 5 This may be construed in two ways. On one hand, as described, aesthetic culture may be treated in its own classes. On the other hand, as of the 1990s, there has been a movement toward teaching culture as a means of promoting intercultural understanding, and framing language study as a part of the larger project of culture study, as in the “European school” of language-and-culture (e.g., Byram and Esarte-Sarries 1991).

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or culture as systematically integrated with the language syllabus. The trend in CFL research is to move toward the latter of the three (Walker 1989; Kubler 1997; Linnell 2001; Xing 2006); yet in practice, as the present study will examine, culture is nonetheless widely treated as a stand-alone subject and inserted more or less ad hoc into language lessons. As an example of a state-of-the-art treatment of culture in CFL pedagogy, we shall take Janet Xing’s (2006) Teaching and Learning Chinese as a Foreign Language: A Pedagogical Grammar, as it systematically integrates all of the above described senses of culture into the CFL curriculum. Xing’s program conforms in spirit to criteria set forth by Walker and McGinnis (1995) and Kubler (1997) in their frameworks for Chinese language programs. To help teachers of Chinese as a foreign language “identify those cultural elements necessary for language teaching and learning”, Xing proposes this criterion: Any traditions, attitudes, rituals, beliefs, behaviors that are unique to Chinese society and people and crucial to learning and understanding the Chinese language, the people and their behaviors may be considered as part of the Chinese culture content to be taught and learned by non-native students of the Chinese language (2006: 242).

As specific examples of culture content, Xing offers five categories (tradition, attitude, ritual, belief, social behavior) that cover each of the aforementioned senses of culture. The program prescribes a four-year, multilevel program and reckons stages in culture learning as analogous to stages in language learning. Cultural themes from concrete to abstract are introduced incrementally as corresponding to “key” words, sentences, and genres. Thus culture is systematically integrated with language in a graded system: elementary (key words) ! intermediate (key sentences) ! advanced (discourse level key genres). In sum, there is no real debate that culture should be integrated with FL study, as language and culture are the warp and woof of one cloth (Valdes 1990; Byram and Morgan 1994). There is a rich literature available on classroom techniques for integrating language and culture (written predominantly in English for ESL/EFL and European language teachers, but largely applicable to CFL teachers as well). The field is so rich, in fact, that the notion of culture invokes a bewildering array of concepts that need sorting for their usefulness and relevance to FL teaching. The question that remains is: how can integrated programs (such as Xing’s) be effectively implemented given the real life constraints of teachers not specifically trained in cultural matters and students who may be encountering a new language and culture for the first time? Xing has identified a wide range of “necessary cultural elements” for the teacher to attend, and she prescribes a plan for addressing these elements. The present study asks, what

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role do the learners (with the backgrounds they bring) play in culture component pedagogy? What role does the teacher play? Given the elements of a native speaker teacher, the linguistic code, and non-native learners, how and where does “culture” show itself, and what non-code information is necessary for the teacher to impart?

3 The study: setting and participants The Chinese language program under observation is part of an East Asian Studies department in one of New York’s state universities offering four-year majors in Chinese (as well as Japanese and Korean). Observed were one of two sections of first year students taught by a native speaker teacher from Taiwan (female, age 30). The class had 20 students from several ethnic and linguistic backgrounds. Except for two Koreans and one Japanese, the students were enculturated in the United States (one immigrated from Colombia at age 7), and spoke Standard American English natively (two were bilingual Spanish-English). NonAsian students were chosen for interviews under the assumption that a greater cultural gap exists between non-Asians and the target, Chinese culture. Six students were interviewed: four females and two males, aged 19 to 21, from diverse American ethnic backgrounds. Two of the six, prior to beginning CFL study, had visited China for less than one month, but did not appear to gain any linguistic insight as a result. The teacher was trained in a master’s level Chinese teaching program at a teacher’s college in Taiwan; she had about five years of experience teaching in the US at the time of this study. Her class regimen was quite rigorous, with workbook homework assignments twice a week including vocabulary, listening, writing, and translating practice. There were two vocabulary quizzes per week and an exam once a week. Classes were tightly structured and teacher-fronted except for one small group activity included in (almost) each class session. The teacher modeled pronunciation, elicited choral response, and using a checklist systematically called on individual students to read or answer questions. The teacher made frequent use of the whiteboard and power point projections. Student questions were not encouraged, and thus infrequent (i.e., from a Western, Socratic method point of view [Scollon 1999]) – about one or two per class hour in the first semester. As the school year progressed, students asked more questions. The course text, Integrated Chinese, 2nd edition, Level 1, parts 1–2 (Yao et al. 2005) is organized in lessons on topics (Greetings, Family, Dates and Time, etc.). Each lesson is arranged: Vocabulary and texts (mostly dialogues), Grammar,

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Pattern Drills, Pinyin Texts, and English Texts. There are “Culture Notes” dispersed throughout the book not arranged in any systematic way, but seem placed more or less ad hoc as the authors see fit to include “cultural” information as ostensibly related to the language presented. For example, in the lesson “At the Library”, there appears a note after the vocabulary list: “In some libraries in China, the reader is not allowed to browse in the stacks. . .” (level 1, part 2, page 29). In the lesson “Asking Directions”, a “Culture Note” reads: “One conspicuous difference between Chinese and American systems of traffic signs is that there are fewer ‘Stop’ signs in the former. . .” (page 59). These notes were virtually unnoticed by the students, and the teacher never referred to them. The period of observation was one school year, from Fall, 2009 to Spring, 2010. The researcher sat in on classes about once a week the first semester, and twice a week in the second semester. Interviews were conducted in the 10th week and 14th week of the second semester. By this time, students had covered level 1, parts 1–2, of Integrated Chinese, including the accompanying workbook. The class met four times each week for a total of four hours and thirty minutes of instruction.

3.1 Methodology and procedures In the interest of qualitative full disclosure, I should insert myself, the researcher, into the narrative at this point.6 I began my observations of the class under study in the first semester with an assumption and some general questions. I assumed that, no matter how culture is defined by the participants, and no matter what implicit or explicit information was transmitted by the teacher,

6 My attitudes, observations, and interactions with participants are no doubt influenced in more or less perceptible ways by my personal characteristics and experiences. I am a middle class European-American male, aged 48 (at the time of the study). An example of why this is relevant: When a student tells me he wants to study either Arabic or Chinese, I can infer that he wants to study an “exotic” language. He and I share a cultural background which includes the understanding that these languages are not merely “less commonly taught”, but also the connotation that these languages are prestigious because they’re “rare” and difficult to learn. My identity is also relevant in my interactions with the teacher, who may perceive me as knowledgeable about American culture, thus coloring her responses. My experience with Chinese language and culture comes primarily from teaching English as a second/foreign language for about 20 years; eight of those years in Taiwan, where I developed a stand-alone course on American language and culture in a college Applied Foreign Languages Department (Danison 2000). I have also taught Chinese language in a small school in the US. As a current graduate student in FL education, I am interested in the role of the linguistic code as a resource in teaching culture.

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culture teaching and learning was taking place by virtue of the presence of a foreign language under study. My questions were: How does “culture” manifest itself in the language being taught and learned? Where does the teacher think it is? Where do the students think it is? Following the qualitative methods of grounded theory (Charmaz 2006), I sought to collect “rich data” in the form of: – a review of literature on teaching culture in the foreign language classroom (CFL in particular) – studying the course text, – meeting with teachers in the department, gathering information about the program as a whole – field notes on classroom observations – in-depth interviews with first-year students of Chinese and their teacher. From my early observations, I developed my research questions and proceeded to plan for interviews with the teacher and students. Interviews were conducted one-on-one in a quiet private setting. Each of the six students was interviewed for one hour on two separate occasions.7 The teacher was interviewed (in English) for more than two hours on one occasion, in addition to numerous informal conversations. Interviews were videotaped and transcribed. 3.1.1 Interviewing the students Interviews were semi-guided, as I aimed to let participants take the lead in defining the language and culture nexus. I explained to the students that I wanted to learn their impressions of learning Chinese and what their learning experience made them think of Chinese culture. I first gathered personal information regarding their language and culture background and probed their interest in studying Chinese. With their course text open in front of us, I pointed to each lesson (Pinyin, Writing Characters, Greetings, Family, Dates and Time, Hobbies, Visiting Friends, Making Appointments) saying (variously worded): Seeing the language is like this, what does it tell you about Chinese culture? I allowed the students to comment on what struck them as noteworthy, and I asked follow-up questions to probe further. Here are two examples:8 7 The second hour of each interview is not included in the present study, as it took an experimental direction not under consideration here. 8 An “idealized” transcription is employed here for better readability with the “hesitations and dysfluencies that are part and parcel of all speech” largely removed (Gee 2005: 129). Emphasis is italicized, pauses are indicated by double dashes, interruptions are indicated with single dashes, unintelligible portions and omissions are indicated by ellipsis, and editorial insertions are in square brackets.

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Interview sample 1 (Referring to the section in the course text where character writing is introduced) (Interviewer): Does the writing give you a general flavor of Chinese culture? (Student M2): It seems like there has to be a lot of precision. . . . It seems so precise like if you screw up one little dot or dash you just completely change the meaning of the word. . . . I: . . . . you mentioned precision. Does that tell you anything about Chinese culture? M2: The culture requires diligence. Since I’ve been at school I’ve met Chinese people and I have a few Chinese friends, and it seems whatever they work at they always do, go a hundred percent in, they do it right, they don’t slack off, especially [our teacher], she’s very focused in her work, and she just goes and goes. She always like seems to be on target, so that’s the precision or the accuracy. Sample 2 (Interviewer points to a picture of a family in the textbook) I: When you look at the picture, do you notice anything different about their house? F4: They have a lot of what we’d consider typical Chinese decorations like the lotus flowers in the background, also the calendar with the statue of Buddha, and even the tea drinking. I: And the way they’re dressed? F4: As far as I can tell, they’re pretty modernly dressed. 3.1.2 Interviewing the teacher I explained to the teacher the nature of my inquiry and the questions I had been asking her students. In addition to several informal discussions, I interviewed her in a manner similar to the students, with the course text open before us as a guide. But my main question for the teacher was: At what points do you think it’s necessary to teach culture as you go through this book (with culture understood as whatever extra-linguistic information learners might need to better understand the language)?

4 Results While student responses are richly diverse, each student interview shows a very similar anatomy, generalized as follows:

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1.

2.

An informal discussion of the student’s linguistic, ethnic, socio-economic background, and orientation to Chinese language study (e.g., why they chose to study Chinese). A semi-guided discussion of the student’s impressions of Chinese culture as prompted by language in the course text, which followed a similar trajectory for each of the six students: – An implicit definition of the word culture revealed by students’ comments – Opinions about the difficulty of the writing system and tones – The student’s impressions that Chinese culture is “polite”, “respectful” “hierarchical”, “practical”, etc. (these general impressions arose early and were interspersed through the interview) – Discussion of varied personal interest related to Chinese culture and divergence from the course text after only about six lessons, about halfway through the book.

Each of the these points will be discussed in turn with illustrative examples from interview transcripts.

4.1 Students’ background Table 1 lists the students’ demographic particulars. Gender and social class are not variables of interest in the present study as factors that bear upon students’ classroom experience. Student Demographics student code name gender age

“F1”

“F2”

“F3”

“M1”

“F4”

“M2”

female

female

female

male

female

male

20

20

21

20

19

21

residence

innercity

suburban

suburban

city

small town

small town

social class (parents’ income and education)

working class

middle class

professsional class

middle class

middle class

working class

home language

bilingual Spanish-English

parents’ ethnicity

immigrants from Mexico

students’ ethnicity

immigrants from Colombia

Hispanic-American

English immigrants from Cameroon

immigrants from Jamaica

African-American

English European-American

European-American

Table 1: Student demographics “Suburban” refers to residential communities built up within commuting distance of New York City. “Small town” refers to residential and commercial community centers in rural areas of New York State. “Working” and “middle” classes are distinguished by hourly wages vs. contract salary. “Professional class” here refers to doctors.

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4.1.1 Age and experience as factors in learning culture Age seems significant, as age cohorts have socially distinct interests and characteristics, and also as students display a lack of socio-pragmatic sophistication which is born of age and experience. For example: Sample 3 (Referring to forms of address in greetings) I: Here in the United States you’d address a teacher as Mr. Wang, but in Chinese literally it would be Wang teacher. What does that say about culture? F4: I noticed it more a difference here between high school and college, like in high school you’d call them Mr. or Mrs., but here [in college] it’s even better if you call the professor depending on what degree they have or something. As far as the Chinese culture it could be just distinguishing between teachers and different professions. I: Did you know they were called ‘professor’ before you came to college? F4: I got used to that when I first came here. As a college student, she is still broadening her knowledge base of appropriate forms of address in her native culture, and has recently learned titling practices for college professors versus school teachers. (She moreover is not clear on the similarities between English and Chinese in distinguishing between teacher/ 老师 and professor/教授.) This illustrates the point that socio-pragmatic knowledge is not static, and “native competence” is a matter of degrees according to experience.

4.1.2 Residential environment as a factor in learning culture Experience, of course, is born not only of age, but of environment. Residence has a great influence students’ exposure to other cultures, as American city dwellers display more familiarity with ethnic/language diversity than small town dwellers. The following excerpts illustrate the experience of small town dwellers. Samples I: M2: I: M2:

4 and 5 (Discussing personal background) Have you had any prior experience with Chinese language or culture? Not with language or culture. . . . What’s the ethnic make up of your high school? It’s majority white, it’s a very small community and very small minority population. My graduating class is 128, about 100 white. The rest are like a mix.

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I: Did you know any Chinese people while you were growing up? F4: Not while I was growing up. I knew a family who had adopted a child who was from China, but I don’t know if they even knew much about her background. Now that I’m in school and I’m around more people from different cultures I have a couple friends who are from China or like have Chinese backgrounds from their parents, et cetera. I: Any foreign languages spoken where you come from? F4: Around there it isn’t popular for people to speak a different or additional language. In contrast, the urban dwellers seem well acquainted with a variety of ethnicities (Chinese in particular): Samples 6 and 7 (Discussing personal background) F1: I went to a school near Chinatown [in New York City] that was like eighty percent Chinese. All my friends are Chinese. . . . M1: I like to shop and dress up a lot and stuff, so in New York City. . . . I would look at the different Asian people and thought like wow I really like the way they dress, it’s so cool. . . . I just always liked Chinese culture period, I even have a Chinese tattoo right here. It says success.

4.1.3 Bilingualism and ethnicity as factors in learning culture Home language and parents’ ethnicity seem to engender a familiarity with certain aspects of Chinese language. Bilinguals were able to draw upon their knowledge of two languages as they learned Chinese, while monolinguals encountered Chinese with a greater sense of “difference” and exoticism. First, some examples of monolinguals’ orientation to Chinese: Samples 8 and 9 (Responding to the question, “Why did you choose to study Chinese?”) F4: With the Spanish and the French, they’re both Romance languages and I wanted to take something that was different, so I decided with the Chinese because it had such a strong influence all over the world, especially in recent years. So I was advised by several people to take it. [Spanish and French are the most commonly taught languages in American schools. (Italics added for emphasis.)]

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M2: Well, I tried to make Arabic my minor or my major, but then once that program got cancelled, like I always knew I was gonna take Arabic or Chinese, so I just went with Chinese. [Arabic and Chinese are commonly known to monolingual Americans as difficult and exotic languages.] As for the bilinguals (who are also city dwellers and the children of immigrants), the theme of “respect” shown in formality in Chinese language resonated with their home language. (This applies to both bilingual and monolingual children of immigrants): Samples 10, 11, 12 (Referring to Chinese forms of introducing and greeting) F2: I feel like to be in the Latin culture and the Chinese culture, they’re very alike. . . . When Americans introduce themselves, it’s very informal, like ‘hi how are ya’, you know, ‘what’s up’, but the Chinese people are very, very formal, and I feel like in Spanish [my home language] it’s like that, too. [In English] it doesn’t really matter who we’re saying hi to. F1: In Spanish, in my Mexican culture, you have to talk to someone with respect like, ‘hello’ ‘good morning’ ‘good afternoon’ [spoken clearly, politely], if they’re older, you don’t know them, they’re of higher rank, you use the formal way, like usted. . . . To me it [Chinese] seemed normal. Chinese has ni and nin, and in Spanish it’s tu and usted. F3: Whether it’s with my parents’ African culture or Chinese culture, I feel like it’s just, respect is such a huge emphasis.

4.1.4 Personal characteristics as factors in learning culture We will return to related linguistic issues in following sections. As for student characteristics and their orientation to Chinese language and culture learning, personality (or psychological makeup) is certainly a variable, but perhaps too complex to treat adequately in the present study. Suffice it to say that the six students displayed six unique points of view and a wide range of personal habits, attitudes, and levels of competence, which is better termed “personal characteristics” than personality. Three examples follow: one student’s peculiar resistance to strange language customs and another student’s proclivity for devising interesting explanations for language phenomena.

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Sample 13 (To the question, “What do you find difficult about Chinese?”) F3: . . . . I am used to getting pretty good grades, and when I study and I still don’t get something, I feel like it’s the language’s fault! [emphasis added] Sample 14 (Referring to the multiplicity of terms for “cousin” in Chinese) F3: . . . . why can’t you just say ‘cousin’, like why can’t it be just one word, and I was like, this is so stupid! [emphasis added] Sample 15 (Referring to the Chinese use of the family name in greeting and addressing) I: What does it say about the culture that they use the family name that way? F4: Well just a respect, I think for other people, and to avoid calling someone the wrong name if you don’t know their first name for sure. Finally, the dimension of personal characteristics encompasses misunderstandings, preconceptions, prejudices, and the like. These may be born of common stereotypes, but they are also distributed individually depending on one’s exposure to other ways of life. Sample 2 above (“Do you notice anything different. . . . about the way they’re dressed?” “As far as I can tell, they’re pretty modernly dressed”), reveals a perception that associates Chinese-ness (or foreignness) with a lack of modernity. While the six students displayed a “politically correct” non-judgmental stance (which is rigorously preached in American education) toward things Chinese, it is nonetheless to be expected that learners will have some resistance, some negative or erroneous judgments, and some biases against a new culture.

4.2 Students’ implicit definitions of culture When asked directly, “What is culture?” students appeared confronted with a difficult question. Here are two responses: Samples 16 and 17 F1: Language – race, tradition – food, clothing. I guess the mannerisms of people, how they talk to you. Depends on the culture, it’s different – eating, how you eat. F4: It’s just someone’s background, traditions that their family has, relates to either their religion or their, where they, where their parents or their grandparents originally came from.

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Ordinary people do not usually have an anthropological definition of culture prepared for quick recital, nor would it be particularly useful to carry such a definition in one’s head. Yet in the process of a discussion of foreign language, when asked, “What does (this language point) tell you about Chinese culture?” students revealed a conceptual schema of “culture” with two basic features: (1) they framed culture as ways of life in juxtaposition, i.e., fuzzy sets of similarities to, and differences from, their own way of life; (2) they accounted for the differences they noticed with hypotheses in terms of general values ascribed to the culture. To illustrate: Sample 18 (Referring to the lesson on dates and time, the student has noted that the Chinese way of denoting months and days is different from English) I: Seeing that months and days are written with numbers, does that say anything to you about Chinese culture? F2: They’re big on numbers. Big on practicality. To put it schematically: – the L2 feature differs from the L1 – months and days have names in English, but they are numbers in Chinese – and it is worthy of remark – remarks pertain to features attended to in the L2: months and days are numbers (subtext: they are not names) – a hypothesis in terms of value is generated – the L2 (and thus its “culture”) marks something which is apparently important or worth attending to, i.e., the numerical aspect of denoting months and days – the language shows (in the student’s reckoning) that the Chinese value practicality because they prefer to use a number system in this way. Obvious examples of language differences triggering hypotheses of value include Chinese vs. English kinship terms. When learners discover that Chinese marks age rank as well as gender in terms for siblings, they remark that Chinese culture must value hierarchy more than American culture. A less obvious example involves the Chinese practice of omitting the possessive particle (的) when referring to a family member (e.g. 我妈, 我爸 / my mom, my dad): Sample 19 M1: Whenever you put ‘de’ it just means possession whatever it is, and so you would think like in American you would say ‘my mother’. . . . In Chinese. . . . you just say ‘I mother’, and the way the word is written is, there’s no separation between you and the parent or you and your sister or you and your brother it goes together [gesturing how characters go together without the particle between them], so that I feel like it’s just a form of intimacy.

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M1’s conception is: L2 differs from L1 in that L2 omits the possessive marker in a particular case. The attended L2 feature appears to be one of special closeness, such that marking possession would downgrade the intended marking of intimacy. The L2 culture, therefore, must value familial closeness. Obvious by omission, there are myriad language differences that learners do not seem to attribute to “culture”. Either the feature is ignored (as in the vast majority of cases), or a non-value hypothesis is offered. I shall call these technical differences. Here is an example in which a student was reluctant to ascribe a cultural value to a linguistic feature: Sample 20 (Referring to 一下, used to moderate or “soften” tone of voice in making a request or offering an invitation) M2: Yi xia, isn’t that ‘just for a while’ or ‘a little while’? . . . . I think with us [English speakers] like when you want to soften something we use a different tone like we change the voice of our language. In Chinese you actually use words to express what you’re trying to say. I: Do you think it has any reflection on the culture? Does it mean something? M2: I think it’s more a vagary of language because Chinese is based on tones. So if they started to soften the tones of their voice to soften something it would confuse the hell out of everybody. There are two things going on here: first, M2 doesn’t seem too clear on what the textbook calls “moderating one’s tone of voice”; second, he notes the contrastive features in terms of technical difference rather than value difference. Chinese, as it goes in M2’s conception, is a tonal language; thus, compared to non-tonal English, there are certain technicalities to deal with when “softening the tones of their voice”. If pressed, a person may venture a guess as to what any given language feature may indicate about its culture. Take for example 行, which translates into English with several senses, among them “to go”, “to undertake”, “to allow or permit”. This case of polysemy may lead to the hypothesis that Chinese language is parsimonious, reflecting a cultural value of parsimony. This seems congruent with the observation that Chinese language tends to deliver short monosyllabic bursts compared to polysyllabic English words; it could connect to stereotypes about Chinese people being “quiet” or “shy”. This hypothesis, of course, is fanciful and not likely to become a pillar in one’s conceptual structure – at least, it is not likely to be explicitly articulated. Yet experience tells us that the mind is constantly in the process of trying to make meaningful connections even among random events.

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The sum of these evolving mental connections made by learners of Chinese, I posit, constitutes the learner’s conception of Chinese culture as it springs from the language. None of this linguistic connecting and conceiving takes place in a vacuum, of course. There are numberless non-linguistic background experiences that inform the learner’s total conception. To list a few: Samples 21, 22, 23, 24 F2: [My Chinese friend] is very polite, very studious, you know, like you would imagine an Asian to be. M1: The only thing I pretty much heard people say was – I never really believed it was true but – they’d say stuff like they eat dogs and cats, that was pretty much the only thing about Chinese I knew. M2: I had a Chinese history class once so I always remember that, it’s like everything is done for the family, I mean not for the self or like personal glory. . . . F4: . . . . I haven’t known a Chinese person for a long period of time, but when I do meet them they’re always, the last person I met she was very polite. . . . almost too polite. People can say they are very friendly but they also try to be modest at the same time. [emphasis added] A learner’s total conception may be more or less widely informed, which is to say nothing of the accuracy or veracity of any of the component knowledge, but that it is an evolving whole, and each new observation is checked for coherence with existing knowledge. This vaguely-defined, evolving whole is the learners’ “implicit definition of culture” (paradoxically, a vaguely-defined “definition”). This can be illustrated by the parable of the blind men and the elephant: none of the blind men can see the elephant to comprehend its entirety, but each can feel a small part of the elephant’s body. From their very limited experience, the blind men state what the elephant is like. Table 2 presents a summary of the students’ impressions of Chinese culture as they spring from the language itself. From their two-semester study of Chinese, primarily from textbook lessons covering greetings, family, dates and time, and visiting friends, students gained a composite impression of Chinese culture as valuing learning, status/hierarchy, precision/practicality/logic, conformity, formality, politeness, humility, and family/ family intimacy. Finally, a major source of the students’ culture learning is the teacher herself. Although she made it clear in the interview that culture teaching is not her goal, her mere presence as a native speaker of Chinese is raw material for student observation and hypothesizing – regardless of what she does or does not say. In the students’ own words:

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Hypotheses about Chinese Culture Triggered by Language Features language feature !

writing system

F1

您贵姓 (asking one’s name)

kinship terms, titles & forms of address

“very respectful”, “very polite”

respectful of rank

F2

value history

“very respectful”

“pride in family”, “filial”, “hierarchical”

F3

“secretive”, educational elitist, conformist

respectful, polite

respectful, “family oriented” “proud”

M1

“so smart”

respectful, humble

“strict on roles and rules”, respectful

formal, respectful, “modest”

hierarchical, respectful of rank

F4

dates & time

一下, 吧 (moderating tone of voice)

的 (possessive particle*)

“definitely use polite language more” practical

logical

M2

diligent, “based on logic”, value precision

formal, respectful, humble

“hierarchical”

“logical”

summary gloss in terms of values

value learning, status, precision, conformity

value formality, politeness, humility

value family, respect, status, & hierarchy

value practicality

intimate family ties

value politeness

value family intimacy

Table 2: Students’ hypotheses about Chinese culture triggered by language features. Except as indicated by quotation marks, students’ responses are paraphrased. * Actually, the omission of the possessive particle.

Samples 25, 26, 27, 28 F3: [The teacher] will talk about something like when you’re in grade school there [in Taiwan], you keep going until you get it. . . . It made me just think of, there must be this importance on education and I guess uniformity. M2: She’s very focused in her work, and she just goes and goes. She always like seems to be on target, so that’s the precision or the accuracy [in Chinese culture; see sample 1] I: Does your teacher give you a sense of what it would be like to study in China? F4: Some idea, yeah. I would guess for the most part that they’re very hard working and they expect a lot out of people. . . . I do know that they value education a lot, even I would say, more so than a lot of people here [in the US].

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M1: I don’t know if it’s just [our teacher] or a lot of Chinese teachers, but she’s like really strict, like I remember, I swear I was no later than 5 minutes handing in my homework and she just gave me a zero. . . . Students’ impressions of their teacher as a representative of the culture seem quite congruent with their impressions from the language. The teacher’s personal qualities or idiosyncrasies no doubt have some skewing influence on her students’ perceptions of Chinese culture, especially since they had no other Chinese teachers at the time to compare her to. In the students’ own words, she was wellliked and respected, and even a favorite teacher.

4.3 The teacher’s implicit definition of culture The goal of the interview with the teacher was to find out at what points she thinks it’s necessary to teach culture in her first-year classes. At the outset, she admitted that Chinese language, and not culture (however it may be defined) is the focus of her class. In her words: “My goal is to show them the differences between English and Chinese, and sometimes the differences are a little bit cultural differences”. By the first use of “differences” she means primarily technical differences, as described in the previous section. Early in the interview she said, “The only differences I can think of right now are grammatical; [as for] cultural, we’ll have to discuss it out”. As the interview progressed, as we thumbed through the text, the preponderance of her comments were in reference to how she explains the various mechanics of the language – writing, pronunciation, grammar, etc. – to her classes. At one point, in response to my question, “Do you see any culture yet?” she said apologetically, “I don’t know how or when to implant culture aspects”. She did reveal a conception of “culture”, however, in many of her remarks. The following vignette is representative of our exchanges, as it illustrates the teacher’s unwillingness or inability to connect language to culture, and thus to entertain students’ questions about it. Here, at my prompting, she attempts to explain why the family name precedes titles in Chinese. Sample 29 I: Why do you say Li xiansheng and not xiansheng Li? T: Xiansheng, xiaojie, you always put surname before them – why? Hmm [pondering] – unlike Mr. Li, we say Li xiansheng – why? I: Well, do you ever suggest some reason why to your students, or do you say anything?

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Family names represent people? Right? Oh? So family names first, and then their chengwei. Their title Yeah their title – what a poor explanation! [laughs] I don’t know – a lot of times I don’t really make sense – but I guess they [students] just have to suck it up!

The teacher re-framed the question in terms of a difference between English and Chinese, recognizing my “xiansheng Li” as the English “Mr. Li”. As for generating a hypothesis of value, however, she was not quickly forthcoming. She was stumped by the question “Why do you say it this way?” because such things are simple facts of life, and asking why seems childish. “Family names represent people?” is her explanation in the form of a question, as if to say, “It’s obvious, isn’t it?” The last line (“I guess they just have to suck it up!”) points to an attitude that colors the teacher’s thinking about students’ questions: There is a lot of language to learn, she thinks, and students’ questions about “culture” can be time consuming and annoying. This is evident in a student’s comment: Sample 30 I: Do you ever ask her why they say it this way? M1: . . . . she’s really strict and keen on her set rules, her set ways, I mean it’s a good thing though, because we’d get really behind with everyone saying ‘I don’t understand this’, but we gotta keep moving [through the syllabus]. As for the culture notes interspersed throughout the text, the teacher said: Sample I: T: I: T:

31 (Interviewer pointing to the course text) So what about this culture note down here? No, I don’t bother. They’ll just read it themselves. Okay. I didn’t even pay attention until students came up to me and said, “Hey on the note number two, and they say ‘ni hao ni hao ra ra’ and I say, ‘Oh really? Oh. I didn’t even read that’.

It’s evident that teaching culture is not the teacher’s interest. It’s also evident that she doesn’t see the relevance in answering students’ questions that stray from the technicalities of language. This is because the teacher herself doesn’t

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feel confident to venture anthropological or sociological guesses, nor does she feel that such guesses would further the cause of language learning. Even though she may articulate such an attitude, her actual performance shows that she indeed teaches culture with language – which is to some degree, of course, unavoidable. In her own words, from a student interview: Sample 32 (Referring to kinship terms; see also sample 14) F3: [I said] why can’t it be just one word [for ‘cousin’] and I was like, this is so stupid, and she [the teacher] was like, ‘No, if you want to learn the language you have to learn the culture’. What she means by “culture” here is a patterned way of doing things: You can’t take a concept from English (one word for “cousin” attending to a smaller number of features) and impose that on the Chinese concept (a multiplicity of words attending to a larger number of features). Her primary concern with “culture” is in making sure students use the language in the correct way, which is in conformity to technical patterns, with the occasional value added in from time to time – sometimes articulated, sometimes unarticulated. Here is an example of information the teacher adds to a polite formula for asking one’s name: Sample 33 T: And with gui xing, when you answer you don’t answer with wo gui xing unless you are the king of China, and there’s no king of China! This is the teacher’s well-rehearsed patter for first-year students. It is intended to be humorous and to anticipate the learner’s possible misuse of the formula (Q: 请问, 您贵姓? A: 我贵姓王). There is information embedded in this explanation, which, regardless of the teacher’s implicitness or explicitness, may be construed by an American learner: Chinese are polite or flattering by asking for one’s “honorable” name; Chinese are humble because they wouldn’t call their own name “honorable”, and perhaps other similar construals. If students want to ask why this is, as occasionally happens, the classroom exchange looks like this (from a student interview): Sample 34 (Referring to the incorrectness of saying “我贵姓”) F3: I remember it was the first two weeks of class and everyone was like ‘Why, why can’t you say it?’, and [the teacher said] ‘cause, “honorable”, you don’t use, you want to be humble’. And we said, ‘Why?’ and she’s like, ‘Well, you have to be humble.’

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As another example of teaching Chinese ways in the course of teaching language: Sample 35 (Referring to the dialogue on “calling one’s teacher”, on the subject of polite ways to refuse when asked to do a favor) I: You teach them not to say ‘no’ directly, but to say something like ‘I’m busy’? Is that different from English? T: What if I want to say ‘no’ in Chinese, that’s what I teach them, but in English I assume that I would say [pause to think] – huh – what would I say differently? Maybe still the same, ‘I’m busy’ – I don’t know – that’s – [pause to think]. How about American way, how do you say ‘no’? I: Lots of times don’t just come out and say ‘no’ either – we’re indirect, too, in our own way. T: Really? No way! The teacher explicitly teaches her students a Chinese method of polite indirectness without framing it as a particular value in Chinese culture. She is not clear on the degree to which this method is used in English. When I say Americans are indirect in their own way, she acts surprised. This shows that she holds an assumption that Chinese are more indirect than Americans, but will not presume to make a definitive statement to me (is she indicating something to me indirectly in her discourse?9). A final example of “cultural” (in this case, pragmatic) information inserted into lessons: Sample 36 (Discussing the phrase 那算了 / “never mind”, “in that case, forget about it”, “forget it”) T: You shouldn’t say ‘na suanle’ because it’s too impolite, too – too casual. I: Mm hm. Now, is this something that you’re telling your students? T: So I would say, ‘Use that only to your friends’.

9 There is an observer’s paradox problem here. On the occasions of my classroom observations, the teacher may have been influenced by my presence such that she resisted making cultural comparisons, knowing that I purport to be a kind of “expert” on Chinese-American intercultural communication. Also in the interview, she may be guarded in her reports on where she inserts culture into the language syllabus.

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In sum, her implicit definition of culture is: the way we speak and do things in Chinese. She may construe this in contrast to the way things are done and said in American English, but not necessarily. As the standard-bearer for Chinese language, she does not feel a need to interpret differences or to offer reasons for the way Chinese is. Her job is to model the language and to exhort students in the technicalities of using it properly. In the words of one student: Sample 37 (See also samples 14 and 32) I: What does she say when you say things like “this is stupid”? F3: Well, granted. . . we all respect her, so we’ll stop because this is her culture, you know. . . . She’s trying to make us aware as well so we don’t look like idiots when we use the language. She doesn’t get frustrated for the most part, though. She’ll say something smart like “Well, no one’s forcing you!”

5 Discussion To summarize the “bottom-up” view given in the above sections: We have a picture of a native-speaker teacher with personal idiosyncrasies and a particular background of experiences which may or may not be germane to students’ overall, generalized concept of Chinese culture, but who nonetheless models the language, and in a somewhat ad hoc manner, models Chinese culture as well. The teacher performs her role as standard-bearer for the language and its correct use (which, inevitably, entails the concomitant culture which she more or less unwittingly models or teaches). We have a picture of students from a variety of backgrounds including a variety of ethnicities in bilingual and monolingual homes in settings ranging from small towns to cities. Each student displays a variety of personal idiosyncrasies, experiences, and levels of competence. Each of the students is nonetheless American, having been educated in American schools, socialized among American peers using standard American English. They view language and culture in terms of difference: technical differences between English (or their other language) and Chinese language, and value differences between American culture (or their other culture) and Chinese culture. These students are evolving a conception of Chinese culture as they make mental connections between various experiential input by way of making hypotheses about cultural values. The classroom/textbook language and the teacher play chief roles in the students’ evolving conceptions.

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Thus, several themes emerge from the picture. Four are prominent: difference, coherence, awareness, and idiosyncrasy. It is observed that, taking the perspective of the learners and the teacher, inclusion of culture in the CFL classroom should be informed by a definition of culture which emphasizes these four themes or elements, described as follows. 1. “Culture is difference” (Kramsch 1993), and learning a new culture is a process of assimilating new information against a background of existing schema, seeing something previously known in the categories of a new system (Olson 2001). Culture is seen by learners (at first) in terms of differences and similarities. Being confronted with differences, learners look to the teacher to guide them to major themes, or a kind of cultural grammar. 2. Language-and-culture is a complex conceptual system or “semiotic network” (Geertz 1973; Lantolf 1999). It is patterned and congruous (Hall 1959). Culture is a complex whole in which meaning ultimately coheres. Language learners look for values that fit together as they attempt to construct a coherent concept of the target culture. 3. Culture is largely out of awareness (Hall 1966). In confronting a foreign culture, both the teacher and her students face metacognitive blind spots. This point is elaborated in section 4.1.3. below. 4. All experience is filtered through individuals who are carriers of culture (Brooks 1968); each person carries an “individual representation” of culture (Kronenfeld 2008). The idiosyncratic makeup of each person affects their uptake of cultural information and how they will react to that information.

5.1 How this study can inform CFL language and culture programs Taking Xing’s (2006) work as a standard in the field of teaching culture in CFL, the following is a commentary from a bottom-up view at real world factors which may inform program theory and design in that field. At least three questions emerge from the classroom picture: What is the necessary culture content to teach? When should this content be introduced? How can the teacher become more aware of the cultural dimension in order that she may answer these questions for herself?

5.1.1 How can we identify “necessary cultural elements” to teach? Xing’s criterion to identify “necessary cultural elements” for the teacher to attend extends to all that is “crucial to learning and understanding the Chinese

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language, the people and their behaviors” (2006: 242). Clearly this is a tall order, but Xing provides guidance as to what those elements should include specifically, and she assumes a four-year time span in which to carry it out. “The important task” writes Xing, “is to identify the elements and to determine when and how these cultural elements can be integrated into language classes and become instrumental in the advancement of students’ Chinese language competence” (2006: 244). Stated another way, the question remains as to what is the necessary noncode information, toward the goal of teaching culture, a teacher should provide in the course of teaching the language. The teacher in the present study put an emphasis on providing technical information that can assist learners in speaking the language correctly, to advance their Chinese language competence. In the course of doing that, she also imparted much about the culture in a tacit way. The language, and what she anticipated that students would struggle with based on her experience, were her guides. Perhaps what is needed in addition to an identification of “necessary cultural elements” is an understanding between the teacher and her students that all cultures share a common core of humanity – similarities – and, as differences are encountered, they can be treated as domains having some overlap and some non-overlap. For instance, the theme of “respect” can be treated as something which both Chinese and Americans do, albeit in varying ways and degrees in varying situations. A guide beyond the language is thus needed. The teacher can only be prepared to teach culture if she is alert to what culture is; knowledge of the four themes described above seems a good beginning.

5.1.2 A graded approach? Xing writes: Assuming that students’ cultural proficiency progresses with their language proficiency, I suggest applying the same theory of learnability in language learning to cultural learning: That is to group cultural elements based on the degree of difficulty in learning, just as we have done with grammatical elements . . . (2006: 244)

This seems theoretically sound, that language and cultural proficiency develop hand-in-hand – the more language one learns, the more culture comes along attached to it. Culture is an evolving concept in the learner’s mind, and as the learner is making mental connections toward a fuller picture of the target culture, learning semantic relations between words is useful to that goal. Xing suggests first learning key words, then key sentences, and beyond that, key genres. Yet a consideration of learners’ idiosyncrasies and L1 can also inform the teacher as to when the “right time” is to introduce key words, sentences, or concepts. When students notice differences and ask for reasons, whether this be in

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the elementary or advanced stages, the time is right for the teacher to introduce semantic connections in the target language and show how these may or may not overlap with the students’ L1. This should not be limited to the word level, as even elementary texts encompass the sentence level and discourse level. For instance, the course text, in lesson six, has a dialogue in which a student calls her Chinese teacher to make an office appointment. A student may ask, “What if the teacher says ‘no’?” This happened in the course of the present study, and the teacher had an opportunity to explain that a direct “no” isn’t appropriate (see sample 35). In fact, Americans wouldn’t say a flat “no” in this situation either. What then is the cultural difference? The difference is in the way the concept is connected to other concepts in the culture. The form of refusal or declining can be introduced as “indirectness”, which is related to “harmony” / 和谐 which is related to “etiquette” / 礼 and to “face” / 面子 and to “guanxi” / 关系. The point is that, although language learning may follow a concrete to abstract or simple to complex pattern, it does not mean that cultural instruction must follow the same pattern. A view from the bottom up shows that the classroom milieu, the concatenation of individuals, their native language(s), their personal concerns, competence levels, and so forth can determine the proper time to introduce any given feature. On a related note, when it is considered that Chinese language learners in the program under study have about a fifty percent rate of attrition, meaning about half of the learners may have only these two semesters of exposure to Chinese language and culture for the rest of their lives, to follow a program that assumes that some aspects of culture are too complex for beginners is to miss an opportunity to raise the level of intercultural awareness among FL learners in the US. A senior professor in the East Asian Languages Department told me that a major goal of foreign language study in their department is to introduce students to alternative ways of thinking as well as to promote fluency in a foreign language. One wonders how much cognitive growth or new understanding of languages and cultures students who leave after one year will take with them. By introducing semantic connections early, the teacher can impart a fuller flavor of the culture earlier, to the benefit of all who go on in CFL study as well as those who will drop out.

5.1.3 Culture is largely out-of-awareness Xing notes: “Native speakers of any . . . language can communicate both effectively and efficiently because they know the culture and understand the society in which they live. . .” (2006: 238, emphasis added). In large part, cultural “knowledge” is like grammatical knowledge; most of us are unaware of the

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many rules of grammar that constantly guide our speech, yet in some sense we know and understand our language. We are likewise unaware of the cultural patterns that underlie our communication, yet we know how to get along. Many learners of foreign language become aware of their native grammar only upon learning the new language. So it is with culture. Missing from Xing’s discussion are questions regarding the role of the native culture in foreign language learning and the out-of-awareness character of cultural knowledge. The teacher in the present study exhibited a lack of awareness not only of the students’ culture in its various senses, but of her own culture in that, although she knew what was appropriate, she could not articulate a reason for that appropriateness. This reason is ultimately, as the teacher puts it, that this is just how things should be done. “You have to be humble”, for example. But what the students are looking for is a sort of logic, a “cultural grammar”, keys to understanding the larger system of culture. They were not satisfied with the answer the teacher gave them, and the teacher was not happy with their incessant questioning. Perhaps by the end of the year the students had found a sort of makeshift cultural grammar. In their encounters with the language, they were confronted with differences for which they ventured hypotheses, and subsequently tested these hypotheses as their learning progressed. Being FL learners, not having the benefit of a surrounding environment filled with Chinese language, not having the opportunity to be constantly engaged in interaction with native speakers, the process of culture learning is slow, and their conceptions no doubt remain stunted and skewed.

6 Conclusion: Usefulness of this study to the CFL teacher The teacher in this study was praised by her students for being able to anticipate the technical problems, as speakers of English, they have while learning Chinese. In one student’s words: Sample 38 I: She has a sense of, what did you say? She has a sense of what you think? M2: Like how it seems to us, but how it is in Chinese, she can interpret that for us. I: So, knowing English she can anticipate what you’reM2: -like what we’re gonna struggle with and what we’ll have a problem with.

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Yet the teacher was not as able to anticipate or answer to their satisfaction questions of world view or value differences. As a learner of English language, the teacher is able to participate with her students as they encounter language differences (and, as she said, “a little bit culture differences”). I posit that if she were also an active learner of American culture, she could also participate with her students as they encounter Chinese culture via their language learning experiences. Herein lies the problem: what precisely about culture should the teacher be learning? In defining the basics of FL teacher training, Walker and McGinnis (1995) state: “An expert learner is one who has demonstrable success interacting with members of the relevant society. An expert teacher of [Chinese] is a person who is most able to assist learners in understanding the strategies and tactics of interacting with the cultures in question” (n.p.). An expert teacher, therefore, should be an expert learner as well, and the goal of learning is success in interaction in the target culture. Research in the culture component in the FL classroom has given us, as already noted, an (over)abundance of material in the form of approaches and activities. What the present study has to offer is not intended to add to the mountain, but rather is an attempt to tease out essential elements from it – to find a sharper focus with which the teacher can better define the task. To that end I have suggested in section 4 above four interrelated aspects of what “culture” is. Culture is seen by learners (at first) in terms of differences and similarities. Being confronted with differences, learners look to the teacher to guide them to major themes, or a kind of cultural grammar. If the teacher remains unaware of cultural differences, and if she is complacent in her role as language standardbearer, she will miss the opportunity to help students grow beyond a simplistic differences-and-similarities view of culture. The teacher needs to cultivate a sense not only of how her native culture differs from her students’ culture(s), but she also needs to cultivate a sense of how meaning coheres in her own culture. Thus, via the language, the teacher can assist students to build a more coherent mental map of the target culture. The teacher should become an active learner, cultivating her students’ and her own awareness in a dialectical process of questioning her students on their native cultures and letting that inform her students’ concepts of the target culture. There are no two students, teachers, or classrooms exactly alike, and so a certain amount of “play” or freedom should be factored into CFL language and culture pedagogy. With the language as a guide, the teacher-as-learner can interact with the unique mix of students in her class toward the goal of making connections among the aesthetic, sociological, pragmatic, and semantic senses of culture triggered by language.

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Wierzbicka, Anna. 1994. “Cultural Scripts”: A semantic approach to cultural analysis and crosscultural communication. Pragmatics and Language Learning. Monograph Series. 5, 1–24. Wierzbicka, Anna. 1997. Understanding cultures through their key words. New York: Oxford University Press. Wolf, W. and K. Riordan. 1991. Foreign language teachers’ demographic characteristics, in-service training needs, and attitudes towards teaching. Foreign Language Learning Annals, 24, 471–478. Xing, Janet Z. 2006. Teaching and Learning Chinese as a Foreign Language: A Pedagogical Grammar. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Zhang, Z. 1988. A Discussion of communicative culture. Journal of the Chinese Language Teachers Association 23 (3), 107–112. Zhu, Bo. 2008. Chinese cultural values and Chinese language pedagogy (Master’s thesis) Document number: osu1228349636 Permalink: http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view? acc_num=osu1228349636

Xiaolu Wang and Tingting Ma

Analysis of pragmatic functions of Chinese cultural markers1 Abstract: Although a discourse marker does not have semantic truth-value and can only generate meanings in the pragmatic category, it can indicate the implicit meaning in the context and contribute to the deduction of the speaker’s intention. If the listener does not know the psychological, social and cultural background implied in the speaker’s utterance, it is hard for him/her to get the true emotion and intention the speaker conveys in the discourse since discourse markers sometimes trigger cultural features of the particular language. Those which can trigger Chinese culture and display distinctive way for Chinese to communicate are termed as Chinese cultural markers (CCMs) in this paper. In Chinese conversation, CCMs have strong pragmatic complexity because their pragmatic functions are implicit rather than explicit. In order to assist the mastery of Chinese language for foreign students, this paper has probed into the pragmatic functions by New Intention and New Common Ground Theory. After the logical analysis, we have found that in daily conversation CCMs usually play such pragmatic roles as follows: ① promoting mutual reciprocity between interlocutors; ② softening the strong tones in speech; ③ hiding interlocutor’s true feelings; ④ alleviating negative expressions; and ⑤ smoothening the progress of discourse.

1 Introduction The study of linguistic markers can be traced back to the mid-20th century and has since reached some academic conclusions. Researchers tend to study linguistic markers from the perspective of connotations, functions (grammatical, semantic, or cognitive), classifications, second language acquisition, and so on. In general, their researches can be divided into two schools, i.e. the School of Consistency and the School of Relevance. The representatives of the first group are Schiffrin (1987), Redeker (1990, 1991), and Fraser (1988, 1990, 1996, 1999), who put emphasis on the consistent relationship of markers in context and on their adjusting and repairing functions in the completion of turn-taking in a conversation. The second group is represented by Blakemore (1992, 1996, 2002) and Jucker (1993, 1996), who claimed that linguistic markers indicate context features and context effects so that both sides of the conversation are able to be smoothly engaged in the context and the perlocution. 1 Sources of corpus in this paper are from: a) Contemporary Chinese Corpus at Peking University; and b) modern Chinese novels.

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In China, such researches are usually focused on the classification, semantic analysis, a combination of discourses or analysis of discourses. The famous linguists Wang (1955), Chen (1978), Xing (1986, 1991, 1997, 2002), Shao (2007), and Zhang and Chen (2000) all showed their concern about this language phenomenon, but they have various controversial arguments regarding its features, functions, insert locations, and the position in linguistics respectively. Other important researchers include Liao (1992), who reclassified Chinese discourse combiners mainly by their functions and locations, listing 16 categories; Ran (2000), who generally probed into communicative roles of markers played in Chinese under the framework of Relevance Theory and Adaptation Theory, terming them all as “discourse markers”; Liu (2004), who divided Chinese linguistic markers into words, phrases, and small clauses, and analyzed their pragmatic functions respectively from such aspects as context factors, verbal communications and so on; and Feng (2004, 2005, 2008, 2011), who contrasted between “discourse markers” and “pragmatic markers” and further pointed out that linguistic markers have no impact on true value propositions, as their functions can be found mainly, in pragmatics. However, compared with researches on English markers, much less attention has been paid to Chinese markers. For instance, very few studies can be found on the Chinese cultural context of Chinese markers, nor on the mechanism of their pragmatic functions. In order to fill in the gap in this area, it is attempted by the authors to do research on the pragmatic functions of Chinese cultural markers (CCMs) in light of the Socio-Cognitive Approach and Assumed Common Ground Theory advanced by Kecskes and Zhang (2009). In other words, we try to describe in this paper the generative process of the pragmatic functions of Chinese cultural markers because such qualitative analysis can easily display their effect on the communicative process of certain discourses. Before analyzing their pragmatic functions, we would like to define the concept of CCMs, distinguishing them from general discourse markers (GDMs), and introduce the New Intention Theory developed from the Socio-cognitive Approach and Assumed Common Ground Theory, on which basis we will then analyze the pragmatic functions of CCMs.

2 GDMs and CCMs In verbal communication, in order to reach the communicative goal, the speaker tends to utilize pragmatic strategy, letting the listener have a better understanding of his/her connotation in a certain communication. In linguistics, a discourse marker is a word or phrase that is relatively syntax-independent and does not change the meaning of the sentence, and has a somewhat empty mean-

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ing (Moder and Martinovic-Zic 2004). According to Swan (2005), a discourse marker is a word or expression which shows the connection between what is being said and the wider context. It connects a sentence to what comes before or after, or indicates a speaker’s attitude to what he is saying (e.g. on the other hand; frankly; as a matter of fact). As discourse markers convey more meaning than the literal meaning of an utterance, they exceed the load capacity of lansign itself. To distinguish them from cultural discourse markers, we just term them as general discourse markers, or GDMs for short. Cultural markers belong to linguistic markers but have their own particular characteristics. In addition to common traits of linguistic markers, cultural markers may trigger special cultural connotations or association with ethnic customs of different cultural backgrounds. A CCM is a kind of marker which can trigger Chinese cultural connotations or national customs under Chinese cultural background besides its feature of a GDM. In a Chinese conversation, a CCM can effectively relay the speaker’s connotation of informing, persuading, and appealing to the listener, and reasonably express the speaker’s negation and denouncement as well in a typical Chinese way. As CCM has a strong link to Chinese cultural information and implicature, it is very difficult for the listener to get the correct information if he/she lacks Chinese cultural background. In an authentic communication, the information obtained from the literal meaning of such cultural markers is likely to be false. However, if the other conversationalist knows such expressions, he/she is willing to accept the “false information”, and will appreciate the real connotation in the Chinese cultural context. In the Chinese language context, a CCM can convey the speaker’s connotation of giving information, proving an argument, appealing to the listener, and rationally expressing his/her own obligation and objection. On the other hand, a CCM can trigger the listener’s association of Chinese culture and adopt certain Chinese ways to respond to the utterance. If the recipient lacks knowledge of Chinese culture, he/she can hardly establish the link between the literal meaning and the Chinese culture and then hardly receive the correct information. In an authentic communicative situation, the literal meaning of any CCM more often than not relays false information, but a Chinese listener is ready to accept such “false information” and gets the implicature from the perspective of Chinese culture. Compared with GDMs, CCMs have the following distinctive characteristics.

2.1 Culture-bound CCMs enable the speaker and the listener to choose the right linguistic strategies according to the change of the context from the perspective of Chinese culture to complete the speech act in the context of a Chinese cultural background while GDMs do not trigger the cultural background. Look at the following example.

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“我真是诚心夸您。 ” 刘美萍委屈了, “这话又不是我说的, 是观众, 女观众 的集体反映。” [‘I praised you from the bottom of my heart.” Meiping Liu felt wronged, “I didn’t say that, but the audience did say it, so they are the collective reflection of the audience.’] (Wang: You Are Not a Layman, 1992) (http://bbs.cqupt.edu.cn/bbsanc.php?path=%2Fgroups%2Fliteral.faq% 2FLiterate%2FD44DE627D%2Fwangshuo%2FD6657DA9D%2FM.1038993251.A)

In (1), the marker “I didn’t say that” reflects a Chinese way of delivering praise and provides a piece of false information, that is, “those words” were not spoken by Liu; instead, this is the common opinion expressed by the audience. Having a deep insight into the sentence, we can find that this marker can be explained in two ways: ① It was the audience who said these words and what Liu did was to repeat only their opinion; ② Liu herself intended to praise the listener by means of reflecting the audience’s opinion. It is not difficult for us to discover that the second explanation can more reasonably account for the speaker’s intention. Moreover, by adopting the false information through cultural markers, Liu can more suitably and appropriately deliver her praise to the listener. However, if either communicative sides have no background of Chinese culture, for example, those foreign students from cultures far different from Chinese culture, may have difficulty in obtaining correct information beyond the literal meaning of CCMs.

2.2 Untranslatability CCMs usually cannot be translated into another language literally or directly but can only be translated with the implied meaning with different literal words according to the context. Likewise, if you know the Chinese cultural background, and even if you know the Chinese language, it is hard for you to translate back in typical Chinese expression when you read the translated version of a CCM. Take the translation of Dream of the Red Chamber as an example. (2)

平儿道：“奶奶这么早起来做什么, 那一天奶奶不是起来有一定的时候儿 呢。爷也不知是那里的邪火, 拿着我们出气。何苦来呢, 奶奶也算替爷挣 够了, 那一点儿不是奶奶挡头阵。不是我说 , 爷把现成儿的也不知吃了 多少, 这会子替奶奶办了一点子事, 又关会着好几层儿呢, 就是这么拿糖 作醋的起来, 也不怕人家寒心。况且这也不单是奶奶的事呀。我们起迟 了, 原该爷生气, 左右到底是奴才呀。奶奶跟前尽着身子累的成了个病包 儿了, 这是何苦来呢。” (Cao: Dream of the Red Chamber, 1754) (http://book.sina.com.cn/longbook/1092043284_hongloumeng/101.shtml)

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From the analysis of the first example, we already know that besides the literal meaning, the discourse marker, “不是我说” has a more important pragmatic function, i.e. directing to the general background of Chinese culture. Here, in (2) from the two authoritative English versions of Dream of the Red Chamber translated respectively by Yixian Yang (2a) and David Hawkes (2b), we can see very clearly that a CCM can hardly be translated directly into English. Yang and Hawkes coincidently adopted the strategy of free translation when they translated this discourse marker. Now let’s look at them one by one. (2)

a. Yixian Yang’s version: ‘“Why get up so early, Madame?” asked Pinger. “Don’t you have a fixed time for getting up every day? Master Lian’s in a bad temper over something and taking it out on us. That’s just too bad!” She turned to challenge him, “Madame’s done enough for you, hasn’t she, always bearing the brunt for you? It’s not my place to say this, sir, but you’ve taken advantage of her all this time, and it’s not much you’re doing for her now – not just for her sake either yet you make such a song and dance about it. Don’t you mind hurting her feelings?”’ (Dream of the Red Chamber, translated by Yixian Yang, 1994: 393) b. David Hawkes’ version: ‘“Why are you getting up, ma’am?” put in Patience. “It’s too early yet. And I don’t see what you have to work yourself into such a terrible temper for, sir! Why take it all out on us? Hasn’t Mrs Lian gone to enough trouble for you in the past? The number of times she’s borne the brunt on your behalf! Perhaps I shouldn’t say this, but in view of all that she’s done for you, it doesn’t seem very fair to make such a big fuss about this one favour, especially when you think how many other people are involved. Do you have no consideration for her feelings? Why should she take all the blame anyway? We were late getting up, and you’re entitled to be angry with us – we’re only servants after all. But when you think how she has worked herself into the ground and ruined her health, it seems so unkind of you to pick a quarrel with her now!”’ (Dream of the Red Chamber, translated by Hawkes, 1976: 1971)

Here it is obvious that it is Pinger (or: Patience) who is speaking. However, she declined, “I am not speaking”. In the novel Pinger is Lian Jia’s concubine, whose position is under Lian Jia and Xifeng Wang (husband and wife). On the one hand, it is not appropriate for her to air her opinion directly when the husband and wife are quarreling. On the other hand, she actually criticizes Lian by implicitly expressing her dissatisfaction with him in her words. The

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CCM “不是我说” softens her tone not to offend Lian. It is appropriate, congenial and reasonable for her to speak to any superior above her, in this way, in Chinese culture. To meet the requirement of the context, Yang and Hawkes translated the same discourse marker by employing different expressions. Yang’s version “It’s not my place to say this” lays emphasis on Pinger’s social status, whereas Hawkes’s version “Perhaps I shouldn’t say this” puts weight on the situational context where Pinger is speaking.

2.3 Loose connection with its context The understanding of the whole sentence where a CCM lies does not necessarily rely on the CCM; in other words, if the CCM is omitted, the meaning of the sentence is still understandable, but if the GDM is omitted, then it may affect the expression of the original sentence. In other words, the connection between the GDM and its discourse context is not exactly like that between the CCM and its discourse context. The former has a close connection while the latter has a loose one. The main connections between a GDM and its discourse context usually include attracting the listener’s attention, laying emphasis, creating certainty, summarizing, exemplifying, providing informative sources, explaining and supplementing, and so on, while a CCM does not have such apparent functions of connections. If a CCM is taken away from the original sentence, the sentence even still makes sense, i.e. the continuum of the whole sentence in structure will not be affected by an omission of the CCM. Now let’s make a comparison between the GDM and the CCM. (3)

a. 汝昌的研究《红楼梦》早在五十年前即已开始, 这一节我想是可以 作证的。 《红楼梦》的研究达到了今天的规模与水平 (C1), 显而易见 , 在五十年前是梦想不到的 (C2)。[Ruchang’s study on Dream of the Red Chamber started fifty years ago. This section I think can be used to prove it. The fact that the study on Dream of the Red Chamber has reached current scope and level (C1), obviously, couldn’t be imagined fifty years ago.] (Huang: Preface of “To Xueqin Cao”, 1985) (http://www.eywedu.com/honglou/62/mydoc001.htm)

In (3a), the word “obviously” is a GDM, indicating summary of the paragraph. However, if the GDM “obviously” is replaced by a CCM “needless to say”, we can see a different picture, because the CCM does not have such close and obvious connection with its context. The whole sentence can still hold its meaning if the CCM is canceled.

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b. 汝昌的研究《红楼梦》早在五十年前即已开始, 这一节我想是可以 作证的。 《红楼梦》的研究达到了今天的规模与水平 (C1), 不用说, 在五十年前是梦想不到的 (C2)。[Ruchang’s study on Dream of the Red Chamber started fifty years ago. This section I think can be used to prove it. The fact that the study on Dream of the Red Chamber has reached current scope and level (C1), needless to say, couldn’t be imagined fifty years ago.]

When comparing between (3a) and (3b), it is evident to see that there exists a close relation between the GDM “obviously” and its contextual clauses of (3a)–C1 and (3a)–C2 while there only appears a loose connection between the CCM “needless to say” and the clauses (3b)–C1 and (3b)–C2. In other words, the meaning of summary of (3a)–C2 from (3a)–C1 is mainly indicated by the GDM. In contrast, the semantic value of CCM “needless to say” in (3b) in the whole sentence does not appear that obvious, but its implicature emerges in the cultural pragmatics. Accordingly, it is safe to define that a CCM is a Chinese culture-bound discourse marker. As a frequently occurring language phenomenon in verbal communication with loose relationship between clauses, a CCM does not have a semantic value. It is not only because it presents the typical Chinese saying and it is a distinctive way for Chinese to communicate with each other, but also because it usually cannot be translated literally or directly from Chinese to other languages (e.g. English) and it can only be translated according to its implicature and its context. Furthermore, it conveys the speaker’s tone of Chinese culture, and triggers the listener to respond to it in a proper Chinese way. Therefore, it helps the communicative process go smoothly forward between Chinese people. The following are a few examples of CCMs. Phrases: 话说回来 [speak back] 看样子 [look at the appearance] 退一步说 [to say the least] 可也是 [also] etc. Clauses:

不至于吧 [You don’t say!] 你看你 [look at yourself ] 不是我说你/他/她 [I’m not blaming you/him/her] 我说什么来着 [what did I say?] 不是我说 [I am not speaking.] 话是这么说 [It can be said.] etc.

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3 New intention and new common ground theory Kecskes and Zhang (2009) put forward the Socio-Cognitive Approach and the Assumed Common Ground Theory, which have amended or polished Grice’s Cooperative Principle (1975), revealed the dynamic and systematic features of verbal communication. Intention, attention and common ground, altogether construct the whole process of verbal communication. According to the dynamic model of meaning (DMM) presented in Kecskes (2008), communication is the result of the interplay of intention and attention on a socio-cultural background. Verbal communication is always carried out in a socio-cultural context, simultaneously impacting on the socio-cultural background. Intention is one of the core factors in verbal communication because communication is considered an intention-directed practice, during which the interlocutors mutually recognize the intentions and goals, and make a joint effort to achieve them (Clark 1996). Therefore, the cooperation between interlocutors is the direct reflection of their intentions. According to the DMM, two components of common ground are identified: core common ground, which is composed of common sense, cultural sense, and formal sense, and mainly derives from the interlocutors’ shared knowledge of prior experience, and the emergent common ground, which is composed of shared sense and current sense, and mainly derives from the interlocutors’ individual knowledge of prior and/or current experience that is pertinent to the current situation (Kecskes and Zhang 2009). Zheng (2009) further elaborated on this theory by employing it in her doctoral dissertation to describe the dynamic features of presupposition and the relationship between presupposition and every factor of verbal communication. She declared that presupposition is the requirement of a sentence for the interlocutors’ acts, beliefs, and the sociocultural context, and that presupposition stems from the restrictions on regular meanings, conversational pragmatics and social cultures. Common ground is related to and consistent with the dynamics of intention and presupposition in verbal communication. In the process of verbal communication, the interlocutor’s verbal expression is directed by his/her speech intention. As we all know that the cognitive process is always affected by the set of intentions. With the progress of the conversation, the interlocutors continuously adjust or alter their own intentions. In other words, in the dynamic development of the conversational context, the interlocutors usually timely adjust or alter their speech acts to realize their continuously updated new intentions. The speaker’s intention or presupposition is based on a core common background. Taking a core common background into account, the interlocutor may choose some comparatively suitable common ground knowledge to accord with the

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progressive situation. It is self-evident that the common ground is also dynamic and will be updated with the progress of the conversation because the speaker would establish a or a set of emergent or new intention(s), which may of course contribute to the set of new common ground(s). After the activation of the new common ground and its mergence with a core common knowledge, the speaker would adjust his/her presupposition according to his/her new intention and new common ground to reconstruct his/her speech act. The following figure may display the process.

Figure 1: Dynamic feature of common ground, intention and presupposition

Chinese cultural background knowledge belongs to a socio-cultural background in the core common background. In a conversation, interlocutors with Chinese background may unavoidably be affected by Chinese culture besides the restriction of communicative intentions. Therefore, they may take the most effective strategies for pragmatic presupposition. A CCM is a representative of such strategies in a concrete communication taking place in a Chinese cultural context. It implies the following possibilities in a conversation: ① Some obstacles appear in the realization of the original intention; ② The speaker encounters an unexpected response; ③ The presupposition needs adjusting; ④ The discourse context is unfavorable to the realization of the speaker’s intention. Usually, when the cultural marker appears at the beginning of the turn, it indicates that the speaker presupposes that he/she may meet with some difficulties to carry out his/her intention. When the cultural marker appears in the middle of the discourse, it demonstrates that the interlocutor has received the other side’s opposition in response, or the discourse context is unfavorable to the realization of his/her intention. At that time, the interlocutor may change his/her strategy for the discourse on the grounds of his/her cultural background

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knowledge. In this process, those pieces of information favorable to the current discourse in the cultural background knowledge may be activated and then access the emergent common ground from the core common ground, which enables the interlocutor to construct new intentions on the pragmatic level in order to more effectively convey and realize his/her original intention. When the speaker chooses a CCM, he/she actually has added another intention to his/her old one. The addition of this new intention mainly takes place on the pragmatic level rather than on the semantic level. Its pragmatic objectives are to purposefully avoid the conflicts between the interlocutors, to smoothly promote the progress of the conversation, and to successfully realize his/her intention from the perspective of cultural background. The emergence of the new intention does not mean the disappearance of the original intention because the two intentions exist separately on the pragmatic and semantic levels, performing their own function without coming into conflict. To meet the requirements of the two intentions, the speaker may alter his/her presupposing act and pragmatic strategy to switch integrally to the explicit meaning from the implicit meaning. From the examples (1) to (3), it can be seen that the use of a CCM signals the emergence of a new intention, the activation of Chinese cultural background, and the alteration of the speaker’s pragmatic strategy. In other words, once the speaker applies a CCM, its pragmatic function will emerge and come into force. If the listener has the Chinese background, he/she will immediately follow the speaker to enter into the new common ground. Otherwise, he/she cannot enter into it, nor can he/she understand the speaker’s implicature. On such a basis, the pragmatic functions of CCMs are salienced. This will be demonstrated in the following figure:

Figure 2: Dynamic function of CCM in a turn of conversation

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From this figure, we can see very clearly that the discourse that CCMs are included is a key link for the interlocutors to establish new intentions both on semantic and pragmatic levels, which with the combination core background knowledge contributes to the set of the new common ground.

4 Pragmatic functions of Chinese cultural markers How can a cultural marker elicit the connotation beyond its literal meaning? The dialectical relationship between the original set of a presupposition, an intention and common ground and the emergent set of a new intention and new common ground, and how they interact with one another is obviously demonstrated in Figure 2. It is in this process that the CCM plays its important role in three aspects: activating the core background knowledge, updating the knowledge in common ground, and adding new intention to the new common ground. Zhang (2009) put forward in her doctoral dissertation the processing principle for presuppositions, and made logical descriptions about the updating process of propositional presuppositions, intentions and common ground in discourse (Please see the detailed theoretical analysis in her dissertation: Research on Theories of Formal Presupposition Based on Dynamic Understanding, Zhang 2009). Following her example, this paper will describe the developing process of CCMs by the same means in order to probe into their pragmatic functions. In our opinion, CCMS have mainly the following five pragmatic functions: ① promoting mutual emotions between interlocutors; ② softening the strong tones in speech; ③ hiding the interlocutor’s true feelings; ④ alleviating negative expression; and ⑤ smoothing the progress of discourse, because they are inseparable from Chinese culture and closely related to profound Chinese traditional philosophy. The following part will analyze these pragmatic functions one by one so as to display the impact of CCMs on the switching of the process of discourse. The signs and their representative meanings in the analysis are shown as follows. U: K: I: C: R:

Set of interlocutors’ utterances Set of interlocutors’ propositional knowledge Set of interlocutors’ intentions Common ground of current discourse shared by interlocutors Pragmatic reasoning

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The entire process of the updating discourse is shown as follows: (Supposing that a turn of A and B’s utterances should be counted as the completion of one turn of discourse) Step Step Step Step Step Step Step Step

One: Two: Three: Four: Five: Six: Seven: Eight:

UA-update KB-update IB-update C-update U-update KA-update IA-update C-update

The functions of CCMs are mainly played on Step Three (IB-update) and Step Seven (IA-update). A and B may revise their intentions (I) respectively according to the other side’s utterances, may add new intention to the new pragmatic level, and may update the common ground (C) together to permit the discourse to continue smoothly. Both new (I) and new (C) act on the speaker’s presupposition to complete the update of the discourse.

4.1 Promoting mutual emotions between interlocutors Pursuing peace and avoiding conflicts are the virtues developed from a long history, which has a close link to the farming culture in China. The thought of “laying stress on the agriculture and restraining trade” has long been associated with the earth and Chinese life. In a primitive society, the life style for Chinese people of beginning work at sunrise and having a rest at sunset has all the more cultivated the notion of sticking to one’s native land and being content with one’s own lot for Chinese people. Such thought can be found in the works of ancient philosophers even before the Qin Dynasty. One such philosopher is Laozi, who said, “Water benefits everything but never fights over anything.” Laozi compared the virtue a nobleman should have to water and taught us to learn from water to moisten everything without preparing to have a conflict with others. His thought implied that a nobleman should hold a modest and prudent attitude, should know the force of peace and calmness, and should be more tolerant than ordinary people in order to avoid meaningless conflicts. Likewise, Mozi held the same philosophy that “The strong should not oppress the weak, and the rich should not insult the poor”, which was cited by China’s former President Zemin Jiang when he visited Moscow in May, 1991, and is now spread worldwide.

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Confucius also advocated similar philosophy in his teaching, “Do not do to others what you do not want others to do to you”, encouraging us to have mutual understanding and mutual respect for others, and not to force others into doing something and not to interfere with others. In other words, do not impose your own opinion on others when they disapprove; just propose some suggestions when you disagree with others, and do not put a stop to anything by force, even if others ignore you. Be polite, rather than conflict with others, when a disagreement occurs. Naturally, such a philosophy of staying at peace with others and avoiding conflicts has been reflected in the Chinese people’s manner of speaking. In reality, interlocutors would express themselves from their own standpoints or positions, which are likely to become the foci of contention. Therefore, in verbal communication it is necessary for interlocutors to use cultural markers to moderate their tone and to temper their own point of view. In this way, the speaker may promote mutual emotions between interlocutors, diminish the probability of conflicts, and reach his/her own communicative goal by seemingly speaking to the position of the listener. (4) 我耐心地说： “妈, 现在不兴订婚那一套了, 你想替他们做个主, 就能做得 了主吗？你趁早打消这个念头吧。 ” 母亲叹了口气, 自言自语道： “可也是 要说呢, . . . 可小冰这孩子, 从那么穷那么老远的一个地方, 能走到今天 这一步, 人家孩子可多不易。一个好汉三个帮, 你也认识不少的人, 到毕 业的时候, 你就不能也帮帮他? . . .” [I said patiently, “Mom, nowadays engagement is out of fashion. How can you decide marriage for them as long as you want to do that? Give up the idea as early as possible. ” Mother heaved a sigh and spoke to herself, “ke ye shi ( You may be right). If it is . . . but Xiaobing, from such a poor and remote region, has gotten into today’s state. It is how hard for her to achieve it. Two heads are better than one. Since you know numerous people, why don’t you help her when she graduates?”] (Liang: Dancer on Arc, 2004) (http://vip.book.sina.com.cn/book/chapter_38687_25626.html) The background of the above passage is that the mother wants to make matchmaking for a young man and a young woman, but the son (“I” in the novel) does not agree. After her suggestion is rejected on her first try, the mother does not give in. As the son is patiently dissuading her from trying, the mother knows better rather than to express her mind openly and directly to her son. Here the CCM “可也是” (ke ye shi / You may be right) in the discourse has partially offset the potential conflict. Then the mother’s topic turns to “Xiaobing”, narrating Xiaobing’s merits and accounting for the reason why she wants to help them

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as well. With the CCM “可也是”, her remark is logical, reasonable and smooth. However, without the CCM “可也是”, her tone would appear stiff and the connection between sentences would seem abrupt, though we can still understand the mother’s words. We may describe the cognitive activities of (4) by employing the processing principle of presuppositions for cognition. To ease our analysis, we reserve the cultural marker “可也是” (may be), and then simplify the utterances of the interlocutors. Interlocutor A (I): You want to decide their marriage, I don’t agree. Interlocutor B (Mother): “可也是” (You may be right), but I will still help them. Here, we just focus on the effect of the CCM “可也是” (may be) on the whole sentence. Step One: UA-update process U0={(φ)} RU: C×I×K=>U C1={p(p they); q(B: wants to decide their marriage); s(common cultural background)} KA1={r(A: disagree; B: decide their marriage): KAr, KA~KB r} IA1={i(tell B, r is true)} Result: U1={UA: uA(You want to decide their marriage, I don’t agree.); UB: (φ)} Explanation: According to the expression of presupposition of proposition r in U1, A has realized his assignment of propositional attitude towards communicative intention. Step Two: KA-update process KB1={φ} RK: C×U×I=>K C1={p(p they); q(B wants to decide their marriage); s(common cultural background)} U1={UA: uA(You want to decide their marriage, I don’t agree.); UB: (φ)} IB1={j1(decide their marriage)} Result: KB2={r(A disagrees B to decide their marriage.): KBr} Explanation: B has understood A’s proposition in UA, and updated his knowledge set. Step Three: IA-update process IB1={j1(to decide their marriage)} RI: C×U×K=>I

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C1={p(p they); q(B wants to decide their marriage); s(common cultural background)} U1={UA: uA(You want to decide their marriage, I don’t agree.); UB: (φ)} KB2={r(A disagrees with B to decide their marriage.): KB r} Result: IB 2={ j1 (to decide their marriage); j2 (IA1={i(tell B, r is true)}); j3 (avoid conflicts with A)} Explanation: B has understood the meaning conveyed by A in UA , and updated her intention set. Meanwhile, B’s opinion is contradictory to A’s. According to s(common cultural background) in C1, B begins to form new intention to avoid any possible conflict in order to meet the requirement of communication. Step Four: CA-update process C1={p(p they); q(B wants to decide their marriage); s(common cultural background)} RC: I×U×K=>C IB 2={ j1(to decide their marriage); j2 (IA1={i(tell B, r is true)}); j3 (avoid conflicts with A)} U1={UA: uA(You want to decide their marriage, I don’t agree.); UB: (φ)} KB 2={r(A disagrees with B to decide their marriage.): KB r} Result: C2={p(p they); q(B wants to decide their marriage); r(A disagrees with B to decide their marriage.); s(common cultural background)} Explanation: Via the cognitive process, the proposition r has been added to the set of common ground C2, and thus the verbal communication has been updated. Step Five: UB-update process U1={UA: uA(You want to decide their marriage, I don’t agree.); UB: (φ)} RU: C×I×K=>U C2={p(p they); q(B wants to decide their marriage); r(A disagrees with B to decide their marriage.); s(common cultural background)} KB 2={r(A disagrees with B to decide their marriage): KB r} IB 2={j1(to decide their marriage); j2 (IA1={i(tell B, r is true)}); j3 (avoid conflicts with A)} Result: U2={UA: uA(You want to decide their marriage, I don’t agree.); UB: ((You) may be (right), but I will still help them.)} Explanation: In UB, B reveals her real intention; however, she applies cultural marker “可也是” (may be) to promote their mutual emotion, to avoid conflicts, and to express roundabout her intention that she still wants to decide their marriage.

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Step Six: KB-update process KA1={r(A disagrees with B to decide their marriage.): KAr, KA~KB r} RK: C×U×I=>K C2={p(p they); q(B wants to decide their marriage); r(A disagrees with B to decide their marriage.); s(common cultural background)} U2={UA: uA(You want to decide their marriage, I don’t agree.); UB: ((You) may be (right), but I will also help them.)} IA2={j} Result: KA2={r(A disagrees with B to decide their marriage.): KAr, KAKBr; t(B avoids conflicts with A), KAt, KAKBt; v(B wants to help them), KAv, KAKBv} Explanation: According to the s(common cultural background) in C2, A understands the “可也是” (may be) in UB , which updates his set of knowledge. Step Seven: IB-update process IA1={i(tell B, r is true)} RI: C×U×K=>I C2=C2={p(p they); q(B wants to decide their marriage); r(A disagrees with B to decide their marriage.); s(common cultural background)} U2={UA: uA(You want to decide their marriage, I don’t agree.); UB: ((You) may be (right), but I will still help them.)} KA2={r(A disagrees with B to decide their marriage.): KAr, KAKBr; t(B avoids conflicts with A), KAt, KAKBt; v(B wants to help them.), KAv, KAKBv} Result: IA2={k(IB 2={ j1(to decide their marriage); j2 (IA1={i(tell B, r is true)}); j3 (avoid conflicts with A)})} Explanation: According to intention principle, B understands the meaning conveyed in UA, and then updates his set of intentions. Step Eight: CB-update process C2={p(p they); q(B wants to decide their marriage); r(A disagrees with B to decide their marriage.); s(common cultural background)} RC: I×U×K=>C IA2={k(IB 2={ j1(to decide their marriage); j2 (IA1={i(tell B, r is true)}); j3 (avoid conflicts with A)})} U2={UA: uA(You want to decide their marriage, I don’t agree.); UB: ((You) may be (right), but I will still help them.)} KA2={r(A disagrees with B to decide their marriage.): KAr, KAKBr; t(B avoids conflicts with A), KAt, KAKBt; v(B wants to help them.), KAv, KAKBv} Result: C3={p(p they); q(B wants to decide their marriage); r(A disagrees with B to decide their marriage.); s(common cultural background); t(B avoids conflicts with A); v(B wants to help them.)}

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Explanation: Via the cognitive process, propositions t and v have been added to the set of common ground C3, the verbal communication has been updated. The Chinese cultural marker “可也是” (may be) not only shortens the distance between the interlocutors (son and mother) and avoids the conflicts between the opposite sides (A stops his mother’s action, but B insists on it), but also further strengthens Mother’s resolution to complete the original intention (to decide their marriage) by revealing her pragmatic new intention (to try to let A, her son, understand her).

4.2 Softening strong tone in speech Whether it is in verbal conversation or in written work, indirectness has long been advocated and has its aesthetic value in Chinese culture. Implicature is one of the most important roles played by a cultural marker generated in verbal communication. Such implicature has its deep root in culture, such as reflected in literature, in art, and in religion. Zhu Guangqian (1987) pointed out, “Endless meanings cannot be conveyed by limited language, and thus, numerous meanings are understood without words. Literature is beautiful not only because it can be expressed in limited language, but particularly because it can relay endless meanings.” Using limited words to convey connotation beyond literal words coincides with Chinese way of expression and temperament, and agrees with the doctrine of the mean which has long been valued by Chinese people. Therefore, whether it is in oral or in written language, Chinese people tend to speak in a roundabout and implicit way to display their own appreciative values, instead of being frank and outspoken and coming straight to the point. Their true meaning cannot be directly detected by the listener. Usually the listener has to think it over to get the real intention of the speaker, after the listener receives the information. It is generally believed in Chinese culture that such a way of verbal communication is appropriate and decent. The implicit way of communication is considered to be temperate and refined, while the explicit way to be simplistic and facile. Such way of thinking in favor of the implicit and against the explicit is praised in the creation and appreciation of Chinese literature. In daily communication, Chinese people are accustomed to placing the most important information at the end of a discourse, and sometimes people even indirectly convey important details owing to the limitation of some important social occasions or of one’s social status. In this way, the speaker tries to soften his/her strong tone and expresses his/her true feelings through reasonable means. For instance:

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周恩来细细问了经过, 叹道： “以后呀, 说话要慎重。许世友不在北京, 不太了解这里的情况。这样吧, 等我出院了, 把你和张春桥的矛盾解决解 决。”周恩来说着说着就动了感情, 说： “好在印发政治局了。张春桥这 个人不好对付啊, 我都对付不了他。你看你呀, 还不想当副总理。”[Enlai Zhou asked him in detail and sighed, “From now on, you should be prudent when you are speaking. Shiyou Xu is not in Beijing, so he doesn’t know the situation here. Okay, let’s settle the difference in views between you and Chunqiao Zhang after I leave the hospital.” While saying these words, Enlai Zhou was carried away by his emotion, “Fortunately it has already been printed and distributed in the Political Bureau. Chunqiao Zhang is a tough guy to deal with; even I cannot settle him down. Look at yourself, you don’t even want to be vice premier.”] (Wu: Yonggui Chen’s Ups and Downs in Zhongnanhai, 1993) (http://news.sina.com.cn/o/2008-02-21/134013450656s.shtml)

The background of the above discourse is that Zhou talked to Chen before he appointed Chen to be the vice premier. Zhou was in the position of premier and could directly appoint the vice premier, which indicated that he had the ability to determine the fate of others in the conversation. Chen did not know the complexity of the political situation in China at that time. Instead of demanding Chen to “look at yourself”, the sentence is more subtle, which confers “implicatures” upon the sentence. The first implicature is the speaker’s criticism to Chen. The second one is his hope or request for Chen to accept the position. The third is the manifestation of the current situation in which Chen has no right to decline the appointment and should not shirk his responsibility. Owing to the length of this paper, only Speaker’s (Premier Enlai Zhou’s) update process, and the process shared by Speaker (S) and Listener (L) for the new common ground (C) are shown in the following. Speaker: Premier Zhou Listener: Younggui Chen US-update process U0={empty} RU: C×I×K=>U C1={p(p the position of vice premier); q(L did not want to be vice premier); s(common cultural background)} KS1={r(S disapproved that L refused to be appointed as a vice premier): KAr, KA~KBr} IS1={i1(tell B, r is true); i2 (soften the strong tone, L is easy to accept)} Result: U1={US: uS(Look at yourself, you even don’t want to be a vice premier); UL: uL (φ)}

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Explanation: S expressed his intention in U1, meanwhile he used the CCM “你看你呀” (Look at yourself ) to give Chen the power of refusal but at the same time he took it away, implying that Chen needed to know better, or know what to do that is proper. In this way, Premier Zhou emotionally pulled closer in their relationship. S and L: C-update process C1={p(p the position of vice premier); q(L does not want to be vice premier); r(S disapproved that L refused to be appointed as a vice premier); s(common ground)} RC: I×U×K=>C IH1={k(IL1={i1(tell L, r is true); i2 (soften the strong tone, L is easy to accept)})} U1={US: uS(Look at yourself; you don’t even want to be a vice premier); UL: uL (φ)} KB1={r(S disapproved that L refused to be appointed as a vice premier): KLr, KLKSr; t(S softened his strong tone), KLt, KLKSt} Result: C2={p(p the position of vice premier); q(L does not want to be vice premier); r(S disapproved that L refused to be appointed as vice premier); s(common ground); t(S softened his strong tone)} Explanation: Through the cognitive process, the proposition (t) has been added to the new common ground (C2). Therefore, the verbal communication has been updated, i.e. a new common ground has been built up in the listener’s mind, which contributes to transforming Chen’s intention to be congruent with Zhou’s willed intention, and thus the emergence of Chen’s new intention.

4.3 Hiding interlocutor’s true feelings “Constant Mean” or “Middle Way” is also one of the most important temperaments in Chinese culture. In The Analects, Confucius regarded the “Constant Mean’’ as the highest moral criterion and the wisest way for him to handle everything as well. “Yong Ye”, an article in The Analects claimed, “Perfect is the virtue which is according to the Constant Mean!” To be mediocre is to stick to the middle of road, to adhere to the rules, to split the difference. Through the ages, Chinese people have developed the middle way to think, act, and to develop one’s social behavior. In reality, tact, flexibility and moderation are the beliefs Chinese people stick to. When they are asked to deal with contradiction, they are good at listening to both sides and to choosing the middle course, i.e. considering both sides neutrally, to seek a middle way to resolve the dispute to pursue moderation and stability. A Constant Mean and good human relations have had a long impact on the spirit of Chinese people,

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which is reflected in their speech, and in the manner of pursuing appropriateness and agreement. Nevertheless, in such a cultural background in which the expression of one’s feelings is constrained, Chinese people do not constrain themselves from developing the linguistic ability to express their thoughts. On the contrary, they try to express their true intention by resorting to a variety of forms of language modes. In real communicative discourse, sometimes due to the restraints of their status or of the occasion, they have to hide their true feelings and reduce the display of their emotions. In this way, they can carry out their conversation in a much more roundabout way, which is in line with the “mean” characteristics of the Chinese way of communication, i.e. avoiding being prominent in a conversation and trying to conceal oneself in a group. The following example will show this point. (6) “最近干吗呢？ ” 我打出一张 “风头”, 问于观 , “老没见你。 ” “惭愧, 不值一提。 ” 于观帮丁小鲁打出一张牌, 冲我道：“说出来臊人。 ” “人现在写小说了—碰！ ” 丁小鲁忙不迭地碰出三张 “白板”。 我和刘会元相视而笑。刘会元说：“咱怎都混得这么惨呵？” “怎么, 你们几位也开始写小说了？ ” 于观笑着说, “不至于吧？你们几个不 是混得不错吗？ ”（王朔《一点正经没有》） [“What have you been doing recently?” I discarded a “Wind” (a tile of Mahjong), asking Guan Yu, “Long time no see.” “Ashamed, nothing worth mentioning.” Guan Yu helped Xiaolu Ding discard a tile, speaking to me, “I feel ashamed to speak out.” “He is now writing a novel, — bump” Xiaolu Ding ponging three “White Dragons”. Huiyuan Liu and I smiled at each other. Huiyuan Liu said, “What a tragic life all we live!” “What? You all begin writing novels?” said Guan Yu, laughing, “You don’t say! All you guys are well off, aren’t you?”] (Wang: Not Serious at All, 1989) (http://showup494956013.blog.163.com/blog/static/ 166665061201062492756270/) In this context, it is presupposed that a novelist is not regarded as a good occupation and that only “those who do not do well” will choose to write a novel. As Yu was the first person to reveal his occupational information, he was placed on a fairly low discourse position. “不至于吧” (You don’t say) implies that the situation was not that bad. After he knew all their occupations are the same as his, Yu showed a little bit of surprise. But because of his position in presupposition, he could not strongly display his incredulous feelings.

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Therefore, the CCM “不至于吧” (You don’t say) in the discourse hides the fluctuation of Yu’s feelings, softens his tone of surprise and violation of expectation, and makes his expression more sensible and appropriate. If the CCM “不至于吧” (You don’t say) is changed into a GDM “不是吧” (Really?), it is less likely to get such a pragmatic effect. Owing to the limitation of this paper, only Speaker A’s and Speaker B’s update processes, and the process shared by A and B for the new common ground (C) are shown in the following. Speaker A: Huiyuan Liu Speaker B: Guan Yu A: U-update process U0={empty} RU: C×I×K=>U C1={p(p the career of novelist); q(a novelist is not a good occupation); s(common ground)} KA1={r(A’s profession is a novelist): KAr, KA~KBr; v (A did not used to be a novelist): KA KBv} IA1={i1(tell B, r is true)} Result: U1={UA: uA(What a tragic life all we live!); UB: uB (φ)} Explanation: A finally realized his communicative intention assigned by his propositional attitude according to the presuppositional expression of proposition (r) in U1 . B: U-update process U1={UA: uA(What a tragic life all we live!); UB: uB (φ)} RU: C×I×K=>U C1={p(p the career of novelist); q(a novelist is not a good occupation); s(common ground)} KB1={r(A’s profession is a novelist): KBr; v(A did not used to be a novelist): KBv} IB1={j1 (IA1={i(tell B, r is true)}); j1(ask whether r is true); j3 (avoid his own true feeling)} Result: U2={UA: uA(What a tragic life all we live!); UB: uB (You don’t say! You guys have a happy life, don’t you?)} Explanation: After B understood what A passed in UA, he updated his set of intentions; In the meantime, as there was a contradiction between v and r, B had an impulse to enquire. According to the s(common ground) in C1 and out of communication needs, the probable intention (j3 ) to avoid the emerging conflict.

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A and B: C-Update process C1={p(p the career of novelist); q(a novelist is not a good occupation); s(common ground)} RC: I×U×K=>C IA2={k(IB1={ j1 (IA1={i(tell B, r is true)}); j1(ask whether r is true); j3(avoid his own true feeling)})} U2={UA: uA(What a tragic life all we live!); UB: uB (You don’t say! You guys have a happy life, don’t you?)} KA2={r(A’s profession is a novelist): KAr, KAKBr; v(A did not used to be a novelist): KAr, KAKBr; t(avoid true feeling), KAt, KAKBt } Result: C2={p(p the career of novelist); q(a novelist is not a good occupation); r(A’s profession is a novelist); s(common ground); t(avoid true feeling)} Explanation: Undergoing the cognitive processing, the proposition (t) is added to the new common ground (C2), and the discourse is also updated. The CCM “不至于吧” (You don’t say) avoids the speaker’s more direct and wounding words – “a novelist is not a good occupation”, letting the speaker easily cloak or cover up his true feelings in order not to hurt the others directly with his words.

4.4 Alleviating negative expressions Confucianism asserted that etiquette is encouraged and peacefulness is prized, so it is proposed to ease social contradictions via etiquette. The core of the principles of etiquette since ancient China has been in the three major relationships between Lord and subject, father and son, husband and wife, and the six minor relationships between father’s brothers, elder and younger brothers, one’s kinsmen, mother’s brothers, teachers and elders, and friends. They are required to look after each other and respect each other in order to ensure everything is harmonious. Therefore, the people living in such a patriarchal clan system would take etiquette as a balanced structure to stabilize the society. To be specific, what people say and do should comply with a series of rules for morality and deeds in the structure, which are established on the basis of clans and families. That is why the Chinese way of speaking is often restricted within the framework of “filial piety and charity”. The nepotistic system of power of the imperial clan tied to kinship has profound influence on Chinese culture, and yet, on the other hand, the way Chinese speak undoubtedly demonstrates the strong characteristics of clan style. Since ancient times, both the notion of the noble and the humble in a hierarchy and the notion of the family blood or kinship relation have a thousand and one links with ancestor worship. Owing to the impact of a patriarchal clan system, the Chinese are accustomed to treating everyone in all of society as a member of one big Chinese family (a national identity), taking into account the

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difference of status and position between the listener and the speaker himself/ herself in social communication. In such a social system, people, especially those with low status, are discreet in word and deed, and even intentionally defame themselves. Therefore, when criticizing others, Chinese people appear overly cautious. They are taught not to criticize others directly, but in a roundabout way, which indicates characteristics in line with the manner of speech and actions of the whole nation. Now let’s look at the following two examples. (7)

那黄老前辈, 不是我说他, 碰着几个阔人, 或是中堂、尚书、有权势的, 一般低颜下膝的恭维 . . . [That Old-timer Huang, I’m not blaming him, would humbly flatter them on his knees whenever he comes across some rich people, high officials, or powerful people . . .] (Li: Short History of Civilization, 1903) (http://gj.zdic.net/archive.php?aid-22728.html)

In (7), the object the speaker is making a comment on is “Old-timer Huang”. As it is not appropriate for him (a young man) to criticize a senior like “Oldtimer Huang” directly, the speaker employs the CCM “不是我说他” (I’m not blaming him) to fuzz his indication. If the listener is someone who knows Chinese culture, then he can understand the implicature of indignity and criticism conveyed by the CCM. A: U-update process U0={(φ)} RU: C×I×K=>U C1={p(p Old-timer Huang); s(common ground)} KA1={r(A disagrees with Old-timer Huang’s act): KAr, KA~KBr} IA1={i(tell B, r is true); i2(indirectly express negation)} Result: U1={UA: uA(That Old-timer Huang, I’m not blaming him, would humbly flatter them on his knees whenever he comes across some rich people, high officials, or powerful people . . .); UB: (φ)} Explanation: A revealed his intention in U1. Meantime, he applied the CCM “不是我说他” (I’m not blaming him) to alleviate his negative expressions. Thus he successfully avoided the face-to-face conflict and direct criticism by expressing indirectly his true intention. (8) 师弟, 不是我说你, 你有多少江湖阅历, 俗语说得好, 知人知面不知心, 何况咱们与孟建雄又没有什么交情, 怎好随便对人说出真话? [ Junior Fellow, I’m not blaming you, how many social experiences do you have? The saying that you may know a person’s face but not his heart makes sense.

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Moreover, we don’t have any relationship with Jianxiong Mrng. How can you tell him the truth?] (Liang: Three Women Warriors, 1957) (http://bbs.jlu.edu.cn/cgi-bin/bbsanc?path=/groups/GROUP_7/Emprise/ novel/D3D555C83/D87152FC8/M.1001073781.A) In (8), the use of CCM “不是我说你” (I’m not blaming you) obviously has the connotation that “You should have known and that it is totally unnecessary for me to point it out”. In verbal communication, in order to smoothly achieve the communicative purpose, the speaker has to alleviate his/her harsh negative expressions to make his words more appropriate. The use of “不是我说你” (I’m not blaming you) is to cushion the offense and to be non confrontational. In such circumstances, the use of the CCM like “不是我说你” (I’m not blaming you) can serve the purpose. U-update process U0={(φ)} RU: C×I×K=>U C1={p(p truth); q(B wanted to tell the truth); s(common background)} KA1={r(A disagreed that B would tell the truth): KAr, KA~KBr} IA1={i1(tell B, r is true); i2(alleviate his negative expressions)} Result: U1={UA: uA(Junior Fellow, I’m not blaming you, how much social experience do you have? The saying that you may know a person’s face, but not his heart may apply here. Moreover, we don’t have any relationship with Jianxiong Meng. How can you tell him the truth?); UB: (φ)} Explanation: A revealed his intention in U1. Meanwhile he used the CCM “不是我说你” (I’m not blaming you) to avoid the conflict. In this way, he easily expressed his true intention without any direct criticism and confrontation. It follows from the above analysis that such CCMs as “不是我说他” (I’m not blaming him) or “不是我说你” (I’m not blaming you) can be employed to avoid direct criticism and to alleviate the speaker’s negative expressions.

4.5 Smoothing the progress of discourse Neutralization and moderation are the behavioral principles for people to deal with interpersonal relationships in China? When reflected in language, the two behavioral principles are presented as “joy without wantonness” or “sorrow without self-injury”, i.e. Chinese people are not supposed to say things that are too upsetting or express too much displeasure, and speak implicitly instead of explicitly. As a result, in a conversation, A is inclined to persuade B while B tries hard to decline A’s opinion. In such a situation, it seems more important for

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interlocutors to speak appropriately. The speaker should try to properly relay his/her intention by choosing the right words so as not to offend the listener. Although everybody has his/her own way of thinking and ways of speaking, interlocutors usually stick to the cooperation principle and avoid too strong a language because going too far is as bad as not going far enough. In other words, knowing when to stop is the Confucian principle, as it is a Taoist principle. It is one of the most important, knowing one knows one’s limits and the limitations of others. The superior speaker is usually most responsible for this obligation. Therefore, they should consider the mood of the other side and gradually move the conversation forward. Only in this way can the speaker grasp a sense of the listener’s feelings, adjusting his/her own words, to have plentiful and multi-level connotations, promoting the conversation smoothly forward. (9) 他接着说：“牛不饮水强按头, 尚且不行, 何况是婚姻大事？她是许了人 家的闺女, 又是个宁死不辱的烈性女子, 纵然刀架在脖子上她不从, 你除 非杀了她, 有何办法？纵然强迫成了亲, 难道她不会寻无常？退一步说 , 纵然不寻无常, 难道她就跟你一心了?” [He added, “You can take a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink”. The saying is not only talking about a horse, but a marriage for human beings. Since she has already engaged with another man and she is a woman of character who would rather choose death before disgrace, she would never agree to marry you even though you put a knife to her throat. There is nothing you can do unless you kill her. Could it be that she would commit suicide even though she was forced to marry you? To say the least, could it be that she would not love you from the bottom of her heart even though she would not commit suicide?”] (Yao: Zicheng Li, 1963) (http://www.eywedu.com/Lizicheng/043.htm) In this passage, the speaker’s utterances go forward one sentence after another. The first one declares that marriage cannot be forced, simply by citing an old saying. The second one indicates that she is a woman of character who would never bow down. The third one further displays such meaning that she would rather commit suicide than surrender even if she was forced to get married. The argument is gradually being unfolded, and clearly and fully gets across to the listener. As it has reached its climax, it seems that there is hardly any better or smoother way to go further. Right in this position appears the CCM “退一步说” (To say the least), which effectively solves the problem by proposing a new hypothesis that she would not love you from the bottom of her heart even though she would not commit suicide. Here the tone of speaking begins to fall from the climax, which makes the whole discourse appear natural, reasonable and convincing. The cognitive process goes as follows.

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A: Speaker B: Listener (and the potential speaker as well) Speaker A’s utterance can be divided into two parts: ① She has already engaged with another man and she is a woman of character who would rather choose death before disgrace; ② To say the least, could it be that she would not love you from the bottom of her heart even though she would not choose to commit suicide? After he finished his first part of the utterance, Speaker A presupposed that the listener’s mood would reach its critical point. That is why he employed the CCM “C” to modulate his word speed and to ease the listener’s increasingly incited feelings. The following analysis is only restricted to the update process of A’s utterances, excluding B’s. Step One: U-update process U1={UA: uA(She has already engaged with another man and she is a woman of character who would rather choose death before disgrace); UB: (φ)} Explanation: According to the expression of presupposition of proposition r in U1, A has realized his assignment of propositional attitude towards communicative intention. Step Two: K-update process KA2={r(A disapproved that B forced her to consented to the marriage): KAr, KAKBr} Explanation: According to his presupposition of how B accepted his opinions, A updated his set of knowledge. Step Three: I-update process IA2={ j1(persuade B to give up his compulsion); j2 (smooth the progress of discourse)} Explanation: According to his presupposition of how B accepted his opinions, A updated his set of intentions after he finished his first part of his utterances. Step Four: C-update process C2={p(p her engagement); q(B forced her to marry him); r(A disapproved that B forced her to consented to the marriage); s(common ground); t(smooth the progress of discourse)} Through a cognitive process, the proposition (t) is added to the new set of common grounds (C2).

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Step Five: U-update process U1={UA: uA(To say the least, could it be that she would not love you from the bottom of her heart even though she would not commit suicide?); UB: (φ)} Explanation: A expressed his intention in U1, and employed the CCM “退一步说” (To say the least) to avoid conflicts, to smooth the progress of discourse, and to make his utterances have richer and more hierarchical connotations.

5 Conclusion Based on the above qualitative analyses, it is concluded that the above five analyzed pragmatic functions of CCMs mainly match with the ideas “for peace and against conflict”, for “the implicit reserved and refined”, for “the doctrine of the mean”, and for “the patriarch system”; each of which should not be neglected in Chinese culture or in the Chinese spirit. Although CCMs are a common language phenomenon, they do not bear true semantic value; instead, they are markers, that mainly play their roles in pragmatics; that is, they trigger the speaker’s Chinese cultural background and make the communicative process go smoothly forward in authentic verbal communication. What they do in verbal communication is promote the mutual emotions between interlocutors, soften strong words in speech, hide the interlocutor’s true feelings, alleviate negative expressions, and motivate a conversation to move along. These pragmatic functions of CCMs not only reflect the attitude of “neutralization” and the “middle way” in Chinese culture, but also mirror the human temperament of pursuing peace and avoiding conflicts. Therefore, we can promote a conversation more smoothly and peacefully by employing the indirect and implicative speech style of CCMs in the Chinese cultural context.

References Blakemore, Diane. 1992. Understanding Utterances. Oxford: Blackwell. Blakemore, Diane. 1996. Are apposition markers discourse markers? Journal of Pragmatics 32: 325–347. Blakemore, Diane. 2002. Relevance and Linguistic Meaning: The semantics and pragmatics of discourse markers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Chen, Wangdao. 1978. On Grammar. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press. Clark, Herbert H. 1996. Using Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Feng, Guangwu. 2004. The Semantics and Pragmatics of Chinese Pragmatic Markers. Modern Foreign Languages 27 (1): 24–31.

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Feng, Guangwu. 2005. Pragmatic Markers and Semantics/Pragmatics Interface. Foreign Language Research (3): 1–10. Feng, Guangwu. 2008. Pragmatic Markers in Chinese. Journal of Pragmatics 40: 1687–1718. Feng, Guangwu. 2011. A neo-Gricean pragmatic analysis of Chinese pragmatic markers. Language Sciences 30: 417–434. Fraser, Bruce. 1988. Types of English discourse markers. Acta Linguistica Hungarica 38 (14): 19–33. Fraser, Bruce. 1990. An approach to discourse markers. Journal of Pragmatics 14: 383–395. Fraser, Bruce. 1996. Pragmatic markers. Pragmatics 6 (2): 167–190. Fraser, Bruce. 1999. What are discourse markers? Journal of Pragmatics 31: 931–952. Grice, Paul. 1975. Logic and conversation. In Syntax and semantics, Peter Cole and Jerry L. Morgan (eds.), 3: 41–58. New York: Academic Press. Jucker, Andreas H. 1993. The discourse marker well: A relevance-theoretical account. Journal of Pragmatics 19: 435–452. Jucker, Andreas H. and Sara W. Smith. 1996. Explicit and implicit ways of enhancing common ground in conversations. Pragmatics 6: 1–18. Kecskes, Istvan. 2008. Dueling contexts: A dynamic model of meaning. Journal of Pragmatics 40: 385–406. Kecskes, Istvan and Fenghui Zhang. 2009. Activating, seeking and creating common ground: A socio-cognitive approach. Pragmatics and Cognition 2: 331–355. Liao, Qiuzhong. 1992. Connectives in Chinese discourse. Selected Works of LIAO Qiu-zhong. Beijing: Beijing Language and Culture University Press 62–91. Liu, Bokui. 2004. Chinese Culture and Pragmatics of Chinese Language. Guangzhou: JiNan University Press. Moder, Carol Lynn and Aida Martinovic-Zic. 2004. Discourse Across Languages and Cultures. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Ran, Yongping. 2000. Summary of Pragmatic Research of Discourse Markers. Foreign Languages Research (4): 8–14. Redeker, Gisela. 1990. Ideational and pragmatic markers of discourse structure. Journal of Pragmatics 14: 367–381. Redeker, Gisela. 1991. Review article: Linguistic markers of discourse structure. Linguistics 29: 1139–1172. Sehiffrin, Deborah. 1987. Discourse Markers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Shao, Jingmin. 2007. Modern Chinese Theory, 2nd ed. Shanghai: Shanghai Education Press. Swan, Michael. 2005. Practical English Usage. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Wang, Li. 1955. On whether there are parts of speech in Chinese. Beijing: Chinese Academy of Science. Xing, Fuyi. 1986. Collection of Grammar. Wuhan: Hubei Education Press. Xing, Fuyi. 1991. Observing the substitution of objects in China. Chinese Teaching in the World (2): 76–84. Xing, Fuyi. 1997. Chinese Grammar. Changchun: Northeast Normal University Press. Xing, Fuyi. 2002. Answers to Three Hundred Chinese Grammatical Questions. Beijing: The Commercial Press. Zhang, Bin and Changlai Chen. 2000. Modern Chinese Sentences. Shanghai: East China Normal University Press. Zhang, Fenghui. 2009. Research on Theories of Formal Presupposition Based on Dynamic Understanding. Doctoral Dissertation. Zhejiang University. Zhu, Guangqian. 1987. Complete Works of Zhu Guanqian ( Vol. 1). Hefei: Anhui Education Press.

Chun-Mei Chen

Gestures as tone markers in multilingual communication Abstract: In this paper, the use of gestures in Chinese as a Second Language (CSL) classroom discourse was investigated to support the argument that visual cues exploited in multilingual contexts can be expressive and effective in language learning and communication. Traditional tonal pedagogy has adopted the numeric notational system introduced by Chao (1968). However, tonal values are such abstract numbers for language learners without tonal backgrounds that the effect of describing tonal numbers in CSL classrooms has been reported to be of dubious effectiveness. In the present study, 180 hours of two elementarylevel CSL classrooms were videotaped to examine the role of gestures as tone markers in multilingual communication. The classroom discourse of 40 language learners from 12 countries was transcribed and was quantitatively and qualitatively analyzed. The results show that learners in the CSL classroom with gestural tone markers had significantly superior communication skills. It can be concluded that visual aspects of speech may play a role in language pedagogy and second language learning. Additionally, gesture has been found to be an integral component of language learning in multilingual contexts.

1 Introduction Mandarin tones are always a challenge for first-year language learners, and tonal pedagogy is an inevitable task for language instructors. In Mandarin Chinese, meaningful lexical differences can be indicated by simply changing the fundamental frequency pattern of a given syllable. Non-tone language learners will process foreign lexical tones with reference to their native prosodic categories, while tone language learners will process foreign tones with reference to their native tone categories (Ladd 1996). Both prosody and nonverbal communication are important components of language classroom interaction, but they are often overlooked in Chinese as a Second Language (CSL) research. Nonverbal behavior refers to any behavior that does not involve language (Kellerman 1992). Languages have formal and explicit rules, and not every nonverbal behavior will lead to communication. Gestures, for example, tend to be treated as incidental rather than essential in face-to-face interaction. As McCafferty (1998) points out in his study, ‘‘gestures and other nonverbal forms of communication

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have been considered potentially important for some time, however, as yet, their connection to second language learning largely remains to be elucidated’’ (p. 94). Other researchers also consider nonverbal behavior to be highly culturespecific, as “nonverbal behavior is inherently ambiguous because it is highly dependent on context for its interpretation” (Fiksdal 1990: p. 47). In addition, “we do not realize that most of it (nonverbal behavior) is in fact learned and therefore specific to the cultural group in which it is found” (Wardaugh 1985: p. 79). On the other hand, researchers who focus on face-to-face dialogue have long understood that some nonverbal behaviors are often used in conjunction with words, prosody, and each other in ordinary conversation (Bavelas et al. 1990; Fridlund 1991; Streeck and Knapp 1992; Clark 1996; Jones and LeBaron 2002). Hurley (1992) explains the pedagogical motive for considering pragmatics, prosody, and nonverbal communication. Together, pragmatics, prosody, and nonverbal communication represent a substantial portion of the skills learners need to make the transition from classroom lessons to interaction with native speakers. Kellerman (1992) also found that body movement plays a significant role in communication both in encoding and decoding. In Lazaraton’s (2004) study, she examines the correlation between gesture and speech in vocabulary explanations. Her results suggest that gestures and other nonverbal behaviors are forms of input for learners that must be considered to be a salient factor in classroombased second language acquisition research. The topic of nonverbal behavior in communication has received significantly more attention among researchers in response to these studies. Gestures are not only movements. Certain researchers have adopted McNeill’s (1992) classificatory system, which indicates that gestures are not simply the arms waving in the air, but, rather, they are symbols that exhibit meaning in their own right (McNeill 1992). Following the principles of McNeill (1992), gestures occur only in speech. Hand movements that occur during face-to-face interaction include the following categories: iconic gestures, metaphoric gestures, deictic gestures, and beats. Iconic gestures are related to the semantic content of speech; metaphoric gestures may be pictographic or kinetographic, but they represent an abstract idea; deictic gestures have a pointing function, either actual or metaphoric; and beats are gestures that have the same form, regardless of the content to which they are linked. In a beat gesture, the hand moves with a rhythmical pulse that aligns with stress peaks in speech. Beats may serve a referential function, but their primary use is to regulate the flow of speech. In the present study, the use of gestures as tone markers is more similar to beats in Mandarin speech. The primary use of gestures in this study, however, is to

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facilitate the production and perception of Mandarin tones in classroom interaction. There is a difference between a hand action and a hand gesture (Kendon 1985; Clark and Gerrig 1990). Hand actions have a practical function in the material world, such as, turning on a light switch or picking up a telephone. Hand gestures have a communicative function in the social world, such as telling someone to turn on the light. If social and communicative factors shape hand gestures, then these factors should likewise cause variations in gestures for the same referent (Özyürek 2000, 2002). Hand gestures serve both as symbols in communication and as part of verbal language usage. Because nonverbal acts are used in verbal language, they must be tightly synchronized with words in both timing and meaning (Bavelas and Chovil 2006). Speakers usually coordinate their hand gestures, and these gestures synchronize with parallel linguistic units (McNeill 1985). Timing is a meta-communicative tool that speakers use to signal that something is in the same integrated unit of meaning (Engle 2000). Gestures are connected to co-occurring speech (Bavelas and Chovil 2006) and have a split-second relationship to words (McNeill 1992). Recent research also reveals that face-to-face dialogue is the most common format of language use in everyday life (Bavelas and Chovil 2006). Face-to-face dialogue is a collaborative activity (Clark 1996) with a high degree of reciprocity and mutual influence at a micro-social level. Within the setting of face-to-face dialogue, an essential criterion for nonverbal communication is its synchrony with words. In contrast, emblematic hand gestures are usually stereotypic and virtually independent of linguistic context. Although verbal and nonverbal messages are both present in the vast majority of instructional environments, it has been argued that they perform different functions in those environments (McCroskey et al. 2006b). Researchers assert that verbal messages stimulate primary cognitive meanings in receivers, whereas the nonverbal messages stimulate affective meanings in receivers. According to the argument of McCroskey et al. (2006a), nonverbal communication has a relational impact on student attitudes and feelings. Richmond et al. (2006) concludes that measuring the impact of nonverbal communication behaviors on students’ cognitive learning outside the carefully controlled experimental environment is notably difficult. Nonverbal communication in instruction has been used to insure effective learning. Second language learners in a communicative class are active participants in their own learning process (Brown 2007). A language classroom with communicative language teaching is learner-centered and cooperative and collaborative learning is emphasized with a focus on students’ formal accuracy and fluency of production. Kinesthetic memory can be exploited for language pedagogy. Birdwhistell (1967, 1970) views body motion communication as a system that

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can be described independently of the behavior of particular participants. He presumes body motion communication to be socially learned and communicative. Previous research with a “Total Physical Response” (TPR) technique has demonstrated that when adults learn listening comprehension, there is a highly significant difference in retention if the adults are in action at the time of learning (Asher 1965, 1966, 1967). Asher (1977) believes that language classes are often the locus of anxiety and proposes the TPR method to be a stress-free model. In a TPR classroom, students are expected to do a great deal of listening and acting before venturing verbal responses to questions. Simply using gestures, on the other hand, has also been found useful in language learning. Allen (1995) undertook an investigation of the effects of emblematic gestures on the development of French verbal expressions. One group was taught a set of gestures to help recall linked verbal expressions at a later time. Compared to other groups, the treatment group (with a set of gestures) showed greater recall of the verbal expressions and forgot significantly fewer sentences than did the other groups. McCafferty (2002) analyzed how gesture is linked to speech in creating zones of proximal development. He found that gestures are implicated in lexical comprehension, illustrations, environmental referents, and imitation. All of these studies have shed light on the role of gestures in second language learning. Most of the research on second language acquisition of Mandarin, however, concerns verbal input with little attention paid to nonverbal aspects of second language (L2) learners, let alone gestures in CSL learning. Little is known about how Mandarin tones are produced and perceived effectively in instructional contexts, particularly in multilingual classrooms with learners from different language backgrounds. The focus of this paper lies in the intersection of emblematic hand gestures, specifically, gestures as tone markers, and the tonal achievements of second language learners in classroom-based face-to-face communication. The encoding design of hand gestures in the present study followed the phonological structure of Mandarin lexical tones in both timing and meaning (contour and direction of the pitch change). It has been found that addressees are more accurate at drawing figures when the speaker uses gestures (Graham and Argyle 1975). The typical encoding design varies as to whether the speaker has a visually available receipt. The basic principle for the design of hand gestures is that they contain an underlying unity. Gestures and speech are synchronous as well as pragmatically expressive (cf. McNeill 1992). Linguistic phonological knowledge is abstract, whereas gestures as tone markers are concrete and dynamic. The purpose of the present study is to investigate whether visual cues exploited in multilingual contexts can be expressive and effective for language learning. Previous studies evaluating gestures in language learning have pro-

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vided some evidence as to how nonverbal form modifies verbal input and makes it easier to understand. Little is known about how Mandarin tonal categories are effectively explained and what nonverbal communication in the CSL classroom entails. A novel feature of this study is that gestures are embedded in classroom practice and considered to be one aspect of classroom discourse. This paper sets out to investigate the nonverbal behavior of language instructors and learners during classroom interaction by analyzing gestures and speech that the subjects employ in tonal pedagogy and practice. The research questions are formulated as follows: 1. What is the role of hand gestures (as tone markers) in classroom-based faceto-face discourse? 2. Does gesturing affect the tonal production and perception of learners in CSL classrooms? 3. What are the linguistic functions and pedagogical effects of gestures as tone markers in classroom practice?

2 Method Data came from two first-year Chinese language (Elementary Chinese I and Elementary Chinese II) classrooms. Instructors were full-time Chinese teachers working in the Chinese Program. Learners came from different countries. The target language in the classrooms was Mandarin, and the languages used for communication among the learners were English and Mandarin. Some learners from the same countries also spoke their mother tongue in the classrooms. Videotaped data were collected during the fall semester in 2009 and the spring semester in 2010 consisting of 180 hours of classroom practices and interactions. The classes were divided into two groups: the control group and the experimental group. In the control group, Mandarin tones were taught mainly in the traditional five-scaled system. In the experimental group, hand gestures were used as tone markers in drills and classroom interaction. Recorded classroom discourse collected from both groups was analyzed to explore the effect of gesturing on the tonal production and perception of first-year learners.

2.1 Participants Forty learners of Chinese as a second language from 12 countries participated in the study. None of the learners was of Chinese descent, and they had no background of Mandarin Chinese before they enrolled in the program. None of them

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had a history of speech or hearing impairment. The number and the nationalities of the learners are illustrated in Table 1. Nationality

Number

Nationality

Number

USA Australia South Africa Germany Ukraine

7 1 1 1 2

Korea Thailand Vietnam Poland Indonesia

8 7 10 1 2

Table 1: Nationalities of CSL Learners (N = 40)

Among the 40 participants, CSL learners from the U.S., Korea, Thailand, and Vietnam constituted the majority. There was a nearly equal ratio of male to female learners. In order to keep the analysis a manageable size, only data from American and Thai learners are considered in this study. Another reason for giving priority to American and Thai is the contrast of non-tonal and tonal experience in their native languages. CSL learners from the U.S. did not have any tonal experience, whereas learners from Thailand did. Language instructors in both groups were in their late 30s and had at least 5 years of experience teaching Mandarin as a second language in college-level programs. Their tonal pedagogy in Elementary Chinese I was taped in its entirety. The subjects of the first fifteen hours of classroom time were Mandarin Pinyin, Zhuyin Fuhao and pronunciation. Tonal pedagogy was the major concern for the first month of the course.

2.2 Tonal pedagogy There are four lexical tones in Mandarin Chinese, which are Tone 1, Tone 2, Tone 3 and Tone 4. The neutral tone is an atonic syllable. A tone is often described in terms of the pitch height and pitch shape it has over the duration of the syllable. The numeric notational system was first introduced by Chao (1968) as a systematic method of transcribing the phonetic pitch of tones. In Bao’s (1999) survey of tone theories, the “tonal values” of the categories differ from dialect to dialect. The term Mandarin is used here to mean the standard language, i.e., the target language in L2 classrooms. Tonal categories in Mandarin are illustrated in (1). The numeric tonal value [5] indicates the highest level on the five-scaled system, whereas [1] indicates the lowest level (Chao 1968; Bao 1999; Yip 2002).

Gestures as tone markers in multilingual communication

(1) Tonal Categories

Tonal value

Pitch Pattern

Tone 1 (yin ping)

55

high level

Tone 2 (yang ping)

35

high rising

Tone 3 (shang)

21 (4)

low falling-rising

Tone 4 (qu)

51

high falling

149

Tone 1, Tone 2, Tone 3 and Tone 4 have been described as “even”, “rising”, “falling-rising”, and “falling” respectively, or H, LH, L, and HL respectively in Yip’s (2002) transcription. The tonal values [212] and [211], however, are frequently uttered in speech for Tone 3 (Chao 1968), which indicates that the values of the four tones may not be reliable in spontaneous or naturally occurring speech. Mandarin Tone 2 (T2) is a rising tone, whereas Tone 3 (T3) is a low (L) tone or a falling-rising tone. In Tone Sandhi contexts, T3 alternates with T2 when another T3 follows. In other words, the Third Tone Sandhi rule turns a T3 (low tone) into a rising tone when followed by another T3. Previous studies (Shih 1986; Chen 2000) provide phonological accounts of the Sandhi rule, and Chen (2000) further proposes stress-foot as Sandhi domain in diverse Chinese dialects. The Mandarin Third Tone Sandhi rule was treated as a dissimilation process on a register level (Yip 2002). When two syllables with identical tones come together, the first one changes its tone. On the other hand, Mandarin tone markers adopted in contemporary textbooks are notably alike. Tone markers in Pinyin and Zhuyin Fuhao differ only with respect to neutral tone. There is no mark for a neutral tone in Pinyin but in Zhuyin Fuhao, one dot is displayed above the symbols. Students in Taiwan are taught Chinese with the aid of Zhuyin Fuhao, while those in Mainland China use Pinyin. Zhuyin Fuhao has visual logographic symbols, whereas Pinyin is an alphabetic system. The instructors in the present study taught their students both systems, but the learners chose either Pinyin or Zhuyin Fuhao in their written assignments. In the present study, participants in the control group and the experimental group used the same textbook, Practical Audio-Visual Chinese (2008), which is one of the most popular CSL textbooks in Taiwan. The tonal markers in the textbook are illustrated in Figure 1. Both instructors taught their students Mandarin tonal categories during the first week of the course. They administered tonal drills and written assignments on Mandarin tones. It was necessary that all CSL learners be familiar with the tone markers in the early stage of learning.

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Figure 1: Mandarin tone marks in the textbook

The two groups of tonal pedagogy differed in the use of gesturing. In the experimental group, the language instructor proposed five types of gestures as tone markers during the first week of the course and manipulated the gestures throughout. In the control group, the language instructor adopted the traditional tone graph as proposed by Chao (1968) without the use of gesture practice in classroom drills. Rather, the instructor in the control group showed her students the numeric notational system of Mandarin tones as seen in Figure 2.

Figure 2: The numeric notational system of Mandarin tones

During tonal pedagogy in the control group, the instructor added the following notes for the Mandarin tones: 1st tone (Tone 1) is high and level – singing; 2nd tone (Tone 2) is low to high – climbing; 3rd tone (Tone 3) is low and level – growling (half third tone only); 4th tone (Tone 4) is high to low – dropping;

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neutral tone is light and short. The instructor also gave the tips on tonal pitch, as illustrated in (2). (2)

a. b. c. d.

It is important to see where a tone starts and where it ends By comparison, you can make the tones more accurately Know the difference between a full third tone and a half third tone When there are two third tones together, the first one is changed to the second tone

In the experimental group, conversely, the instructor used tonal contrasting, hand gestures, intensive drills, collaborative tasks, and indirect tonal error correction during the first week of the course. One example of tonal contrasting in the Experimental Group is illustrated in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Tonal contrasting between Tone 3 and Tone 1

Most importantly, the instructor added the visual input of tonal contour in her classroom practice. She demonstrated hand gestures for each tone in the drills, and asked the students to use hand gestures when giving answers. Demonstrations and practices of gesturing Tone 1, Tone 2, Tone 3, and Tone 4 are given in Figure 4 and Figure 5, respectively. Although the instructor stood during the demonstration, the students were not required to stand during the practices unless performing tonal drills or other classroom activities. Neutral tone was also included in gesturing encoding because some of the learners adopted Zhuyin Fuhao in their written assignment. The instructor

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Figure 4: Demonstration and practices of gesturing Tone 1 (left) and Tone 2 (right)

Figure 5: Demonstration and practices of gesturing Tone 3 (left) and Tone 4 (right)

demonstrated the gesturing of neutral tone as a dot above her head as illustrated in Figure 6. The design of hand gestures assumes an underlying unity of gesture (McNeill 1992). The instructor demonstrated tonal gesturing with consistency and unity. After a few practices, the CSL learners in the classroom were familiar with the gestures as tone markers during their drills. The instructor in the experimental group also reminded her students that gesturing tone markers was useful both in monosyllabic words and disyllabic words. Classroom drills included both. Figure 7 illustrates the practices of tonal gesturing in disyllabic vocabulary Táiwān ‘Taiwan’. It should be noted that learners of Chinese often use gestures and postures with tones. Some learners prefer making the gestures with their hands or fingers, while others prefer tilting their heads. In the present study, the students

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Figure 6: Demonstration of gesturing neutral tone

Figure 7: Practice of gesturing two syllables

in the experimental group were encouraged to gesture with their hands during tonal drills or classroom activities to insure that both the instructor and the classmates understood. Students who were answering with hand gestures often stood so that their gesturing was seen by the rest of the class, and particularly by the instructor in front of the classroom. It is clear that gestures as tone markers have a communicative function in the CSL classroom as a component of giving answers or indicating understanding to the instructors. In this case, gestures as tone markers are tightly in sync

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with words in both timing and meaning. Gestures are synchronized with parallel linguistic units (McNeill 1985), and, in the CSL classroom, they are connected to co-occurring speech (cf. Bavelas and Chovil 2006). The students were also taught that in trisyllabic words, longer phrases, or, in fast speech, gesturing might not be of great help. In Third Tone Sandhi contexts such as ní hăo (‘how are you?’ nĭ hăo becomes ní hăo), students gave their answers according to the actual pronunciation. In written assignments, both the underlying tone (Tone 3) and the surface tone (Tone 2) were considered correct in the cases of Third Tone Sandhi, although the underlying tone (Tone 3) was represented in the textbook.

2.3 Data collection One hundred eighty hours of two elementary CSL classrooms were video-taped so as to examine the role of gestures as tone markers in L2 learning and multilingual communication. Classroom discourse was transcribed, and tonal production and perception of the CSL learners were examined using both quantitative and qualitative methods. The instructors in the two groups gave permission to videotape and analyze the discourse in their classes. The CSL learners also consented to being videotaped. Videotaped data were collected from two semesters of first-year Chinese language courses, fall semester of 2009 and spring semester of 2010. The audiotapes were transcribed by the author using conversation analysis (CA) conventions (cf. Atkinson and Heritage 1984). The number and frequency of correct responses of CSL learners in the two groups during tonal drills were counted and compared. The instructor in the experimental group employed a great deal of gestures as tone markers and other nonverbal communication in her classroom instruction. Only gestures as tone markers were analyzed in this study. Data from the first semester of the language course were the basis for the analysis because of a larger number of tonal drills in the CSL classrooms.

2.4 Tonal achievement ratings and measurements In order to compare the effect of gestures as tone markers on the tonal achievement in the two groups of CSL classrooms, five experienced Mandarin instructors (not involved in teaching the two groups) were asked to rate the learners’ tonal accuracy. All instructors had at least five years of experience in teaching Mandarin as a second language in college-level language programs. The five Mandarin instructors were asked to watch 120 minutes of videotapes during the 10th week of the course and evaluate the American and Thai learners’ tonal

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accuracy. No gesturing occurred during the 120 minutes of videotapes. The Mandarin instructors did not know the difference in tonal pedagogy in the two groups. None of the Mandarin instructors had special training in speech. They were selected primarily on the basis of how they would rate their students’ tonal accuracy and what they would consider to be a tonal error. The Mandarin teachers watched the videos individually but heard the pronunciation of the CSL learners via loudspeaker. Each Mandarin teacher participated in tonal achievement ratings on successive days if they could not finish watching within one day. They were asked to complete in an evaluation form for each American and Thai learner. The median of the replicate ratings of each leaner was determined for each instructor. If the students were given different ratings on different days, the scores were averaged. The Mandarin instructors used a scale ranging from ‘poor tone’ (1) to ‘excellent tone’ (10) to rate the oral performance of the CSL learners. Both accuracy and fluency were taken into consideration when rating the students. Too many pauses and corrections would result in a lower score. Time for the completion of each accurate response was also counted in the ratings, as the Mandarin instructors could read the time on the screen. Videos could be replayed, but ratings could not be changed once given. The Mandarin instructors saw the learners prior to the ratings. They were informed of the codes (such as Subject 1, Subject 2, or Subject 3) of the learners and previewed the videotapes so as to recognize the learners during the rating process. Acoustic measurements of the tonal tokens of the CSL learners were based on their pitch values, durations, and pitch range, using Praat and PitchWorks. Pauses and corrections in classroom discourse were also examined to evaluate the fluency of the language learners in L2 learning. In each assigned communication task, language fluency, accuracy, and the amount of time for completion were evaluated. Tonal productions, such as pitch range and prosodic features, and perceptions of Mandarin tones as evaluated by the Mandarin instructors in the two groups were compared. In this paper, gestures were taught in the language classroom, and acoustic measurements were made to verify the role of hand gestures in L2 tonal production. This study also aims to explore the correlation between phonetic features of Mandarin tones with gesturing and those without gesturing.

3 Results The instructor in the experimental group used a variety of gestures while giving tonal explanations during the first and second lessons of the course. Next, CSL learners adopted these gestures as tone markers in their communication.

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Sample (3) illustrates the use of gestures as tone markers in the classroom interaction. (3) (During class activities the instructor walked to Subject 1 and Subject 3) “. . . You have to pronounce the second word as the third tone, a fallingrising tone (with hand gestures) . . .” 1 Subject 1: Dui a! Correct PT ‘Right.’ 2 Instructor: Dui bu dui? Correct not correct ‘Right.’ 3 Subject 3: Wo bu zhidao I NEG know ‘I dont’t know (I am not sure).’ 4 Instructor: Na ni hui shuo ma ma? then you can say horse PT ‘Can you say the word “horse”?’ 5 Subject 1: Dui. Correct 6

Ma shi di san sheng (with hand gestures) horse is the third tone ‘Right. The word “horse” is with the third tone.’ (with hand gestures)

7 Subject 3: (.5) 8

>Ma< (with hand gestures) horse ‘Horse.’ (with hand gestures)

As can been seen from (3), Subject 3 did not get the second word with the third tone correct on the first attempt. The instructor used hand gestures to remind the subject of the pitch contour of the third tone. With the help of the tonal gesturing of Subject 1, Subject 3 pronounced the third tone correctly with gestures when delivering the word mă ‘horse’. Tonal gesturing also occurred in interactions between students from different countries in the experimental groups. Sample (4) illustrates gestures paralleling verbal communication between the learners in the CSL classroom.

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(4) (American learner, Subject 6, gesturing to Subject 7 from Thailand) 1 Subject 6: Ni hao ‘Hello.’ 2 Subject 7: Ni hao ‘Hello.’ 3 Subject 6: Ni hao ma? you good PT ‘How are you?’ 4 Subject 7: ni hao, >xie xie< (with gestures) ‘Hello, thank you.’ (with gestures) 5 Subject 6: Ni jiao sheme mingzi you call what name ‘What’s your name?’ 6

(.5)

7

>mingzi< (with gestures) name ‘Name?’ (with gestures)

Using hand gestures, learners from the U.S. and Thailand were more confident in delivering their questions and responses in classroom interactions. In sample (4), Subject 6 had already asked the question, “What’s your name?” However, he repeated the key word in the question using hand gesturing to insure that the recipient understood the question. Using this method, the recipient had a second form of communication with the subject. Even when Subject 6 failed to say the tones in the word míngzi ‘name’ correctly, the message still came across with hand gestures. Sample (5) illustrates the combination of verbal communication and hand gesturing in the experimental group. In addition to gestures as tone markers, nonverbal communication was utilized in the CSL classroom. (5)

(The instructor asked Subject 6 to work with Subject 9, because Subject 9 did not yet know the name of Subject 6.) 1 Subject 6: wo meiyou a (with gestures, waving hands) I no PT ‘I did not intend . . .’ (with gestures, waving hands) 2 Subject 9: Oh, (laughter) 3 Subject 6: . . . (laughter)

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Gestures as tone markers facilitate the CSL learners’ tonal production in face-to-face dialogue. For those learners not familiar with Mandarin tones in the early stages of the course, hand gestures gave them an outlet to rethink and correct what they said in the target language. Sample (6) illustrates how the CSL learners followed the gestures of the instructor with hesitation at first and later duplicated hand gesturing in their pair activities. (6) (Subject 3 was assigned to finish a pair dialogue with Subject 4.) 1 Instructor: (to Subject 3) Ni

shi wang xiansheng (with gestures) you are wang gentleman ‘You are Mr. Wang.’ (with gestures)

2 Subject 3: . . . (Silence) (Looking at Subject 4 and another classmate in front of her) 3 Subject 6: (1.5) 4

Wo shi . . . >wang xiansheng< . . . >wang xiansheng< (with gestures) I am wang gentleman wang gentleman ‘I am Mr. Wang . . . Mr. Wang.’ (with gestures)

5 Subject 4: Wo zhidao, ni

shi >wang xiansheng< (with gestures)

I know you are wang gentleman ‘I know, you are Mr. Wang.’ (with gestures) Using gestures as tone markers in tonal error correction had some advantages in classroom instruction. Both the instructor and CSL learners never used the term bu dui ‘incorrect’ in the classroom after giving their answers of Mandarin tones. Those who did not get the correct tone modified their answers by changing their hand gestures. Both the instructor and the students waited until the other classmates finished gesturing. They gestured the correct answers to each other. With a few turns of practice, most of the learners produced the correct tones using gesturing. Corrective feedback at the initial stage of language learning could cause the students anxiety during classroom communication. Using gestures as tone markers in multilingual contexts may reduce this anxiety and reduce the number of verbal errors at the beginning stage of tonal learning. For instance, a learner can gesture a falling pitch contour to show that he understands a falling-tone visual or audio input, even if he cannot produce the correct

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verbal form of the falling tone. Using the silence strategy helped students avoid face-threatening but, on the other hand, hindered communication progress in second language learning. Some learners might avoid verbal expressions to prevent them from making errors. A student’s consistent silence affects the overall pragmatic development of L2 learners because instructors ignore the lack of verbal response and misunderstand the learners’ corrections. Using gestures as tone markers can serve as an alternative to silence or corrections in classroom communication. Gestures can also be treated as visual cues and a part of effective learning strategies. When language learners actively participate in authentic and intentional classroom activities, and visual cues (gestures as tone markers) provide constructive and cooperative feedback, their classroom discourse shows the process of meaningful learning (cf. Jonassen et al. 2003). Integration of visual cues can bridge the gaps in multilingual communication among the first-year learners from different countries. Quantitative analyses of the CSL classrooms, however, showed different frequencies of correct responses in the two groups. The experimental group’s correct responses to the instructors’ tonal queries between the fourth to the eighth week of the first semester course were analyzed, totaling approximately 3–4 hours of tonal drills per week. The numbers of correct responses were submitted to ANOVAs. The results showed that the simple variable of group (control and experimental) was significant ( p < 0.05). The frequency of accurate responses within 15 hours of classroom interactions is illustrated in Table 2.

Learners

American (N = 7)

Thai (N = 7)

Control Group

33%

67%

Experimental Group

59%

78%

Average

46%

73%

Table 2: Comparison of frequency of accurate responses in the two groups

As shown in Table 2, the frequency of accurate responses among both American and Thai learners in the experimental group is higher than that of the control group. The majority of first-year CSL learners using hand gesturing are more likely to give accurate responses, regardless of the tonal or non-tonal background of the learners. Although Thai learners show a higher frequency of correct responses than American learners within the same group, all learners in the experimental groups show consistently more correct responses than those in the control group.

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To assess the students’ tonal achievements, the five Mandarin instructors watched the videotapes, heard the pronunciation of the CSL learners, and gave ratings for each learner (American and Thai). The Mandarin instructors used a scale ranging from 1 (poor) to 10 (excellent) to rate the oral performance of the CSL learners. Figure 8 shows the mean tonal achievement ratings obtained for the two groups as well as the ratings according to the background of the learners.

Figure 8: Tonal achievements of American learners (left) and Thai learners (right)

Figure 8 reveals several important differences. First, the learners in the experimental group have better tonal achievements than those in the control group. The experimental group’s higher ratings are consistent among the Mandarin instructors. Although Thai learners in both the control and experimental groups seemed to have better tonal achievements than American learners, Thai learners in the experimental group received even better tonal achievements ratings than those in the control group. Acoustic measurements for the tonal production of the CSL learners included 1024 tokens (32 words × 8 subjects × twice × one turn with gesturing and one turn without gesturing = 1024) of monosyllabic Mandarin words. Voice tokens from four male (2 American learners and 2 Thai learners) and four female (2 American learners and 2 Thai learners) subjects aged 23–28 were collected for the measurements. All of the subjects were in the experimental group of the present study. The purpose of the acoustic measurements is to investigate the effect of hand gesturing on phonetic tonal production. The recordings were taken at the 24th week of the first-year Mandarin Chinese course after the subjects had at least six months of Mandarin study. The word list consisted of 32 Chinese characters (even numbers for four tonal categories)

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with Hanyu Pinyin and tone markers. The experimenter (the author) demonstrated the hand gestures following the instructor’s encoding in the experimental group. The subjects were asked to pronounce the word list twice: the first time with hand gestures and the second time without using gesturing. Each subject was individually recorded in a quiet classroom using a digital recorder with a microphone. Tokens from eight subjects were recorded and sampled at 22,050 Hz on the Praat and Pitch Works programs. Each word was repeated twice with about 3 seconds in between, allowing double measurements of the same word to be made. Multiple measurements of the same word were averaged. The pitch analysis range was modified to accommodate the pitch range for each speaker. The results were statistically analyzed by one-factor ANOVAs.

Figure 9: Effect of gesturing on pitch range of eight CSL learners

Figure 9 shows the pitch range among the eight subjects. The diamond represents the pitch range with gesturing, and the square represents the pitch range without gesturing among the subjects. Subject 1, Subject 2, Subject 3, and Subject 4 are American, while Subject 5, Subject 6, Subject 7, and Subject 8 are Thai. Most of the learners demonstrated a wider pitch range when producing Mandarin words with gesturing except Subject 5 and Subject 8. The widest pitch range was found in the tokens produced by Subject 1, who averaged 26 Hz. When the subjects produced the Mandarin words with gesturing, the final rising part of the third tone was attested more frequently. Although wider pitch range was found among six subjects, which indicates gesturing could affect the pitch range of the CSL learners, the effect of the gesturing is not statistically significant (p > 0.05; for instance, Subject 1: F (1, 62) = 3.87, p = 0.054).

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Results from acoustic measurements show that gesturing could affect the representations of the CSL learners’ tonal production, although the effect was not statistically significant. Together with the results of the frequency of accurate responses and the tonal achievement ratings, it appears that gesturing does affect the productions and perceptions of CSL learners in the experimental group. Compared with the oral performance of first-year learners from the U.S. and Thailand in the control group, hand gesturing positively affects the oral performance and classroom communication of CSL learners.

4 Discussion Corrective feedback has generally been found to be beneficial in acquisition (Gass 1997; Gass and Selinker 2001; Gass 2003). Two major types of interactional feedback are recasts and elicitations, which have also been considered to be pedagogically useful strategies in communicative language classrooms (Doughty 2001; Doughty and Varela 1998; Gass 2003; Williams 2005). Recasts refer to feedback that reformulates a learner’s non-target-like utterance into a target-like one (Nicholas et al. 2001). When an interlocutor reformulates a learner’s error, the reformulation may draw the learner’s attention to the target form by signaling to the learner that his or her utterance is deviant in some way (Long and Robinson 1998). Recasts may also provide learners with opportunities for modified output, which, it has been suggested, is crucial for L2 development (Doughty 2001; Swain 1995, 2005; Nassaji 2009). Elicitations, on the other hand, refer to feedback that does not correctly reformulate the learner’s error, but rather encourages the learner to reformulate it (Loewen and Philp 2006; Lyster 2004; Nassaji 2007). Elicitation strategies include self-correction, promoting and providing learners with opportunities to test and revise their hypotheses about the target language (Lyster 2002, 2004; Lyster and Ranta 1997). Elicitations also provide opportunities for negotiation of form through various types of requests for clarification and correction (Lyster and Ranta 1997; Lyster 1998). Using gestures as tone markers in multilingual contexts provided opportunities for the CSL learners to recast their tonal output and self-correct their own tonal production. The use of gestures as tone markers could serve as a nonverbal alternative to tonal corrective feedback. Direct correction made by the instructors does not yield long-lasting results. Nonverbal corrective feedback has been shown to be more effective than providing the correct verbal answer. Gestures are one type of corrective feedback in classroom activities that prevent the learners’ potential embarrassment. It is widely agreed that the best person to correct an error is the

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person who makes the error. Manipulating gestures as tone markers to guide the learners to make self-correction or peer-correction is an effective method. Another explanation for the success of hand gesturing in the experimental group is possible. In second-language contexts, gesture may partly compensate for difficulties with the verbal channel (cf. Gullberg 1998). Both CSL learners with and without tonal backgrounds could find themselves in a situation in which Mandarin is the only common language between themselves, the instructor and most of their classmates. In this case, gestures as tone markers can insure the comprehension of the instructor and the recipients in the classroom interaction. A message may be understood not because of the oral production of the learners, but rather because of their hand gesturing. In response to the research questions proposed at the beginning of this paper, the role of hand gestures as tone markers in face-to-face classroom discourse is clearly not only for movement. Gestures as tone markers are symbols that exhibit meaning in their own right (McNeill 1992) and occur only during speech in classroom interaction. Hand gestures as tone markers are more similar to beats in Mandarin speech, and the primary use of gestures is to facilitate the production and perception of Mandarin tones in face-to-face classroom interaction. Gesturing does affect the productions and perceptions of CSL learners in the experimental group. In fact, gestures increased the accuracy rate of firstyear learners in their oral performance, and gestures can be used as politeness strategies in tonal error correction. Gestures as tone markers can also have communicative functions in CSL classrooms. When unsure of a response, learners can check other classmates’ gestures. In the perception of Mandarin tones, pitch is a robust cue. Perception of pitch height is dependent on adjacent tones rather than absolute pitch values. Many of the tonal errors produced by American CSL learners are due to the misplacement of the pitch range. It is crucial for CSL learners to acquire the pitch contour (pitch values at onset and offset) of each Mandarin tone. Pitch contour of Mandarin tones can be visualized using hand gesturing. The frequency of accurate responses among American learners in the experimental group (with hand gesturing) is higher than that of the control group (without hand gesturing), and the same pattern can be found among the Thai learners. Although Thai learners have shown more accurate responses than American learners within the same group, learners in the experimental groups have shown consistently more correct responses than those in the control group. In the tonal achievement ratings of the CSL learners, both accuracy and fluency were taken into consideration. Overt pauses and corrections reduced the fluency rating of the oral performance, whereas the misplacement of pitch range and pitch contour would result in a tonal error.

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A wider pitch range was demonstrated when speakers produced Mandarin words with gestures, which indicates gesturing could affect the pitch range of the CSL learners, although the effect of gesturing is not statistically significant. The findings reported in the present study indicate the unavoidable gap between experimental research and classroom pedagogy. While the effect of gesturing was verified in the ratings of the experienced Mandarin instructors and the frequency of accurate responses in classroom activities, gesturing was not shown to be statistically significant in the acoustic measurements. From a pedagogical standpoint, gestures as tone markers did, in fact, increase the production accuracy of first-year learners in CSL classroom; however, gestures have their own restrictions. Gestures as tone markers must synchronize with parallel linguistic units in timing to make sense in classroom drills. Gestures are also symbols that exhibit prosodic meanings in their own right. In classroom practices, gestures exaggerate the tonal pitch direction of single words, but they may not be practical in fast speech flow. Tonal gestures often form messages with the words they accompany. In the present study, gestures proposed in the experimental group incorporate the visual phonological structure of Mandarin tones and act as communication cues in classroom discourse in multilingual contexts. The other limitation of this study concerns the effectiveness of the gestures themselves on students’ tonal improvement. In the current study, it is possible that the experimental group that used hand gesturing made more of an emphasis on the tonal aspect of the language. It could be merely the matter of emphasis or focus that makes the difference. A further study over time in which both teachers use the experimental and control methods with different groups of students might address this issue. In addition, the current study focuses mainly on the effectiveness of gesturing in language pedagogy and learning. It is clear that Mandarin tones may be effectively taught and learned using gestures. Future studies should also explore the effectiveness of these gestures on the learners’ communication with each other.

5 Conclusion In this study, the use of gestures in classroom discourse was investigated to support the argument that the visual cues exploited in multilingual contexts can be effective for language learning. One hundred eighty hours of videotaped data were drawn from two CSL classrooms to examine the role of gestures as tone markers in multilingual communication. Classroom discourse of 40 language learners from 12 countries were transcribed and then quantitatively and

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qualitatively analyzed. One language instructor proposed five types of gestures as tone markers in the first week of the course and manipulated the gestures throughout, whereas the other language instructor adopted the traditional tone graph as proposed by Chao (1968) without the use of gestures in classroom drills. The shapes of the written tone markers in Mandarin Chinese basically follow the pitch contour of the isolated Mandarin tones. However, tonal values are such abstract numbers for language learners without tonal backgrounds that the effect of describing tonal numbers in CSL classrooms has been reported to be of dubious effectiveness. In the present study, hand gestures followed the phonological structure of Mandarin lexical tones. In the experimental group, hand gestures were used as tone markers both in drills and classroom interaction. The basic principle for the design of hand gestures is that they must have an underlying unity (McNeill 1992). The instructor demonstrated the tonal gesturing with consistency and unity. Pauses and corrections in the classroom discourse were examined to evaluate the fluency of the language learners in multilingual communication. In each assigned communication task, language fluency, accuracy, and time to completion were evaluated. The results have shown that the learners in the CSL classroom with gestural tone markers had significantly better communication achievements, including better tonal production and a higher frequency of accurate responses. Gesture has been proven to be an integral component of the language learning process in multilingual contexts. Visual aspects of speech may play a role in language pedagogy and second language learning. It can be concluded that nonverbal acts serve an intrinsic role in language learning used in face-to-face discourse. Kinesthetic memory can be exploited in language pedagogy, and this study adds to the preexisting pool of evidence. The awareness of conversational hand gestures as analogically encoded symbolic acts is not redundant when used with the verbal words, but rather tonal gestures often form messages along with the words they accompany. Linguistic phonological knowledge is abstract, whereas gestures as tone markers are concrete. Gestures as tone markers must be tightly synchronized with the timing and meaning of words and with parallel linguistic units (McNeill 1985). Gestures as tone markers in the CSL classroom are connected to co-occurring speech. Gestures in this context are the visual phonological structure of Mandarin tones in CSL classrooms and act as communication cues in multilingual classroom discourse. Finally, it was noted that gestures as tone markers have their own limitations. As pointed out by the instructor in the experimental group, gesturing tone markers was useful in monosyllabic words and disyllabic words. In trisyllabic words or longer phrases or even in fast speech, however, gesturing

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might not be as effective. Gestures as tone markers could be extremely useful in first-year, especially first-semester, CSL classrooms. As CSL learners begin to improve and display their fluency in Mandarin speech, the use of gestures as tone markers could gradually be lessened.

References Allen, Linda Quinn. 1995. The effects of emblematic gestures on the development and access of mental representations of French expressions. Modern Language Journal 79: 521–529. Asher, James J. 1965. The strategy of the total physical response: an application to learning Russian. International Review of Applied Linguistics 3: 291–300. Asher, James J. 1966. The learning strategy of the total physical response: a review. Modern Language Journal 50: 79–84. Asher, James J. and Ben S. Price. 1967. The learning strategy of the total physical response: some age differences. Child Development 38 (4): 1219–1227. Asher, James J. 1977. Learning Another Language Through Action: The Complete Teacher’s Guidebook. Los Gatos: CA: Sky Oaks Productions. Atkinson, J. Maxwell and John Heritage (eds.). 1984. Structures of Social Action: Studies in Conversation Analysis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bao, Zhiming. 1999. The Structure of Tone. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Bavelas, Janet B. and Nicole Chovil. 2006. Nonverbal and verbal communication: Hand gestures and facial displays as part of language use in face-to-face dialogue. In The Sage Handbook Nonverbal Communication, Valerie Manusov and Miles L. Patterson (eds.), 97–115. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. Bavelas, Janet B., Alex Black, Nicole Chovil and Jennifer Mullett. 1990. Equivocal Communication. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. Birdwhistell, Ray. 1967. Some body motion elements accompanying spoken American English. In Communication: Concepts and Perspectives, Lee O. Thayer (ed.), 53–76. London: Macmillan. Birdwhistell, Ray. 1970. Kinesics and Context: Essays on Body Motion Communication. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Brown, H. Douglas. 2007. Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy. New York: Pearson Education. Chao, Yuen-Ren. 1968. A Grammar of Spoken Chinese. Berkeley: University of California Press. Clark, Herbert H. 1996. Using Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Clark, Herbert H. and Richard J. Gerrig. 1990. Quotations as demonstrations. Language, 66, 764–805. Chen, Matthew Y. 2000. Tone Sandhi. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Doughty, Catherine. 2001. Cognitive underpinning of focus on form. In Cognition and Second Language Instruction, Peter Robinson (ed.), 206–257. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Doughty, Catherine and Elizabeth Varela. 1998. Communicative focus on form. In Focus on Form in Classroom Second Language Acquisition, Catherine Doughty and Jessica Williams (eds.), 114–138. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Engle, Randi A. 2000. Toward a theory of multimodal communication combining speech, gestures, diagrams, and demonstrations in instructional explanations. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Stanford University. Fiksdal, Susan. 1990. The Right Time and Pace: A Microanalysis of Cross-Cultural Gatekeeping Interviews. Norwood, NJ: Ablex Publishing. Fridlund, Alan J. 1991. Sociality of solitary smiling: Potentiation by an implicit audience. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 60: 229–240. Gass, Susan M. 1997. Input, Interaction, and the Second Language Learner. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. Gass, Susan M. 2003. Input and interaction. In The Handbook of Second Language Acquisition, Catherine Doughty and Michael Long (eds.), 224–255. Oxford: Blackwell. Gass, Susan M. and Larry Selinker. 2001. Second Language Acquisition: An Introductory Course. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum. Gullberg, Marianne. 1998. Gesture as a Communication Strategy in Second Language Discourse: A Study of Learners of French and Swedish. Lund, Sweden: Lund University Press. Graham, Jean A. and Michael Argyle. 1975. A cross-cultural study of the communication of extra-verbal meaning by gestures. International Journal of Psychology 10: 57–67. Hurley, Daniel S. 1992. Issues in teaching pragmatics, prosody, and non-verbal communication. Applied Linguistics 13: 259–281. Jonassen, David H., Jane L. Howland, Joi Moore and Rose M. Marra. 2003. Learning to Solve Problems with Technology: A Constructive Perspective. Columbus, OH: Merrill PrenticeHall. Jones, Stanley E. and Curtis D. LeBaron. 2002. Research on the relationship between verbal and nonverbal communication: Emerging interactions. Journal of Communication 52: 499–521. Kellerman, Susan. 1992. ‘I see what you mean’: The role of kinesic behaviour in listening and implications for foreign and second language learning. Applied Linguistics 13: 239–258. Kendon, Adam. 1985. Some uses of gesture. In Perspectives on Silence, Deborah Tannen and Muriel Saville-Troike (eds.), 215–234. Norwood, New Jersey: Ablex Publishing Corporation. Ladd, D. Robert. 1996. Intonational Phonology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lazaraton, Anne. 2004. Gesture and speech in the vocabulary explanations of one ESL teacher: A microanalytic inquiry. Language Learning 54: 79–117. Loewen, Shawn and Jenefer Philp. 2006. Recasts in the adults English L2 classrooms: Characteristics, explicitness, and effectiveness. Modern Language Journal 90: 536–556. Long, Michael H. and Peter Robinson. 1998. Focus on form: Theory, research, and practice. In Focus on Form in Classroom Second Language Acquisition, Catherine Doughty and Jessica Williams (eds.), 15–41. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lyster, Roy. 1998. Recasts, repetition, and ambiguity in L2 classroom discourse. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 20: 51–81. Lyster, Roy. 2002. Negotiation in immersion teacher-student interaction. International Journal of Educational Research 37: 237–253. Lyster, Roy. 2004. Differential effects of prompts and recasts in form-focused instruction. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 26: 399–432. Lyster, Roy and Leila Ranta. 1997. Corrective feedback and learner uptake: Negotiation of form in communicative classrooms. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 19: 37–66. McCafferty, Steven G. 1998. Nonverbal expression and L2 private speech. Applied Linguistics 19: 73–96.

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McCafferty, Steven G. 2002. Gesture and creating zones of proximal development for second language learning. Modern Language Journal 86: 192–203. McCroskey, James C., Virginia P. Richmond and Linda L. McCroskey. 2006a. Nonverbal communication in instructional contexts. In The Sage Handbook Nonverbal Communication, Valerie Manusov and Miles L. Patterson (eds.), 421–436. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. McCroskey, James C., Virginia P. Richmond and Linda L. McCroskey. 2006b. An Introduction to Communication in the Classroom: The Role of Communication in Teaching and Training. Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon. McNeil, David. 1985. So you think gestures are nonverbal? Psychological Bulletin, 92: 350–371. McNeill, David. 1992. Hand and Mind: What Gestures Reveal About Thought. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Nassaji, Hossein. 2007. Elicitation and reformulation and their relationship with learner repair in dyadic interaction. Language Learning 57: 511–548. Nassaji, Hossein. 2009. Effects of recasts and elicitations in dyadic interaction and the role of feedback explicitness. Language Learning 59: 411–452. Nicholas, Howard, Patsy M. Lightbown and Nina Spada. 2001. Recasts as feedback to language learners. Language Learning 51: 719–758. Özyürek, Asli. 2000. The influence of addressee location on spatial language and representational gestures of direction. In Language and Gesture, David McNeill (ed.), 99–117. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Özyürek, Asli. 2002. Do speakers design their cospeech gestures for their addressees location on representational gestures. Journal of Memory and Language 46 (4): 688–704. Richmond, Virginia P., Derek R. Lane and James C. McCroskey. 2006. Teacher immediacy and the teacher-student relationship. In Handbook of Instructional Communication: Rhetorical and Relational Perspectives, Timothy P. Mottet, Virginia P. Richmond and James C. McCroskey (eds.), 167–193. Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon. Shih, Chilin. 1986. The Prosodic Domain of Tone Sandhi in Chinese. PhD Dissertation, University of California, San Diego. Streeck, Jürgen and Mark L. Knapp. 1992. The interaction of visual and verbal features in human communication. In Advances in Nonverbal Communication: Sociocultural, Clinical, Esthetic and Literary Perspectives, Fernando Poyatos (ed.), 3–24. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Swain, Merrill. 1995. Three functions of output in second language learning. In Principle and Practice in Applied Linguistics: Studies in Honour of H. G. Widdowson, Guy Cook and Barbara Seidlhofer (eds.), 125–144. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Swain, Merrill. 2005. The output hypothesis: Theory and research. In Handbook of Research in Second Language Teaching and Learning, Eli Hinkel (ed.), 471–483. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. Wang, Shu-Mei, Tsui-Ying Lu and Ye-Ning Chen. 2008. Shiyong Shiting Huayu 1 [Practical AudioVisual Chinese 1]. Taipei: Cheng Chung. Wardaugh, Ronald. 1985. How Conversation Works. Oxford: Blackwell. Williams, Jessica. 2005. Form-focused instruction. In Handbook of Research in Second Language Teaching and Learning, Eli Hinkel (ed.), 673–691. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. Yip, Moira. 2002. Tone. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Ying Liu

The collaborative construction of cultural knowledge in a Chinese movie class Abstract: With the recent development in second and foreign language education, the relationship between context and language has drawn keen attention from a growing number of L2 education researchers. While most researchers focus their attention on the effects of local contexts on teaching and learning, the construction of target culture context still requires further research. The goal of this study is to investigate how classroom activities help students at the L2 level acquire and share cultural knowledge that allows them to form a context for new conversations and activities in their L2 environment. I will begin by reviewing some definitions of ‘culture’ and ‘context’. Then, later in the paper, I will examine the process by which target culture contexts are constructed in a second year Chinese film class based on observational data. Finally, I will discuss related pedagogical implications.

1 Introduction 1.1 Language in context The relationship between language and its context has been explored extensively by researchers. Wittgenstein (1978) conceptualized language as games embedded in broader patterns of actions, whereby the meaning of a word or a sentence is determined by people’s use of language within specific contexts rather than by the word or sentence itself. In order to contrast the language in real life communication with abstract “sentences belonged to nobody,” Bakhtin (1986: 83) used the term “utterance,” which is “framed and delimited by a change of speech subjects” and directly reflects an extraverbal reality. Bakhtin argued that there were two essential aspects of utterance: addressivity of the utterance and the influence of the anticipated response. According to Bakhtin, any participant in a conversation must consider not only his/her relationship with the addressee, but also the addressee’s background and possible reactions to what has been said. The grammar rules provide people with scaffolding upon which to build their conversations, but the actual interaction must be based on a comprehensive knowledge of the addressee, which is part of the conversational context. Another aspect of this context lies in the dialogical echoes from others’

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preceding utterances. Bakhtin (1986: 87–88) argued that when people select words to construct utterances, they by no means take them from their neutral, dictionary form. Every word is taken from other people’s utterances with a specific “stylistic aura,” whereas the “stylistic aura” is derived from the use of a word within specific discourse communities.

1.2 Creating context in communication Wittgenstein’s game metaphor and Bakhtin’s utterance theory imply that communication is a coordinated activity, which would breakdown when interaction between rejoinders collapses. “Common Ground” has been defined by Clark (1996) as the part of information that rejoinders share and rely on at the moment of communicating; this kind of “common ground” has also been referred to as “shared frame of reference” by Mercer (2000: 41). On the one hand, speakers attempt to design their utterances in such a way that they have reason to believe the addresses can readily understand their intentions on the basis of their common ground. On the other hand, listeners always draw on their past experiences in order to make sense of what they have heard.

1.3 Conversational ground rules and culture Mercer (2000: 44) mentioned several categories of contextual resources that people draw on during their communications, including their physical surroundings, past shared experiences and relationship between the speakers, their shared tasks or goals, and the speakers’ experience with similar types of conversation. One kind of contextual resource that enables people to communicate effectively is ‘conversational ground rules,’ which refers to the “conventions which language users employ to carry on particular kinds of conversations.” (Mercer 2000: 28) Different types of conversational ground rules are employed based on different conversations. However, to ensure the success of a conversation, speakers should adopt the same conventions. If these rules and conventions are broken, misunderstandings may occur. Such misunderstandings are very common in intercultural communications when speakers with different cultural background bring different conversational ground rules to their conversation. For students to learn a foreign language, becoming equipped with the linguistic code is far from enough. Knowledge of the “conversational ground rules” comes from a comprehensive understanding of the target culture. Hammerly (1985) placed culture into three useful categories: achievement culture, which

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represents the great achievements of a society; informational culture, which deals with the kinds of knowledge that a society values, as well as historical and other facts about the society; and behavioral culture, which refers to the common daily practices and beliefs that define an individual and dictate behavior in a specific society. These three aspects of cultural knowledge not only make up essential components of the background knowledge that speakers would draw upon in their communications, but also provide implicit “conversational ground rules” for speakers during a conversation. The importance of awareness of culture for language learners is illustrated in Agar’s (1994: 29) statement: “You can master grammar and the dictionary, but without culture you won’t communicate. With culture, you can communicate with rocky grammar and a limited vocabulary.” Given the importance of cultural knowledge in communication, this type of learning would be vital for CFL (Chinese as a foreign language) learners. Walker (1995) emphasized that the primary goal of a foreign language learner is to recognize and express intentions in the target culture. To interpret one another’s intentions, people have to communicate within a shared cultural framework. Given this understanding, Walker (2000: 228) presented a “chain of being an individual” in a culture: culture creates contexts; contexts provide meanings; meanings produce intentions; and intentions define individuals. In Walker’s pedagogy, it is a primary goal for foreign language teachers to help their students to interpret intentions within specific contexts. However, in recent years, most CFL research has still focused on the acquisition of linguistic items. Few studies have examined the importance of stressing cultural knowledge, especially in classroom settings. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to investigate the way in which Chinese cultural knowledge is constructed in CFL classrooms, and to propose a model of culture learning in CFL classroom settings accordingly.

2 The study In order to investigate the ways in which Chinese cultural knowledge are in CFL classrooms, I observed an intermediate level Chinese class at a mid-western American University for ten weeks. The class met five times a week for 50 minute sessions. Among the five class-meetings every week, two are film classes, in which the students discuss a modern Chinese movie, and three are listening and speaking classes, which focus on language drills in specific contexts. Two instructors co-teach this course; one is an American and the other is a native Chinese speaker. The teaching philosophy of the course is guided by Walker’s

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performed-culture theory (1995), which focuses on the culturally appropriate behavior in authentic Chinese contexts. The importance of learning language within a cultural frame of reference is emphasized in the syllabus. Except for some grammar background classes, all other classes are conducted strictly in Chinese. In this paper, I only focus on the film sessions. I observed the class twice a week, coincidentally when the films were scheduled. Interviews were conducted with both instructors at the end of the quarter, in order to understand their intentions as well as perceptions of the movie classes. All conversations in classes and interviews were recorded with the permission of the students and instructors. All data recorded was transcribed immediately after class. I have kept the transcription format as simple as possible, in that I have only included information about such aspects as pauses, or non-verbal aspects of communication when I felt these were essential to the comprehensibility of the speech and the presentation of an analysis. To protect the privacy of the participants, all names included in this paper are pseudonyms. The movie watched in class was Beijing Gushi: the story of Beijing, which tells of an American immigrant family returning to their hometown of Beijing, in the 1980s. The instructor told me in the interview that they chose this movie because it reflects many potential cultural conflicts that American people might encounter in China. My analyses are organized around three main themes: (a) the joint construction of the target culture context; (b) the teachers’ role in the construction of the target culture’s context; (c) the contextualization as a chronological process.

2.1 The joint construction of the target culture knowledge The movie presents Chinese people’s behavior within an authentic cultural context. The target language is presented in real life situations. To understand the movie, students not only have to understand the language code, but also need to associate the movie characters’ behavior with the characters’ past experiences, and interpret their intentions according to the frame of references in Chinese culture. In order to interpret the movie, the students must be able to understand the characters’ behaviors within the context of Chinese culture. For intermediate level Chinese students, to interpret the movie from a Chinese person’s perspective is by no means an easy task. Therefore, as I observed, the main activity in this class was for students to share their understanding, and check with the teacher and peers to see whether those interpretations were reasonable in Chinese culture.

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In the following example, a typical class discussion is analyzed to show how the cultural contexts are negotiated and constructed among a group of CFL students.

Session one: Living in a Chinese host’s house In this class session, a student named Du, asked a question related to the intention of the movie character Mrs. Zhao. In the movie, Mrs. Zhao’s younger brother, Mr. Fang, has just returned to China after living in the United States for more than 20 years. Mrs. Zhao invites Mr. Fang’s family to dinner and asks them to stay in her house. After Du asked the question, students Bi, Ou, He, Shi, and Ke gave their opinions. (The teacher played the movie.) Du:

Bi: Teacher: Ou:

Teacher: He: Teacher:

Ke: Teacher:

Teacher:

赵太太为什么不要她的弟弟住旅馆？ Why Mrs. Zhao doesn’t let her younger brother live in a hotel? (The teacher stopped the movie and looked at the whole class.) 因为她觉得太贵了。 Because she thinks it’s too expensive. 好。还有呢？ Good. Any other reasons? 而且因为她是姐姐，她是方先生的姐姐，他应该住在她家。 It’s also because she is the elder sister; she is the elder sister of Mr. Fang. He should live in her house. 好，说的好。还有呢？ Good. Well spoken. Any other reasons? 赵太太想念方先生。 Mrs. Zhao misses Mr. Fang. 可能。可能。还有呢？柯智，赵太太已经做什么了？ Probably. Probably. Any other reasons? Ke, what has Mrs. Zhao already done? 她准备好了。 She has prepared a room for him. 她已经准备好了。 She has already prepared a room for him. (Ke and Shi raise their hands) 柯。 Ke.

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听说，外国人住中国人的家不可以，真的吗？ I heard that the foreigners are not allowed to live in Chinese people’s house. Is that true? Shi: 我听说以前在六十年代七十年代外国人不应该住在中国人的家里。 I heard that some time ago during the 60s or 70s, foreigners don’t live in Chinese people’s homes. Teacher: 对，那个时候不可以。可是现在好像没有问题。而且他们是家里 人，所以 即使是外国人，可是也是家里人。 Yes. It’s not allowed at that time. But now it probably is not a problem. And they are family members. So even though Mr. Fang is a foreigner, they are also relatives. Du: 我在中国人家里住过，可是我想外国人和中国人的习惯不一样， 所以不那么容易。 I have lived in Chinese people’s home. But I think foreigners’ customs are different from Chinese people. So it’s not easy. Teacher: 对，不容易让外国人住中国人的家里。 Yes, it’s not easy to have a foreigner live in a Chinese home. (The teacher continued to play the movie.) Ke:

In this session, we see six students and the teacher actively engaged in a discussion about the Chinese hosting tradition. The student, Du, first raised a question related to the background of the target culture: why Mrs. Zhao asked her younger brother to live at her home, rather than in the hotel? This question initiated the activity of contextualizing Mrs. Zhao’s decision from a Chinese perspective. Students played an active role in the discussion and each student provided a different perspective. Ou contextualized Mrs. Zhao’s decision according to her understanding of the Chinese norms: Mr. Fang is her brother. In China, the brother should live in his sister’s house. The teacher confirmed her perspective first and then asked for more possible answers. Then He contextualized Mrs. Zhao’s decision according to information about the characters in the movie: since Mr. Fang had lived in the United States for more than 20 years, Mrs. Zhao must be missing Mr. Fang. The teacher responded with “probably” to accept this perspective. And then, with the teacher’s hint, Ke contextualized Mrs. Zhao’s behavior according to Mrs. Fang’s immediate past experience: Mrs. Fang has arranged a room for her brother so she asked her brother to stay. As we can see in this short conversation, Mrs. Fang’s decision was contextualized at different levels. Students’ different perspectives were encouraged by the instructor, and he helped all the students in class to understand the movie on a cultural level.

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However, the students’ contextualization is not restricted to the movie itself. As both the students and the teacher were aware, the goal of the class was to learn Chinese language and Chinese culture, the students were able to recontextualize the classroom discussion according to their own cultural knowledge or experience. As an example in this sequence, the students Ke tried to confirm his knowledge that “foreigners can’t live in Chinese people’s house.” His original knowledge seemed to contradict the scene in the movie. As we can see in the sequence, his confusion was cleared by the contribution of another student and the teacher when he realized that his knowledge reflected a history of China, but not the modern cultural context. Students also shared their personal experiences in class. In this sequence, Du told the class that she had lived in China before. She shared her experience with her classmates that even though now it is ok to live at Chinese people’s homes; it is still difficult to get along with Chinese hosts. As we can see in this sequence, one student’s question about the context of the movie captured the attention of the entire class. The class then constructed the context knowledge at different levels, including the Chinese cultural knowledge, the movie’s general background, and the movie character’s immediate past experiences. The students also recontextualized the discussion using their previous knowledge as well as personal experiences. In this way, the class activities became a continuing process in which everyone’s shared frame of reference was expanded. In this process, students played an active role in obtaining information, sharing their own personal experiences and target cultural knowledge, and incorporating the new perspectives into their understanding of the Chinese culture.

2.2 The teacher’s role in the construction of the target culture’s context In this film class, the target culture knowledge was not a one-way transmission from the teacher to the students. Everyone contributed their own perspectives and the knowledge was shared among all participants in class. In this section, we will discuss the role of the teacher in the collaborative contextualizing process.

Session two: At Yi Da’s home Session two occurred in the second week of the quarter. In this sequence, students were discussing the living arrangements of Yi Da, the main character in the movie. Lili is Yi Da’s girl friend from a rich family.

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(The movie changed its setting to Yi Da’s home. The teacher stopped the movie and asked the whole class a question.) Teacher: 好，现在我们在哪儿？慕。 Well, where are we now? Mu. Mu: 现在在胡同里。 Now in the alley. Teacher: 嗯。在胡同里。意达的家。意达的家和莉莉的家一样吗？(pauses) 有什么不一样？ Yes. We are in the alley. Yi Da’s home. Is Yi Da’s house the same as Lili’s house? (pauses) Is there any difference? Ma: 意达的家比莉莉的家小。 Yi Da’s house is smaller than Lili’s house. Teacher: 嗯。意达的家比莉莉的家小。 Yi Da’s house is smaller than Lili’s house. Du: 没有草地。 There is no lawn. Teacher: 还有呢？他们家的房子怎么样？ Anything else? How about his house? Shi: 不好。那人有很多人。 Not good. That person has lots of people*. (A grammatically wrong sentence) Teacher: 在那个地方有很多人。而且房子不好。这个地方叫什么名字？ 莉莉的家叫四合院，意达的家在 . . . (pauses) That place has lots of people. And the building is not good. What’s the name of that place? Lili’s house is called “Sihe Yuan.” Yida’s house is at . . . (pauses) Wei: 胡同。 Alley. Teacher: 在胡同。胡同。胡同里头有四合院，好的房子。还有那种不好的房 子，叫大杂院。 (The teacher wrote “Da Zayuan” on the blackboard. The students took notes.) 大，很大的大，杂，是很多的，乱七八糟 的。有很多人在一起。这个地方叫大杂院。他们住在一个大杂院里 头。所以他们家有钱吗？ In the alley. Alley. In the alley there are many “Sihe Yuan,” which are good house. There are also many not so good houses. Those are called “Da Zayuan.” (The teacher wrote “Da Zayuan” on the blackboard. The students took notes.) Da, very big. Za, very messy. Many people live together. This placed is called Da Zayuan. They all live in a Da Zayuan. So is Yi Da’s family rich? Wei: 没有钱。 He is poor.

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In this sequence, the teacher helped the students elaborate on the description of Yi Da’s living place, which hints at the movie’s future plot. The function of this sequence will be further discussed later. In this section, I will mainly focus on the teacher’s role in the construction of contextual knowledge. The teacher first established the shared frame of reference by asking “where are we now?” Throughout the quarter, “where are we now” was the most common question the teachers asked when the setting in the movie changed. This question at least has two different functions. First, it set up the physical location for the conversations in the movie. All information related to the place is discovered. In this sequence, by asking “where are we now,” the Beijing alley becomes a prominent element, which explains why so many people were sharing a court yard and later why Yi Da’s neighbor friend comes to his house even without Yi Da’s permission. Second, as observed in this sequence, the natural answer for this question is “We are in Beijing’s alley,” rather than “We are in a building at the university.” By asking this question, the teacher mentally transported the students to the Chinese culture, which implied that Chinese culture was the background for all discussions and everyone should apply a Chinese perspective. In this sequence, the major technique that the teacher used was elicitation. The teacher attempted to obtain useful information from students by prompting them with questions. It is the teacher who guided the whole dialogue as a “primary knower.” New words were introduced on the blackboard. The introduction of vocabulary was infused into the film class, and provided the class with a common vocabulary for future discussions that they would need in order to communicate their mutual understanding to each other. The teacher did not always play the role of “primary knower” in class. In sequence three, we can see that students took the role of discussion leaders and the teacher only provided the information that students asked about.

Session three: The college entrance exam The main character in the movie, Yi Da, had failed the college entrance exam twice during the past two years. Yi Da’s father was encouraging him to study hard to pass it this time. In this sequence, students began to inquire about the standards of Chinese college entrance exams.

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(Shi raised a hand and the teacher stopped the movie.) Shi:

Teacher: Mu: Teacher: Mu: Ke: Teacher: Mu:

Teacher:

如果意达已经考高考两次，为什么他爸爸想这次能考上？ If Yi Da has already attended the college entrance exam twice, why does his father believe he could pass this time? 好，慕。 OK, Mu. 因为这次 . . . Because this time . . . (pause) 上次。 Last time. 上次他差十二分。 Last time he was only short of 12 points. 高考一共多少分？ What’s the total scores of the college entrance exam? 刘老师? Teacher Liu? 不同的省是不一样的。在北京可能是，以前全国是750分。750分。 但是现在有没有改革我不知道。 The standards are different for different provinces. In Beijing it’s probably . . . In the past, the total scores were 750. 750. But I am not sure whether it has been changed or not. 好，至少几百分。好。还有没有问题。所以十二分不算多。 OK. At least several hundred points. Ok. Any other questions? So 12 points are not much.

In this sequence, again we can see that students’ understanding of the movie’s conversation depended on their knowledge of the target culture. If they hadn’t known the total scores of the college entrance exam, they could not tell how much those 12 points count and to what extent Yi Da was behind. The lack of the target cultural knowledge determines that it is necessary to construct the cultural context first. In contrast with sequence two, the students in this sequence played a major role in the construction of cultural knowledge. The students solicited information from the teacher. The teacher instead adopted the role of a facilitator who is responsible for information distribution. At that time, I was observing from the back of the classroom. Both the students and the teacher were aware of my Chinese background. Therefore, the teacher asked me to share my knowledge about Chinese culture.

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As I mentioned earlier, this class had two instructors: one was an American and the other was a Chinese TA. According to my observation, the two instructors constructed the cultural knowledge in different ways. The American teacher always included me in the classroom conversation by asking about my own knowledge of culture. The Chinese TA always shared his own experiences with his students. However, a further discussion of the effects of teachers’ background and identity is beyond the scope of this paper.

2.3 The contextualization as a chronological process In foreign language classrooms, the constructing of the target culture context is a chronological process. On the one hand, new knowledge is built upon a prior shared knowledge among the teachers and the students. On the other hand, the construction of new knowledge is also directed by the teachers’ expectations of the future activities, which might include activities in classroom or in the target culture.

Session four: Dating the girl next door Sequence four is a dialogue immediately following session three. When Yi Da’s father is encouraging Yi Da to study hard for the college entrance exam, he prohibits him from dating the neighbor girl, Lili. The students were discussing Yi Da’s father’s opinion of this girl.

意达的爸爸喜欢莉莉吗？ Does Yi Da’s father like Lili? Teacher: 嗯 . . . 他喜欢莉莉吗？ Em . . . (pauses) Does he like Lili? Wei: 不喜欢。不喜欢。 He doesn’t like her. He doesn’t like her. Teacher: 他说什么？ What did he say? Mu: 呃，他总是想，呃，意达的爸爸说呃意达总是呃想 (pauses and laughs) 所以，他嗯，没有空学习。 Uh, He always wants to, uh, Yi Da’s father said, uh, Yi Da always wants to (pauses and laughs) So, he, uh, doesn’t have time to study. Teacher: 他说了一句话，他说什么？(pauses) 他们和赵家 . . . Ok. He said one sentence. What did he say? (pauses) They and Lili’s family . . .

Du:

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我想嗯我想意达的爸爸喜欢莉莉可是他想意达和莉莉不是一要* (wrong word) 的人。 I think em . . . I think Yi Da’s father likes Lili, but he thinks Yi Da and Lili do not belong to the same class. Teacher: 差不多。不是一要，是一号。一号的人。 Almost correct. Not “yiyao.” It’s “yihao.” “Yihao de ren.” Shi: 一号的人。 “Yihao de ren.” (No one had questions. The teacher continued to play the movie.) Shi:

With the help of the teacher, one student finally got the correct answer that Yi Da and Lili do not belong to the same social class. Session four occurred in the sixth week of the quarter. This sequence may explain the intention of the instructor in session two mentioned earlier in this paper, which occurred during the second week of the quarter. In sequence two, the students see Yi Da’s house in the movie for the first time. The teacher kept asking the students to describe the physical environment of Yi Da’s house. He also asked students to compare Yi Da’s house with Lili’s house. The student’s conclusion was that Yi Da’s house was small, messy and his family was poor. In this way, Yi Da and Lili’s family background was constructed as shared information for the class. Although such information seemed irrelevant when it was first constructed, it became important contextual information for students’ discussion in session four occurring four weeks later. The teacher’s expectation of future classroom activity determined his teaching activity. The expectation of students’ future experience in the target culture also played an important role in class.

Session five: Privacy in China In this sequence, students were discussing the concept of privacy in China. Teacher: 柯，保罗为什么不高兴？ Ke, why is Paul unhappy? Ke: 他认为莉莉的妈妈不应该看信。 He thought Lili’s mom should not read Lili’s letters. Teacher: 那莉莉认为这件事怎么样呢？史。 Then how did Lili think about this? Shi. Shi: 莉莉认为没什么。 Lili thought it didn’t matter.

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Teacher: 那保罗很生气。因为她的妈妈看她的信。他认为这是什么啊？这是 privacy。中文怎么说？隐私。这是隐私。但是她认为没关系，没有 什么，妈妈可以看她的信。所以中国人以前没有隐私。但现在不是 这样了，你现在去中国，会发现中国人好像越来越尊重你的隐私。 Then Paul was angry because her mom read her letters. What did he think? This is “privacy.” How to say “privacy” in Chinese? Yinsi. This is yinsi. But she thought it didn’t matter, didn’t matter. Her mom could read her letters. So in that time Chinese people had no privacy. But now the situation changed. If you go to China now, you will find Chinese people respect your privacy as well. In sequence five, Paul, a teenager born in the United States is surprised to see that Lili allowed her mother to read her letters. This knowledge of culture was critical for understanding Paul and Lili’s conflict. Since the fact that Chinese people don’t care about privacy was never mentioned in class before, the instructor explained it thoroughly. It is obvious that such information, “Chinese people don’t care about privacy,” was enough to understand the cultural setting of the movie. However, the teacher was also aware of the cultural change in China during recent years. Therefore he incorporated the students’ future experience into his explanation. The expectation of students’ future experience in China framed the teachers’ discussion of the movie’s context. Through the teacher’s explanation, the students gained a “frame of reference” that was closer to the “frame of reference” shared by today’s Chinese people which will continue to be used in the future.

3 Discussion From this analysis, we can see that film classes provide a good opportunity for CFL students to learn about Chinese culture. The dynamic relationship of in-class discussion, building of target culture knowledge, and students’ future L2 communication is presented in Figure 1. CFL learners experience three steps in their cultural learning process. First, in order to interpret the intentions of the characters in the movie, students need to collaboratively construct the context of the target culture at three different levels: movie characters’ immediate past experiences; the movie’s background information such as the time and location of a specific scene; and the target cultural knowledge. Through this process, they gradually liberate themselves from the “frames of references” (Mercer, 2000) in their native cultures, and their frames of reference gradually approximate those shared by Chinese people. Second, once the target culture knowledge is

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constructed, CFL learners will make use of this cultural knowledge as part of common ground when communicating with Chinese native speakers. As Walker (2000: 228) suggests, “culture creates contexts; contexts provide meanings; meanings produce intentions; intentions define individuals.” Knowledge of the target culture provides critical information which allows an individual to contextualize his or her communication and convey his or her intentions. However, communication in the target culture is by no means the final step in the cultural learning process. Since contextualization is a chronological process, the expected communication in the target culture would in turn affect and direct the cultural learning activities.

Figure 1: Dynamic relationship of class activity, culture knowledge, and future L2 communication

4 Pedagogical implications My study presents a model of cultural knowledge construction in CFL classes. While the informal question and answer process in a movie class, as presented and analyzed in this paper, functions as a useful tool for CFL students to build up their knowledge of the target culture, it is only a small component for the entire CFL class. Along with this type of discussion, instructors could design other related activities for cultural learning. For example, following the question and answer session, students could be asked to narrate the plot of the film from a particular movie character’s perspective. Such activity would require students to use the linguistic knowledge they have already acquired, and at the same time interpret the story within a specific cultural context. Another activity for a movie class might be a skit performance. Student could take roles of the movie

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characters and perform a skit in class, through which they would apply their linguistic and cultural knowledge in real contextualized situations. From my analysis, we can also see that the knowledge of the target culture is not directly transmitted from the teacher to the student. Instead, students are actively engaged in the classroom discussions, negotiating different perspectives, contributing their personal knowledge and sharing their personal experiences. The collaborative classroom discussion of the movie provides students the opportunity to observe, describe, analyze, and interpret, which are important skills in intercultural communication. The teachers help contextualize the movie and offer some help when necessary. But the role of the teacher is more like a facilitator who is responsible for the distribution of information.

References Agar, Michael. 1994. Language Shock: Understanding the Culture of Conversation. New York: William Morrow and Company. Bakhtin, Mikhail M. 1986. Speech Genres and Other Late Essays. Trans. by Vern W. McGee. Austin, Tx: University of Texas Press. Clark, Herbert H. 1996. Communities, commonalities, and communication. In Rethinking Linguistic Relativity, John J. Gumperz and Stephen C. Levinson (eds.), 324–355. Cambridge, New York, and Oakleigh: Cambridge University Press. Hammerly, Hector. 1985. An Integrated Theory of Language Teaching and Its Practical Consequences. Blaine, WA: Second Language Publications. Mercer, Neil. 2000. Words and Minds: How We Use Language to Think Together. London: Routledge. Walker, Galal. 1995. Learning Less Commonly Taught Languages: An Agreement on the Bases for the Training of Teachers. Columbus, OH: OSU Foreign Language Publications. Walker, Galal. 2000. Performed culture: Learning to participate in another culture. In Language Policy and Pedagogy, Richard D. Lambert and Elana G. Shohamy (eds.), 223–238. Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Wittgenstein, Ludwig. 1978. Philosophical Investigations. Oxford: Blackwell.

Chapter 3 Acquisition of language structures

Wen Xiong

The acquisition of Chinese modal auxiliary Neng Verb Group (NVG): A case study of an English L2 learner of Chinese Abstract: This longitudinal case study investigates the process of how the Chinese modal auxiliary Neng Verb Group (include neng 能, keyi 可以, hui 会, keneng 可能) is acquired by an English L2 learner of Chinese. Data was collected and based on interviews conducted every week, covering a period of approximately 35 school weeks. This study reflects his learning of Chinese from the very initial part of his language development. The learner’s Chinese acquisition path from the very beginning through the growing control of Chinese is explored by using distributional analysis relating form and meaning at different times by looking at his L2 speech production, and the contrast between Interlocutor Dependent Uses (IDU) and Interlocutor Independent Uses (IIU). The IIU reflects the learner’s own control of the interlanguage; whereas the IDU reflects constraints imposed or support provided by the interlocutor. Changes in the exploration of the learner’s increased interlanguage capacity can be seen in the increment in the production of the IIU compared to the IDU. This case study provides a view inside the strategies and the thinking of a particular learner, revealing the way processes change in the acquisition of Chinese as a second language. More important, the study will contribute to the methodology of the studies of SLA by introducing and exemplifying how to analyze the learner’s speech production in the aspects of both quantity and quality.

1 Introduction The objective of this longitudinal case study is to document the sequence in which particular Chinese modal auxiliary Neng Verb Group (NVG) emerge; to provide a means of exploring the meanings associated with the forms used; and to investigate the developmental pattern of an English learner of Chinese for these four Chinese auxiliary verbs. The modal auxiliary verb is a finite sub-category of the verb, clustered around particular semantic concepts, usually used to express mood or modality. Chinese modal auxiliary NVG includes neng, keyi, hui and keneng, shares the meaning cluster of possibility, ability and permission. The NVG is not only a set of frequently used words in Chinese, but also one which is frequently used wrongly

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by learners of Chinese (Ji 1986; Tao 1991; Xiong 1996; Chen 2002), and they continue to use them deviantly until very late. Within the scope of this objective, the related enquiry in this paper is: even though the NVG is regarded as a group linguistically, is there evidence that this is also true perceptually for L2 learners? The enquiry is concerned with the relationship between the linguistic analysis of the target language and the learner’s learning process. It also relates to the issue of what the teaching should respond to if it is to be effective, which leads to the enquiry of why there is a lack of mastery of the Chinese modal auxiliary verbs by learners.

1.1 The design of the study The case study is of an English speaking beginning learner of Chinese. Interviews were conducted every week for about 45–60 minutes, covering a period from September 2001, to June 2002, consisting of two terms of approximately 35 school weeks. I observed and listed changes in the learner’s natural development in the acquisition of the Chinese modal auxiliary Neng Verb Group over a set period of time. My aim was to determine how learners gain access to and make use of the NVG words. The subject of the longitudinal study is an American man, Kim, who was aged 35 at the time of the first recording. At that time Kim had been in Shanghai, P. R. China only one month and had had only two weeks of classroom-based learning of Chinese at one of the metropolitan University. He took 20 hours Chinese every week averagely. The researcher was his instructor of listening Chinese; meeting him 4 hours per week in class. Kim had been trained as an engineer in the U.S and was interested in pursuing a new career in China. His first language is English, and he had studied Spanish for one year in high school. Upon his arrival in China, Kim spoke absolutely no Chinese. His wife had accompanied him to China. They talked in English and spoke Chinese only when Kim needed to study Chinese. He lived in on-campus dormitory, surrounded by Chinese students and international students who were taking Chinese courses in the university.

1.2 Literature review The importance of acquiring the auxiliary has been long acknowledged in children’s linguistic development. In the study of language development, research

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on L1 (Halliday 1975; Wells 1979, 1985; Perkins 1983; Richards 1990; Papafragou 2001) claims that the acquisition of the auxiliary is particularly interesting because it is important in a child’s linguistic development in relation to the acquisition stage, rate, variation and communicative strategies, reflected in Richards’ (1990: 5) assertion that “Despite the possibility of alternative strategies to express auxiliary meaning, however, an increasing mastery of the syntax, semantics and pragmatics of auxiliary usage is an inextricable part of language development from an early stage.” There have only been two studies about modal auxiliary verbs in L1 Chinese. Erbaugh’s (1982, 1992) study did not focus on modal auxiliaries exclusively but on the overall acquisition of syntax of Chinese. Guo’s (1994) was the first to study the full range of sentence forms, semantic meanings, and discourse functions of Mandarin Chinese modal auxiliaries in children’s speech. In the study of teaching Chinese as a second/foreign language, Wang (1982) was the first to mention the characteristics of Chinese modal auxiliaries on the basis of the errors of students. Ji (1986) made a syntactic contrast between English modal verbs and Chinese auxiliaries. Xiong (1992, 1996, 1997 and 1999) made an overall contrast between Chinese Neng Verb Group and its English counterpart, the CAN Group, from syntactic, semantic and pragmatic perspectives. Studies made an attempt to answer the questions about why Chinese modal auxiliaries create learning difficulties for foreigners who study Chinese and how the problem can be solved. However, evidence from either experimental or naturalistic studies is rare. There appears to exist only two empirical studies about the acquisition of Chinese modal auxiliary verbs by adults. Furthermore, in one of these two studies the modal auxiliaries were not the primary focus of attention. Wang (1997) discussed the negation of modal auxiliary verbs when investigating the acquisition process of Chinese negation markers bu and mei based on the Chinese Interlanguge Data Bank (Beijing). Chen (2002) started with an enquiry into why learners of Chinese cannot distinguish between Chinese auxiliary verbs neng, keyi, hui and the Possible Complementary VP structure (Verb + de + complementary), and then focused on the acquisition of keyi by English learners of Chinese L2. Substantial conclusions are difficult to draw from the analysis due to the limitation of the size of the corpus data. Thus, in looking at the acquisition of the Chinese modal auxiliary words, opens multiple possibilities for enquiry, such as whether the acquisition of Chinese modal auxiliary verbs is related to a developmental stage, or rather reflects different patterns of variation.

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2 Methodology When looking at the data from the case study, there are two separate processes that are involved: one is counting, and the other is interpreting, to determine what the counting means and represents. Section 2.1 talks about how the NVG uses are identified; and Section 2.2 focus on how we label the NVG uses.

2.1 The developmental issue: emergence as a criterion Acquisition criteria will be different based on different theoretical premises and ways of data collection in describing language development. Most of the studies in language acquisition, including both L1 and L2 studies, have adopted accuracy or mastery criteria (Brown 1973; Schumann 1978; Burt and Dulay 1981; Krahsen 1982; Pica 1984). Accuracy or mastery criteria are used to define acquisition by checking the suppliance of a correct form in between 80% and 90% of from three to five obligatory contexts. These criteria are based on the notion derived from L1 research (Cazden 1968) that stability is achieved after approximately 80% accuracy is achieved. This idea was extended in SLA research through the claim that the item that has higher accuracy is acquired earlier. Therefore some researchers (Brown 1968; Dulay, Burt & Krashen 1982; Pica 1984) have inferred that an accuracy order is equivalent to a sequence of acquisition. This claim has been debated (Andersen 1977, 1979; Meisel, Clahsen and Pienemann 1981; Ellis 1985; Larsen-Freeman & Long 1991) based on arguments that the accuracy criterion is a quantitative criterion. The critique also notes that the learner’s production is viewed from the perspective of the target language rather than in its own right and in relation to its own internal systematicity. It has also been pointed out that when using the mastery criteria, the incorrect forms in the learner’s L1 system are disregarded. This ignores the fact that the learner’s interlanguage system is “. . . in the system of language at every point in his development . . . the learner’s errors are evidence of this system and are themselves systematic” (Corder 1967: 24). Therefore it is an implausible standpoint that tracking the interlanguage system development can be achieved by looking at the system only when it is refined and accurate. Pienemann defined emergence as follows: From a speech processing point of view, emergence can be understood as the point in time at which certain skills have, in principle, been attained or at which certain operations can, in principle, be carried out. From a descriptive viewpoint one can say that this is the beginning of an acquisition process, and focusing on the start of this process will allow the researcher to reveal more about the rest of the process. (1998: 138)

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These kinds of views treat the very first use of the language as the most consistently informative point for understanding shared features of learners’ dynamic L1 systems. By applying this criterion to decide on the emergence of a form, the presence of alternate forms and linguistic contexts is required. Quantification of the data needs to be undertaken for the distributional analysis in order to demonstrate the continuity of interlanguage development, and the size of the data sample also needs to be considered in order to demonstrate that there is sufficient evidence for rule application. In this study, a word is regarded as a form, and therefore the presence of its alternate forms, as well as its alternate meanings, and linguistic contexts is also considered. When looking at the acquisition of the Chinese modal auxiliary NVG, it is clear that a single occurrence does not mean the acquisition of everything in terms of learning a word, since learning a word involves multiple-layers of learning. On the whole, knowing a word means to have knowledge of its form, meaning, and grammatical function. It is not necessary to assume that knowing everything about a word is required for knowing a word. Knowing part of or some aspects of particular item should also be regarded as knowing that item. In addition, a word could be well known, or reasonably well known, moderately well known or even only slightly known to unknown (Wolter 2001: 48). If we think that the general metaphor for SL development is growth, expansion, and increased control and within that there are successive phases, and if we think of the varied notions that emergence is trying to produce, emergence is trying to fight against the model of a discrete system looked at only when it is refined and accurate, precise and correct. In fact, the actual emergence units produced by the learner “. . . may be words, formulae or attempts at longer utterances. The utterances may or may not conform to the grammatical structure of the second language” (Nicholas 1987: 23). The units of the learner’s interlanguage are more arbitrary than the linguist’s definition of the units of language, such as lexis and grammar. When applying the criterion of emergence, we find that the importance of emergence, plus the importance of focus on lexical acquisition opens up the possibility of understanding the system more clearly. It brings the discarded elements, such as formulae, of some previous discussions back into the discussion, whereas a narrow focus on syntactic acquisition is inclined to block them out. Since space has now been created for more than one kind of emergence, the distribution of the emergence of words of the NVG needs to be counted in a variety of ways. In the case of the Neng Verb Group, each item of the NVG is polysemic so that each has more than one meaning and shares overlapping meanings between and within the group.

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The implication of these observations is that, regardless of whether the meaning and its relevant structures are interlocutor dependent uses or interlocutor independent uses, we should count them as evidence of a more or less systematic pattern of distribution.

2.2 The interlocutor dependent uses (IDU) and the interlocutor independent uses (IIU) There is a gradual process of movement of the system that underpins the NVG words in Kim’s Chinese production from his very first use of the NVG words. Early on, this process is reflected in the change in the relative frequency of utterances that are independent of the interlocutor. Regardless of the time, there are always both interlocutor dependent and interlocutor independent utterances. There are some responses to my questions which contain the NVG words, some repetitions of my uses, and some independent uses after I gave explanations encouraging Kim to “notice” (Schmidt 1995) words of the NVG, and certainly there are also some independent uses that are appropriate expressions in the contexts without any effort from the interlocutor. The change in the frequency of production will reveal the extent of independence in the learner’s use of the relevant features of the interlanguage. The changes in the proportion of independent uses are even more important for the whole profile of the development. We need not only an understanding of frequency with which certain things are occurring, but also an understanding of their role in the overall system. In order to get a total sense of that, we need both quantitative and qualitative perspectives. Consequently, another perspective is to think of the quality of Kim’s productions. The distinctions between the productions that depend on the interlocutor and the ones produced independently can be interpreted as a qualitative contrast in his use. The IIU reflect the learner’s own control of the interlanguage; whereas the IDU reflect constraints imposed on or support provided by the interlocutor. The IDU can continue long after the capacity for independent uses have been established if the circumstances of the interaction enable this (for example, in a teacher controlled classroom). Changes in the exploration of the learner’s increased interlanguage capacity can be seen in the increment in the production of the IIU compared to the IDU, if the circumstances permit. The detailed discussion about the distinction between the IDU and the IIU will be graphed and reported in Section 3.2. The progressions involve shifting from the IDU to the IIU, shifting from a receptive dominant system to a productive dominant system.

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The process of the acquisition of the NVG by Kim will be viewed from the above perspectives as proceeding through two broad phases. These phases are first a phase that I have labeled Interlocutor Dependent Phase and second a phase that I have labeled Interlocutor Independent Phase, which will be defined in greater detail in the following sections by checking the quantitative distribution of meanings and structures.

3 Data analysis 3.1 Frequency of the uses of the NVG words Data was collected based on a weekly interview, including 22 recordings covering about 35 weeks of learning from beginning. Table 3.1 is based on the frequency of different forms and meanings of the Neng Verb Group words used by Kim. Kim’s use Meanings of the NVG words

Total number of uses

Time of emergence

neng

neng 1: ability neng 2: permission neng 3: possibility Total

9 13 1? 23

Recording 5 Recording 8 Recording 11

keyi

keyi 1: ability keyi 2: permission keyi 3: possibility keyi 4: Hai keyi = just so so, it’s ok. (Formulae) keyi 5: keyi shuo = can I say / I can say, etc. (Formulae) Total

23 14 21 7

Recording 5 Recording 5 Recording 3 Recording 2

13

Recording 15

78

hui

hui 1: ability hui 2: possibility Total

25 + 5 R –/ 30

keneng

possibility

1(R)

Recording 1

Table 3.1: Kim’s production of the NVG words Codes: 1. The first column is the four NVG words: neng, keyi, hui and keneng. 2. The second column is the various meaning of each NVG word used by Kim, marked 1, 2, 3 . . . 3. The third column is the frequency of the uses of different meanings 4. The forth column is the time point when the meaning was first used. There are altogether 22 recordings in the whole data collection. 5. ?: stands for unclear meaning in the context 6. R: stands for a use that is the repetition of the interlocutor 7. –/: no production

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The numbers in the above table represent Kim’s overall uses of the NVG words in 22 recordings that lasted 45 minutes to one hour in each session.

Figure 3.1: Overall frequency of uses of the NVG words by Kim

Figure 3.1 shows the proportion of the use of the four words in the Neng Verb Group: neng, hui, keyi and keneng based on Table 3.1. As will be noted in the discussion below, the major issue to emerge is that, even though the NVG words are presented and theorized as a single group, the features of their acquisition indicate that for the learner, at least initially, the words do not form a single entity. Keyi is the most frequently used word in the group and appears in every session after its first use and constitutes over 62% of the total use of NVG. Furthermore, keyi also shows: (1) regular presence; (2) a variety of meanings in alternation; (3) a variety of grammatical places; (4) a more independent production rather than depending on the interlocutor. In contrast, keneng appears only once, and accounts for a mere 0.5% of the total use of the NVG (the computer generated chart rounds up to the nearest whole number). In comparison with the above two words, hui is the second most frequently used word in the Neng Verb Group, averaging around 24.5% of the total use of the NVG. Hui is the earliest produced word in the Neng Verb Group, as early as the first recording. In contrast, neng accounts for 13% of the total use of NVG. It is, in fact, one of the less frequently used words, which implies that there is a contrast between the way linguists and learners identify whether or not neng is the central member of the group.

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In summary, Table 3.1 and Figure 3.1 show that all four words are used in various ways: (1) The frequencies are different. From the learner’s perspective, even if a formal linguistic analysis has created an entity called the Neng Verb Group (NVG), the more important concept is keyi. Keyi seems more general, a more salient character of Kim’s Chinese. It was used more frequently and flexibly. In contrast, Kim had the English expression maybe to use and it seems he did not feel there was any need to use the Chinese equivalent expression of “possibility”, keneng, particularly early on. Hui and neng were used with intermediate frequency. Therefore, it is worth noting that keyi appears to be more significant in the overall construction of the pattern than the others, despite the name of the group being the Neng Verb Group. One of the interesting questions is why keyi is the most significant in his consciousness. (2) The times of emergence of the NVG words are different. Regardless of whether the uses of the words are under the influence of the interlocutor or not, the times of emergence of the NVG words vary. Not only the NVG words, but also the meanings belonging to each word appeared either at a different time or at the same time. This leaves much room for discussion later. Why and when do they emerge? To what extent and in what situations do they emerge? (3) The range of meanings of the NVG word is acquired differently. Each member of the NVG is polysemic, with more then one meaning item but sharing some areas of overlapping meaning within the NVG. From observation of Kim’s uses, not every meaning of members of the NVG had been taught and produced at the time of finishing interviewing. As shown in the above table, one meaning of the total of four meanings of hui, two meanings of the total of four meanings of neng, and five meanings of the six meanings of keyi had been explored. It should be asked whether there is a meaning difficulty rank among all these meanings, and whether the learner can substitute words where their meanings overlap, or use words in different ways. All these differences listed above provide great stimulus for our discussion. Although the linguists and the pedagogies tend to treat all four words as a group to study and teach, the L2 learner has his/her own route to acquire them. The route of development will be discussed in the following sections.

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3.2 Distributional pattern: the interlocutor dependent uses (IDU) and the interlocutor independent uses (IIU) As discussed in Section 3.1, the four NVG words, neng, keyi, hui and keneng have been used by Kim at different rates, a simple count of the frequency with which the different meanings are distributed is not very revealing. Further questions should be raised about whether all these uses are the same, and to what extent these productions reflect the developmental stage of the L2 learner’s interlanguage. Since the interview recordings took the form of both unstructured and semistructured interview sessions. These task-based interviews related to the use of Chinese modal auxiliary NVG words as would be expressed by native speakers. In these tasks, Kim’s performance was, therefore, unavoidably influenced by the interlocutor. Across these diverse contexts, Kim responded in the following six ways: (1) I explained to Kim some uses in the context, and then he tried to use them. (2) I initially used the NVG word, and then Kim copied my sentence pattern to use the word with its modeled meaning. (3) I initially used the NVG word, and then Kim used the word in a different utterance with its modeled meaning. (4) I gave Kim a noticing exercise for the relevant words and contexts, but did not push him to use or use initially the NVG words. Kim then realized he could use the words. (5) Kim produced a NVG verb spontaneously in natural conversation. This category also includes the cases that occurred after I had set up (but not modeled) contexts in which the words could be appropriately used, and then he used a NVG verb. (6) In contexts designed to elicit the NVG words, Kim changed topics or kept talking without obviously reaching for my cue. In the analysis of the data, I classified the above cases (1), (2) and (3) as IDU, in which contexts the NVG words had been used by the interlocutor as the trigger to lead Kim to follow. In contrast (4), and (5) are labeled as IIU, in which contexts Kim (the learner) produced the NVG words initially and independently without any influence from the interlocutor. Since (6) provides no evidence of the NVG related behavior, this category has not been included here in the frequency count. Therefore, IIU reflects the learner’s own control of the interlanguage; whereas IDU reflects constraints imposed on or support provided by the interlocutor. The contrast is not a simple binary choice. A use can be regarded as independent

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because it has not been directly modeled, or because the learner found it by himself. These two things are not always the same in the way they influence progression movement in the scale. On a scale from the most dependent to the most independent; the medium areas carry the combination of these two categories’ features. In developing the categories within the areas from the IDU to the IIU, I have considered the features listed in Figure 3.2, which have resulted in different categories being located at different points, progressively moving from the most dependent to the most independent along a gradient:

Figure 3.2: The continuum from the IDU to the IIU

(1) and (5) stand for the two extremes of the gradient from the most dependent uses to the most independent uses. Cases between these two extremes need more analyze, I have detailed the ways in which I have used the criteria to motivate the position of the categories on the continuum. Reasons and examples are shown below. The following examples are drawn from the data, where X stands for the interlocutor (me), and K stands for the learner Kim, to show the difference between the IDU and the IIU. Both the interlocutor and the set contexts prompted Kim to use the modal auxiliary verbs of the NVG, illustrating the differences between the above six categories. Case 1: Interlocutor Dependent Uses (IDU) This case reflects the influence of the instruction. The IDU can occur in naturalistic acquisition and in formal instruction. The main characteristic is that this use is not a spontaneous one. It had been explained, translated, practiced or modeled, and all of these activities classify it as the IDU. E.g. 3-1 (Recording 5, 15/11/2001) X: “可以” also means “may”, to ask permission, “我可以进来吗”? “keyi” also means “may”, to ask permission, “1SG AUX jin lai PRT” ‘keyi also means “may”, to ask permission, “May I come in?” ’ K Ok. X: How do you say “May I call you tonight?”

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K: 晚上我可以电话吗？ Night 1SG AUX phone PRT ‘May I call tonight?’ The interlocutor told the learner that the word keyi had another, different meaning and gave an example to show how to use it, as “keyi also means may, to ask permission, e.g. ‘Wo keyi jin lai ma’ (May I come in)?” After that, the interlocutor invited the learner to use the word and tried to express “May I call you tonight?” in Chinese. Kim supplied an appropriate auxiliary in an appropriate structure, but he used a noun form (dianhua = phone) instead of the correct verb form “da dianhua” (make phone, i.e. make a call). This case is somewhat like activities or practices happening in the formal classroom setting. Examples of this occurred only three times, as I tried to avoid this kind of explaining and modeling in the conversations. Cases 2 and 3: Interlocutor Dependent Uses (IDU) These two categories of the IDU are the next grade from Case 1. There was a range of interactions between the researcher and the subject focusing on the production of the NVG words, especially early on. Case 2, as in Example 3-2, is more dependent than Case 3, as in Example 5-3, because although both cases are all the situations in which the interlocutor initially used the NVG word, in Case 2, Kim just repeated the pattern that the interlocutor used; however, in Case 3, Kim extended the pattern to use the NVG word that was used by the interlocutor. E.g. 3-2 (Recording 1, 7/10/2001) K: 我说汉语 not well, 一点儿。 1SG AUX speak Chinese NEG well, one CL ‘I can speak Chinese not well, a little bit.’ X: 你会说英语吗？ 2SG AUX speak English PRT ‘Can you speak English?’ K: oh, 我会说英语。 (laughing) Oh, 1SG AUX speak English ‘Oh, I can speak English.’ E.g. 3-3 (Recording 1, 7/10/2001) X: 会说德语吗？ AUX speak German PRT ‘Can you speak German?’

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K: 不会说。 NEG. AUX speak ‘(I) can’t speak.’ X: 会说别的语吗？ AUX speak other POSS language PRT ‘Can (you) speak other languages?’ K: 我会说西班牙语一点儿, enough for food. 1SG AUX speak Spanish one CL, enough for food ‘I can speak a little bit Spanish, enough for food.’ The above examples mark the emergence of hui in Recording 1. I initially used the word, but Kim did not use it in his response at first. When I continued to use it in the conversation, he began to respond using hui, which is classified as Case 2; and then he continued to use the negative and short forms which I had not used in the conversation, which is classified as Case 3. Case 4: Interlocutor Independent Uses (IIU) To move from the IDU to the IIU is a gradual process. Some of the examples carry the features of both categories. I gave the preference of the IIU to Case 4, as in Example 3-4, although it is interlocutor or teacher initiated. Schmidt (1990, 1995, and 2001) talked about noticing as the prerequisite for acquisition. He argued that simply “prompting” someone about a word/feature is not the same as getting them to “notice” it (i.e. getting them to see how the feature fits within their existing interlanguage system.) In this case, in discussing his hobbies, I gave Kim a noticing exercise by reminding him that he had learnt the NVG word, and also that he had put it in his vocabulary list. After this reminder, he began to pay greater attention to examples of the word and realized that he could in fact use the word, and then made an attempt to use the word by talking about one of his hobbies. This is an example of independent use because I neither modeled it, nor pushed for it to be used. I merely gave the testing context to see whether it would trigger the use of the NVG word neng. For that reason, I believe that it is possible to claim that the word was “noticed” in the sense intended by Schmidt. E.g. 3-4 (Recording 5, 15/11/2001) Kim was talking about his hobbies X: have you learnt the word “neng”? K: Did you ask me about “nan” or “neng”? X: I asked “neng”, in which lesson? (he is checking his vocabulary list), have you learnt that? K: Yeah, in one of the classes. Oh, how can I say? (found in the list) “neng” means “can do, know how to do”.

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X: Yeah. *K: 我能独木舟。 1SG AUX canoe ‘I can canoe.’ (Canoe is only Noun form in Chinese.) X: 我能？(with a raising intonation, showing a repetition of Kim’s utterance) 1SG AUX ‘I can?’ K: 我能独木舟。 1SG AUX canoe ‘I can canoe.’ The above neng example shows that at the beginning, the interlocutor gave the learner the opportunity to notice by asking the question “Have you learnt the word neng?”, but did not give any explanation for the word. The question was used to check whether the learner was aware of the word or not, at least receptively. This reminded the learner that he “knew” the word, and told the interlocutor that “neng means ‘can do, know how to do’” after checking his vocabulary list, then it led Kim to realize that he could use the word. He made a connection between the existing knowing and the current context and produced the spontaneous utterance “Wo neng dumuzhou” (I can canoe). Case 5: Interlocutor Independent Uses (IIU) This case marks the next step on the IIU scale after Case 4, as in Example 3-5, and occupies the other extreme of the gradient of the movement from the most dependent uses to the most independent uses. It is a typical case of what is called initially independent use in this study, which is the spontaneous use of the learner. It could occur in both naturalistic conversation and in guided contexts. E.g. 3-5 (Recording 7, 29/11/2001) K: So, 什么时候你学习？ So, what time 2SG study ‘So, what time will you study?’ X: 我想明年一月。 1SG want next year January ‘I want (to study) in January next year.’ K: 一月，我可以给你 application. January, 1SG AUX give 2SG application ‘(In) January, I can give you an application’ The above keyi example shows the learner was quite confident to offer help “wo keyi gei ni application. (I can give you an application)” after he knew that X

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wanted to start to study in January next year. From raising the question initially as “shenme shihou ni xuexi? (what time will you study?)” to offer help, this conversation was totally controlled by Kim (the learner) and all the utterances were produced independently, including the word keyi. Case 6: Avoidance E.g. 3-6 (Recording 5, 15/11/2001) X: 你会做饭吗？你会做饭吗？ See, you bring some food. 2SG AUX cook PRT? 2SG AUX cook PRT? See, you bring some food. ‘Can you cook? Can you cook (REP.)? See, you bring some food.’ K: Yes, 对。 ‘Yes, dui.’ This 3-6 hui example shows that although the interlocutor initially used the word hui to raise a question and intended to lead the learner to give an affirmative or a negative response to the question “can you cook?”, Kim did not respond with a native speaker’s response as “hui (can)” or “bu hui (cannot)”, but said “yes, dui (yes)”. It is not very clear that his response was an affirmative one, or just an interactional response whether in order to maintain the flow of communication. Clearly he did not use the strategy to copy the word hui initially used by the interlocutor. Examples of avoidance are not considered further here since their overall status and the interpretation of them as “avoidance” is necessarily uncertain. The above six examples show the proportion of different sources of Kim’s production of the NVG words from the IDU to the IIU. Patterns in Kim’s use of the NVG words over 22 recordings are identified and illustrated in Figure 3.3.

Figure 3.3: Percentage of Kim’s IDU and IIU of the NVG words

The column graph compares the proportions of the IDU and the IIU of Kim’s production of the NVG words for the 22 Recordings. The graph shows the

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increasing frequency of the IIU with the decreasing frequency of the IDU over time, which represents Kim’s increasing independent control of his uses of the NVG system. The more proportions of the IIU increase, the more the learner’s internal capacity to control Chinese grows. The graph shows that before Recording 4, Kim’s production of Chinese is entirely influenced by the interlocutor and he did not produce any NVG words independently. From Recording 5 to Recording 10, Kim’s production of the NVG words emerged but was largely influenced by the interlocutor. Recording 6 has the same percentage of the IDU and the IIU. Recording 7 is an exception in which the IIU outnumber the IDU. Recording 10 is an isolated session with no NVG words being produced. However, Recording 11 is a turning point after which Kim’s IIU of the NVG words begins to exceed the IDU. After Recording 11, the IIU dominates Kim’s production of the NVG words, which demonstrates significantly the growing control of the use of the NVG, as well as the substantial reduction in the influence of the interlocutor. However, there is an exception in Recording 20, in which the IDU outnumber Interlocutor Independent utterances. In conclusion, the change from the phase that is dominated by IDU to the phase, which is dominated by the IIU over 22 recordings, is roughly marked at Recording 11. The information given in the column graph indicates the steady change with some irregularities in the learner’s interlanguage system in terms of the NVG. I will discuss this change and the two broad phases based on the distinction between the IDU and the IIU in Section 3.3.

3.3.1 Two broad phases of Kim’s developmental uses of the NVG words In this analysis, I will adopt the terms stage and phase to distinguish the learner’s developmental processes. A stage (Meisel, Clahsen and Pienemann 1981) will be regarded as a universally sequenced developmental progression according to the linguistic capacities, which are represented. A phase that is based on Nicholas (1987: 97) is defined as developmental changes in the interlanguage, being modified in this study as characterized by both quantitative and qualitative features. Based on the distinction between the IDU and the IIU, we can claim that there are two very broad phases in the development of Kim’s learning of the NVG words (see Figure 3.3). The first phase is dominated by the IDU, and covers the period from Recording 1 to Recording 10. Recording 6 is one with the same percentage of the IDU and the IIU. Since there are only two examples in total in this recording, the result can be arbitrary. Recording 7 is the only exception to the general pattern

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in the first phase, in which the IIU outnumber the uses of interlocutor dependent utterances. The reason why the learner performed well in this session is probably due to his familiarity with the topic. Kim was asked to give some suggestions to a Japanese student who wished to study Chinese in the same university where Kim was studying at that moment. Questions covered how to contact the Foreign Student Office to get the information and when was the best time to apply, as well as what kinds of help Kim could offer. All questions could be answered based on Kim’s personal experience because he had the experience of applying the overseas study. Kim’s utterances contained both Chinese and English, but the uses of the NVG words were well presented. This pattern could be interpreted to mean that the general internal capacity and personal experiences of an adult learner can influence his use of the L2 even though his L2 is in quite a preliminary stage. Therefore, being familiar with and experienced in communicating about a topic can lead to a L2 learner’s greater control of a conversation, and therefore, more independent uses will be produced. The final recording in this phase, Recording 10, is a session without any use of the NVG words. An inspection of the data indicates, that although those contexts were introduced for prompting Kim to use the NVG words, he simply did not use them. The once activated system of the NVG seems quite passive during this recording. The second phase is dominated by the IIU and covers the period from Recording 11 to Recording 22. After Recording 11, Interlocutor Independent Uses of the NVG words increase steadily over time. However, there is an exception in Recording 20, in which the IDU outnumber the IIU. In this recording, neng 2 Permission and keyi 2 Permission were used in certain contexts in which I asked Kim to describe some regulations about access to the computer lab. This guided context allowed Kim to use the negative form of neng 2 Permission to express “Not allow to do something”. Kim produced neng 2 independently after I modeled the word neng 2. The negative form of neng 2 Permission is used to negate both neng 2 Permission and keyi 2 Permission when these two words share the meaning of “Permission”. The negative form of keyi 2 Permission is used to express more strongly the meaning “Forbidden to do something”; the two uses are shown below:

Figure 3.4: The relationship between neng2 and keyi2 in both affirmative and negative form

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Since the relationships between different forms of negation are complex, I asked Kim questions such as “Nimen neng/keyi yong ziji de pan ma? (Can you use your own floppy?)” requesting him to give an affirmative or negative answer. As part of my modeling of the possible uses of the two negative forms, I alternated between neng 2 and keyi 2 questions, in part also to see whether Kim could reproduce my model. The meaning of “permission” is hard to express directly in the conversation, especially if the L2 learner is one who is expected to grant permission; therefore, in this session neng 2 and keyi 2 were embedded in the questions asked by the interlocutor, which is defined as the IDU in the previous description. This is why Recording 20 is an exception. The two broad phases identify the overall patterns in Kim’s interlanguage development from the IDU dominant period to the IIU dominant period. The intervening changes and exceptions reflect the features of the learner’s interlanguage system reinforce the point that the changes are not just a linear development. One of the important characteristics of the phase labels IDU or IIU is that they capture the dominant or most salient characteristic rather than the only characteristic of the phase. They do not mean that every utterance, production or recording has to bear the same characteristic. There are minor phases within each of the two dominant phases, which are characterized by quantitative and qualitative features from the IDU to the IIU, the interlanguage changes and is formed by the sub-processes such as elaboration, consolidation and reduction. Thus, the developmental processes are characterized by the expansion and stability of both meanings and structures of uses of the NVG words by Kim at different times for different words. The discussion of these minor phases will not be reported in this paper due to the limitation of the length.

4 Discussion 4.1 The development paths of the NVG words As discussed in Section 3.3, the distinction overall between the IDU and the IIU in Kim’s production enables me to divide the development of his Chinese into two broad phases. The overall tendency of the development is from the IDU to the IIU, which reflects the change in the learner’s control of the interlanguage. The learner progressively needs less support from the interlocutor and other external help over time, so that the IIU reflect the learner’s increased control of the interlanguage, whereas the IDU reflect constraints imposed on or support provided by the interlocutor.

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It is also interesting to find that, even though the NVG words are presented and theorized as if they were a single entity by linguists and pedagogies, the features of their acquisition indicate that for the learner, at least initially, the words do not form a single entity. The different words represent separate acquisitional tasks and show different patterns of development. The figures below clearly demonstrate the individual and different developmental patterns of the NVG words.

4.1.1 Keyi

Figure 4.1: Relative Frequency of Interlocutor Dependent Uses and Interlocutor Independent Uses of keyi by Kim

Keyi offers a picture that clearly indicates the most overall progress in learning of the NVG words by Kim. Although the learning had not yet been completed at the time that recordings finished (see Figure 4.1), keyi had been used increasingly frequently and occurred in every recording. Interlocutor Independent Uses exceeded Interlocutor Dependent Uses as from Phase 2. The relative frequency reached as high as 90% in Phase 4. Kim’s use of keyi proceeded with a significant increase in Interlocutor Independent Uses from Phase 1, although after Phase 4, there were slight falls in relative frequency in Phases 5 and 6. The general trend was a steady approach to the target. As discussed previously, the successful learning of keyi has been presented not only as it appears regularly in every phase, but also because it expresses a variety of meanings and occupies varied grammatical locations. Five sub-meanings of a total of six meanings of keyi had been explored. Seven sentence types, which have not, however, covered all the grammatical structures of modal auxiliary verbs described by linguists,

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have been used in a range of different meanings by Kim. The overall elaboration suggested that a systematic emergence happened in keyi in Phase 4, which is earlier than any of the other NVG words, which means it is the most progressive and successfully learned NVG word. This can be seen in the comparison with the other NVG words below, first with neng and then with hui.

4.1.2 Neng

Figure 4.2: Relative Frequency of the Interlocutor Dependent Uses and Interlocutor Independent Uses of neng by Kim

The pattern for neng displays increasingly extensive learning by Kim, although the learning had not yet been completed (see Figure 4.2). It proceeds with significant increases and decreases between the IDU and the IIU, but it appeared to be slowly approaching the target. After Phase 4, the IIU prevailed over the IDU, but from Phases 1 to 3, the phases were dominated by the IDU. Phase 4 was the phase that demonstrated Kim’s increasing progress in his Chinese and control of his uses of neng. However, only two sub-meanings of a total of four meanings of neng had been explored. Interestingly, these two sub-meanings never occurred in the same phase. In that sense, it seems that they were used as two different entities rather than as variants of the same word. The uses of neng differ from keyi in that Kim used neng in a much more limited way in terms of both meanings and syntactic forms. There was also a period of disappearance of the uses in Phase 5. Five sentence types were explored by Kim, which were mostly used to express neng 1 ability . neng 2 permission , and were used in a restricted way in the basic structure “Aux + VP/AP”. Therefore, the acquisition of neng represents an

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increasing but only partly successful pattern, with a slower learning pace and less stable performance than keyi. 4.1.3 Hui

Figure 4.3: Relative Frequency of the Interlocutor Dependent Uses and Interlocutor Independent Uses of hui by Kim

Hui, in contrast to keyi and neng, appears to have no continuous acquisitional pattern, with the frequency of Interlocutor Independent Uses rising, falling and decreasing (see Figure 4.3), even though it is the earliest word used by Kim in the whole of the NVG group. The learning is not very progressive because most of the six phases were dominated by the IDU. Only in Phase 4 did the IIU prevail over the IDU. Therefore, the uses of hui generally reflect constraints imposed on or support provided by the interlocutor. It has been pointed out before that the IDU can continue long after the capacity for the IIU has been established if the circumstances of the interaction allow it (e.g. in a teacher controlled classroom). However, at the time the interviews were completed, this kind of capacity for hui had not been seen to be established by Kim. As a result, there was only one submeaning of a total of four meanings of hui that had been explored, and this meaning was largely dependent on the interlocutor. Five sentences types have been used mainly focusing on the basic structure “AUX + VP/AP”, which is less diverse than other words. 4.1.4 Keneng Keneng represents another totally different acqusitional pattern in the early stage of the L2 learning. It seems that there is a functional parallel between

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Chinese keneng and English maybe. Kim had the English expression maybe to use and it seems he did not feel there was any need to use the equivalent Chinese expression of “possibility” keneng, particularly early on. He was exposed to the guided contexts, which allowed him to use keneng many times, but in fact he did not respond to the set context. The single use on November 15, 2002 was a repetition or echoing of the interlocutor, which I don’t count as part of his uses. There is little that can be said about keneng because it did not provide enough tokens for analysis. keneng’s meaning space seems occupied by maybe which is something Kim used to fulfill the function of expressing possibility. Therefore he did not need to do anything with the Chinese equivalent keneng in his uses. Clahsen, Meisel and Pienemann (1983, also see Clahsen and Muysken 1989; Meisel 1991) argued that the following five features are characteristic of language learning of L2, as opposed to the viewpoints insisted on by Universal Grammarians who think that grammatical development involves setting of parameters, triggered by the input not only in L1, but also in L2. The features of L2 development are: (1) Limited ultimate attainment (2) Slower rate of acquisition (3) Individual differences (4) Discontinuity in acquisitional patterns (5) Grammatical phenomena related to a specific parameter learned as separate facts As illustrated in my case study above, the four NVG words, keyi, neng, hui and keneng represent separate acquisitional tasks and show different patterns of development, at least early on. Keyi represents the most comprehensive acquisition pattern; neng is a model of slow but extensive acquisition; hui is limited and constrained acquisition; and keneng represents the functional substitution strategy. On the whole, the acquisition of the four NVG words differs in the rate, the pattern and the attainment. Meanwhile, what we should be aware of is that, although the four words are processed in different patterns, the processes of the learning’s interlanguage system are interrelated at some points in time. The whole system is interwoven by multiple-sub-systems. The distinction made between the IDU and the IIU are the major features in describing the development of Kim’s Chinese, which also can be traced by Kim’s use of other communicative strategies during the conversation. His uses of “avoidance” strategy and English, as his first language, evidence the overall change of his Chinese and the development of the NVG.

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It is not surprising to find that the number of the gaps was higher in the early phases (the Interlocutor Dependent Uses Phase) than in later ones (the Interlocutor Independent Uses Phase). This implies that Kim had not built enough relationships between the form and function in situations, especially early on. Almost every recording in the early phases contained avoidance or insufficient uses of the NVG words. This lasted until Recording 11, which is the turning point of the IIU phase. After Recording 11, Kim could respond to almost all the guided contexts with only one exception in Recording 16. Therefore avoidance also provided evidence from the opposite angle that the change of the uses of the learner from the more IDU to the more IIU were important. The dominant uses of IIU, the decreasing or disappearing of avoidance of the guided context tasks demonstrated Kim’s growing control of his Chinese over time.

4.2 Issues for further research It may be argued that the subject (Kim) in this longitudinal study had made limited progress (at the basic level) in the development of Chinese as his second language when the interviews were completed. The acquisition of the NVG words had not been fully explored in either form or meaning. On the other hand, the data could be interpreted as providing evidence of the development of the initial stages in Chinese language acquisition by an English speaker. As shown in previous sections, Kim’s acquisition of the NVG words developed from the IDU to IIU, which was not a linear process. The data discussed in the case study provides evidence for the way an English speaker began to acquire Chinese as a second language over two semesters in a Chinese University, particularly the way of exploring one of the sub-systems of the Chinese model auxiliary NVG. In order to further investigate the acquisition beyond the basic proficiency level, taking a more extended longitudinal study is necessary and the following questions might be pursued: (1) What is a realistic expectation for an English learner learning Chinese in China for a longer duration in terms of acquiring Chinese modal auxiliary verbs including the NVG? (2) In which order do Chinese modal auxiliary NVG words appear in the learners’ interlanguage? If there is an order, are these orders the same? (3) What matches and disparities appear between the learner’s entire interlanguage development and the development of modal auxiliaries? (4) What aspects are of particular difficulty when differentiating the features of Chinese modal auxiliaries for a second language learner?

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The above questions could provide a means of establishing patterns of Chinese second language acquisition by combining insights from both lexical acquisition and syntactic acquisition.

4 Conclusion and pedagogical implications The overall distinction between Interlocutor Dependent Uses (IDU) and Interlocutor Independent Uses (IIU) in Kim’s production indicates the overall tendency of the development is to greater independence, which reflects the change in the learner’s control of the interlanguage. The Interlocutor Independent Uses (IIU) reflect the learner’s own control of the interlanguage whereas the Interlocutor Dependent Uses (IDU) reflect constrains imposed on or support provided by the interlocutor. The two major phases of Kim’s Chinese development were based on the analysis of his production as it changed from IDU dominant phase to the IIU dominant phase (See Section 3). The Figure 3.2 illustrates the features of these two categories and the gradient from one extreme to the other. The four NVG words, keyi, neng, hui and keneng represent separate acquisitional tasks and show different patterns of development, at least on the early stage of acquisition (See Section 4.1). Based on the analysis of the paper, we found that the introduction of the notion IDU and IIU enables us: (1) To make the connection between the learner’s production and external social factors; (2) Not to constrain the influence on the language learner to the idea of “tutored” or “untutored”, but also to give attention to the large area between these two contexts; (3) To identify the change from IDU to the IIU as a reflection of the growing capacity for “the learner’s self instruction” ( Johnston, 1994). Based on the finding of the research, the first pedagogical implication is, the acquisition of the NVG words could not have been completed in one step. It will take time/steps for the learner(s) to gain the control the interlanguage and fully explore the whole NVG entity, relying on the resources from both in and outside the classroom. In current teaching practice for the Chinese modal auxiliary verbs, the basic syntax (AUX + VP) and the core meaning are taught in the beginning class. Beyond the basic structure and the core meanings, the complex collocations of syntax and semantics have not been woven into the syllabus systematically. The pragmatic functions of the NVG words, which are context dependent, have been

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ignored. The NVG has been treated as “familiar” words after the first year of learning. There is obviously a gap between what we design for the teaching and what the learners need to learn. Therefore, the various dimensions reflecting the multifaceted natures of the NVG need unpacked at different levels of teaching and interwoven into the syllabi. The second implication responds to the relationships between the “groupness” and the item-specific nature of the words being learned. Despite evidence that the learner in my study recognized relationships between the four words, Kim initially used keyi, hui, neng, and keneng as separate items (See Section 4.1). The challenge for teachers is how to balance a response to the more itemlike initial recognition by the learners with the recognition of the intra-group relationships between the words. Current teaching practice tends to be based on working with these words as a group. This requires the learners to have progressed through systematic emergence in order for them to be able to benefit from such instruction. Given the findings of this paper, it seems more appropriate to move toward greater recognition of the path that the learners are following, if this course of action does not misdirect the learners. One way in which this could be done is by exploring more thoughtfully the meanings and uses of individual items of the group before attempting to introduce the overlapping meaning-form relationships within the group. These pedagogical implications enable us to clarify the issues relating to how categories such as the NVG in Chinese are understood by researchers and teachers. It may inform Chinese language syllabus design and pedagogical practice in classroom teaching. This case study is a view inside the strategies and the thinking of a particular learner, revealing the way processes change. It provides the insight of how to investigate the acquisition of the polysemous words, in the case of Chinese modal auxiliaries, which is linguistically regarded as a group of words. The way of making distinction between the Interlocutor Dependent Uses (IDU) and the Interlocutor Independent Uses (IIU) exemplify how to analyze the learner’s speech productions in both quantity and quality ways, which is essential to the methodology of the studies of SLA. Thus, any monolithic approach to analyzing the complexity of L2 development and associated extensions to the pedagogical context will fail to capture or respond to learners’ strategies and needs.

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Pienemann, M. 1984. Psychological constrains on the teachability of languages. SSLA, 6 (2), 186–214. Pienemann, M. 1998. Language processing and second language development – Processability theory (1 ed.): John Benjamins Publishing Co. Amsterdam/Philadelphia. Richards, B. J. 1990. Language development and individual differences – a study of auxiliary verb learning (1 ed.): Cambridge University Press. Schmidt, R. W. 1990. The role of consciousness in second language learning. Applied Linguistics (11), 129–157. Schmidt, R. 1995. Consciousness and foreign language learning: A tutorial on the role of attention and awareness in learning. In: J. C. Kathleen Bardovi-Harlig, Claire Kramsch et al. (ed.). Schmidt, R. 2001. Attention. In: P. Robinson (ed.), Cognition and second language instruction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Schumann, J. 1978. Social and psychological distance as factors in second language acquisition, the pidginization process: A model for second language acquisition (1 ed.): Rowley, Mass, Newbury House. Tao, Lian. 1991. Xiandai hanyu zhudongci taolun [Discussion on modal auxiliary verbs in modern Chinese]. Paper presented at the 4th Symposium of Teaching Chinese as a Second Language, Beijing. Wang, Xiaojun. 1982. Cong liuxuesheng de yubing kan hanyu zhudongci de tedian he yongfa [Studies of the characters of Chinese modal auxiliaries form the errors analysis of foreign students]. Yuyan Jiaoxue yu Yanjiu (Language Teaching and Researching), 4. Wang, Jianqin. 1997. Hanyu “bu” he “mei” fouding jiegou de xide guocheng [The acquisitional process of Chinese nagative marker “bu” and “mei”]. In: J. Wang (ed.), Hanyu zuowei di er yuyan de xide yanjiu [Studies of Chinese as second language] (pp. 193–210). Beijing Language University Press. Wells, C. G. 1979. Learning and using the auxiliary verbs in English. In: V. Lee (ed.), Language development. New York: Wiley. Wells, C. G. 1985. Language development in the pre-school years. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Wolter, B. 2001. Comparing the L1 and L2 mental lexicon. SSLA (23), 41–69. Xiong, Wen. 1992. Hanyu zhudongci yanjiu shulue [The Reviews on Auxiliary Verbs Studies]. Chinese Study, Jilin, China (2), 48–52. Xiong, Wen. 1996. Hanyu “neng” lei zhudongci he yingyu qingtai zhudongci “can” lei de duibi yanjiu [Comparative study on Chinese model verb “neng” verb group and English auxiliary verb “can” group]. In T. N. A. O. T. C. A. A. S. Language (ed.), The 5th National Symposium of Teaching Chinese as a Second Language (288–309). Shen Zheng: Beijing Language University Press. Xiong, Wen. 1997. Hanyu “neng” lei zhudongci de yuyong yanjiu [The pragmatic study on Chinese model auxiliary “neng” verb group]. In: X. Shen (ed.), Linguistics studies in the coming new century (pp. 322–331). Tai Pei: Zhong Hua Book Store Press. Xiong, Wen. 1999. Hanyu zhudongci de jieshi chengfen [The interpretants of Chinese modal auxiliary verbs]. Shijie Hanyu Jiaoxue (Chinese Teaching in the World ), 4 (50), 59–62. Xiong, Wen. 2007. The Modal Auxiliary Neng Verb Group in the Acquisition of Chinese as a Second language, La Trobe University, Australia, unpublished Ph.D dissertation. Zhang, Yanying. 2001. Second language acquisition of Chinese grammatical morphemes: A processability perspective. The University of Canberra, unpublished Ph.D thesis.

Yi Xu

Acquisition of Chinese relative clauses at the initial stage Abstract: This paper examines the initial acquisition of Chinese relative clauses by learners of Chinese as a Foreign Language (CFL). After discussing some issues related to current CFL teaching materials and the differences between relative clauses and noun-modifying clauses, this paper reports findings from a Listening Comprehension Task. Some pedagogical proposals are put forth based on these discussions.

1 Introduction In the field of second language acquisition (SLA) of English and other IndoEuropean languages, the structure of relative clauses has received substantial attention from both linguists and teachers since the 1970s (Doughty 1991; Eckman, Bell, and Nelson 1988, Gass 1979, etc.). There has been a recently revived interest in the L2 acquisition of relative clauses especially of East Asian languages. But when it comes to the L2 acquisition of Chinese relative clauses (RCs), two problems come to mind: first, the “relative clause” is not a traditionally recognized type of sentence structure by many Chinese grammarians. Although linguists such as Huang (1989) have referred to the structure of Chinese RCs in their works, different terminologies such as “attributive clauses”, “complex noun-phrases”, or “de-phrases” (de-zi duanyu) have been used by scholars in China. At the same time, Comrie (2002), using Japanese as a case in point, proposes that some putative “relative clauses” in East Asian languages may simply be “attributive clauses” in nature. In other words, it may not be unanimously agreed upon that Chinese has “relative clauses” with the same syntactic structure that English RCs are assumed to have. A second problem is the lack of consensus among generative linguists or SLA linguists in general and material writers and teachers. This problem is evidenced by Chinese as a Foreign Language (CFL) textbooks’ different treatment of language samples with RC structures. Differences between the “attributive clause” and the “relative clause” can be discussed in terms of whether there is a true gap within the clause, co-indexed with the head noun, whether there is syntactic movement, and whether any essential differences can be established between attributive clauses (also referred to as noun-modifying clauses) and relative clauses in that language. In these

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aspects of consideration, putative Chinese RCs do actually share similar characteristics with RCs in Indo-European languages. The discussion here will not get into the details of syntactic analysis of putative Chinese relative clauses. Instead, readers are referred to Xu (2010) for a review of literature and analysis in theoretical linguistics. In the following, only apparent differences between “attributive clauses” and “relative clauses” will be discussed, as they pertain to teaching purposes. Both attributive and relative clauses involve a “head noun”, the Noun Phrase that the clause modifies. But relative clauses typically involve a gap, shown by the blank space in (1a–b), which is co-indexed with the head noun, the man in (1a). If the gap is in the Subject position within the clause, as in (1a), the clause is a Subject relative clause. If the gap is in the object position, as in (1b), the clause is an Object RC. (1)

a.

The man that [ __ kissed Susan] is her teacher.

b.

The man that [Susan kissed __ ] is her teacher.

In noun-modifying clauses, there is no gap within the clause, and it is the whole clause that has a relation with the head noun. (2)

The rumor [that she is forced to resign] got around quickly. In Chinese, the same contrast stands.

(3)

[ __ 教我的] 老师姓王。 [ __ jiao wo de] laoshi xing Wang. teach me de teacher name Wang ‘The teacher that teaches me is named Wang.’

(4) [王老师辞职的] 事都传遍了。 [Wang laoshi cizhi de] shi dou chuan-bian le. Wang teacher resign de matter all spread-around PAR ‘The news that Teacher Wang resigned got spread around.’ Two types of relative clauses will be discussed here: Subject RC, exemplified by (3), and Object RC, exemplified by (5) below: (5)

[我教 __ 的] 学生去年都毕业了。 [Wo jiao _ de] xuesheng qunian dou biye le. I teach de student last-year all graduate PAR ‘The students that I taught all graduated last year.’

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Traditionally in CFL teaching materials, relative clauses are not distinguished from noun-modifying clauses or attributive clauses. (The terms “noun-modifying clauses” and “attributive clauses” are used somewhat interchangeably in CFL textbooks. (See the textbooks series Integrated Chinese and Interactions, for instance). After all, de is considered a nominal-phrase marker, and the clause before the head noun involves some types of verbs in both cases. These structures are typically introduced to novice-high or intermediate-low learners and this classification perhaps stems from material writers’ effort to simplify the grammar items introduced to learners. However, in this classification, the fact that Subject and Object RCs must have a gap in Chinese is ignored. In the next section, I will discuss why introducing RCs as a mere type of noun-modifying clause may not be ideal, especially given learners’ production errors.

2 CFL materials and learner errors Integrated Chinese introduces RCs as a type of attributive clause: “Chinese attributives, often followed by the particle de, always appear before the elements that they modify. Verbs, verbal phrases, and subject-object phrases an all serve as attributives” (p. 107). Examples that are listed as “verbs or verbal phrases as attributives” include the following: (6)

a. 写的字 (example from IC, 2nd edition) xie de zi write DE character ‘the character that (I/somebody) wrote’ b. 新买的饭卡 xin mai de fanka new buy DE meal-card ‘the meal-card that (I/somebody) recently bought’ c.

以前认识的朋友 yiqian renshi de pengyou past know DE friend ‘the friends from the past/the friends that (I) knew from the past’

d.

这是送给你的生日礼物。 zhe shi song-gei ni de shengri liwu. this is give-as-present you DE birthday gift ‘This is a birthday gift for you/that I am giving you.’

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With a closer look, these examples have an Object relative clauses structure; they are presented in the Verb-Noun or VP-Noun forms because the relative clause has a null Subject. (Chinese is a pro-drop language, i.e., the Subject, given the right linguistic context, could be null.) The full forms of some of the above examples are shown below, with Chinese characters and the pseudoChinese examples in English: (7)

a. [(小王) 写 __ 的] 字 [(Xiaowang) write __ DE] character __ 的] 衣服 b. [(我) 新买的 [(I) newly-bought __ DE] clothes c.

这是 [(我) 送给 你 __ 的] 生日 礼物 this is [(I) give you __ DE] birthday gift

The problem is that some Verb-N or VP-N forms, including those samples introduced in the textbook, actually have the structure of a Subject relative clause. (8) 昨天 [ __ 来的] 同学 zuotian [ __ lai de] tongxue yesterday come DE classmate ‘the classmates who came yesterday’ The inclusion of these examples with different structures could possibly confuse learners. Furthermore, since these examples are introduced as attributive clauses, the following two types of noun phrases, which have different structures, might look the same to learners: (9)

[ __ 教中文的] 老师 [ __ jiao Zhongwen de] laoshi teach Chinese DE teacher ‘the teacher that teaches Chinese’

(10)

[教中文的] 方法 [jiao Zhongwen de] fangfa teach Chinese DE method ‘the method of teaching Chinese’

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A potential issue is that learners may use the V-N or VP-N structures in ways that they themselves do not fully understand. In an experiment that Xu (2010) conducted using a Sentence Completion Task, learners made the following errors when prompted to produce a relative clause: (11) [从小的时候起恨的这个人] 是他的邻居。 [Cong xiao-de shihou qi hen de zhe-ge ren] shi ta de lingju. From childhood time on hate DE this-CL person BE he DE neighbor ‘the person that (he) hates from Childhood is his neighbor.’ (12) [刚才请来的那个人] 是小王的同学。 [Gangcai qing-lai de na-ge ren] shi Xiaowang de tongxue. Just-now invite DE that-CL person BE Xiaowang DE classmate ‘the person that (he) invited over was Xiaowang’s classmate.’ (13) [等的那个人] 姓张。 [Deng de na-ge ren] xing Zhang. wait DE that-CL person name Zhang ‘the person that (he) is waiting for is named Zhang.’ This Sentence Completion Task included 16 test items where only a relative clause was the grammatical production, and 40 L2 participants completed the task. There were 11 cases where learners produced a VP-N sequence such as (11) and (12) and 33 cases where learners produced a V-N sequence such as (13). Meanwhile, the accuracy rate of learner production in this experiment was 80.3%–84.4% (with two counter-balancing groups with an equal number of demonstrative-first ad demonstrative-second relative clauses). In other words, such errors contributed to 6.9% of all learner productions, or 38.9% of all learners’ errors that were observed in that experiment. In fact, producing a VP-N/V-N sequence was the predominant type of error that was analyzable. To a certain extent, those sentences are perhaps comprehensible if they are interpreted as Object RCs with a null Subject. (11) [(他) 从小的时候起恨得这个人] 是他的邻居。 [(Ta) cong xiao-de shihou qi hen de zhe-ge ren] shi ta de lingju. he from childhood time on hate DE this-CL person BE he DE neighbor ‘The person that he hates from childhood is his neighbor.’ These sentences were produced in isolation with no discourse context that allows a null subject, and a large number of productions like (13) may indicate

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that learners do not have competence of Subject or Object relative clauses. Instead, they were simply producing a V-N sequence that resembles some of the examples that they have been exposed to in textbook materials, without being explicitly aware of the function of the structure. Some other errors that learners made include resumptive pronouns or a resumptive NP (i.e., using the head Noun itself in the relativized position) in Object relative clauses in which there should be a gap. Seven errors of this type were found in this experiment, contributing to 6.2% of all errors that learners made. (Aside from the error type of VP-N/V-N sequence and resumptive pronouns or NPs, almost all other learner errors could not be potentially analyzed as having a relative clause structure in any way.) (14)

a. 于颖陪她的那个人是她的朋友。 (learner production) Yu Ying pei ta de na-ge ren shi ta de pengyou. Yu Ying accompany she DE that-CL person BE she DE friend ‘The friend that Yu Ying accompanies is her friend.’ b. [于颖陪__ 的] 那个人是她的朋友。(corrected grammatical sentence) [Yu Ying pei __ de] na-ge ren shi ta de pengyou.

In other words, the problem of introducing “relative clauses” as attributive or noun-modifying clauses would fuse the structure of Subject and Object RCs, for which a gap is required, and true noun-modifying structures like (10). While the author agrees that simplifying grammatical notions will perhaps make the Chinese language seem more accessible to learners, this should not be done at the expense of accuracy. A gap is required in Chinese Subject and Object relative clauses, just like English, and CFL learners should be made to realize that, in order to avoid or be aware of the errors such as those in (11–13) and (14a). Although relative clauses are a complex sentence structure, teaching CFL learners the grammatical form of this structure can be quite implementable, especially given that relative clauses in English and many other Indo-European languages use the gap strategy for Subject and Object RCs too. In the following section, I will report findings from an experiment conducted with CFL participants whose native language is English.

3 SLA experiment 3.1 Existing literature The bulk of literature in ESL studies has found that it is much easier for learners to acquire Subject relative clauses than Object ones. Such a structural preference

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is found both in SLA studies as well as psycholinguistic experiments (Gass 1982; Doughty 1988; Gibson, Desmet, Grodner, Watson, and Ko 2005; Hamilton 1994; Izumi 2003). Online processing studies of Chinese RCs in Chinese as a first language have so far yielded controversial results in different studies, with some finding a preference for Subject RC (Hsiao and Gibson 2003) while others claiming otherwise (Lin 2006; Kuo and Vasishth 2006). L2 acquisition studies on Chinese RCs are scarce. Chen (1999) used a grammaticality acceptance task (i.e., asking the participants to rate different types of RCs on a 1–5 scale). She finds that for L1 Chinese participants, as well as for L1 English and L1 Japanese speakers who are learning Chinese, Subject RCs appear to be easier when the demonstrative-classifier precedes the RC, whereas Object RCs are easier when demonstrative-classifiers follow the relative clause. Because Chen’s study involves more than one variable and no statistical analysis, the result is not conclusive. More recently, Packard (2008) used a self-paced reading task to examine L2 speakers’ reading of Chinese RCs. He claims that Subject RCs are read more slowly than Object RCs. While this is the first self-paced reading task to probe this issue using L2 participants, the sentences used in his experiment are not counterbalanced. Apart from the factors that Packard examined, including gap position and matrix position, animacy appears to be a confounding factor that was not controlled for in this study.1

3.2 Listening comprehension task The following presents compelling reasons to study Chinese relative clauses, and opens a new avenue for research. The purpose of the current experiment is to investigate whether a certain type of relative clause could be easier for learners, and what errors learners make in comprehension tasks during the beginning stage of their learning of Chinese RCs. It is also hoped that answers to these questions can point to beneficial ways of instruction to facilitate learners’ better acquisition of the structure. Because participants recruited for this study were native speakers of English, a brief review of the differences in English and Chinese RCs is needed: As English 1 Packard’s Subject RCs often involve at least one [–animate] object in the RC part (e.g. “the woman that understood the situation”), and in some Subject-gapped RCs in his experiment, both the Object and the Subject are NPs which are normally [–animate] are not used in exactly idiomatic ways, (e.g., qingzhu chunjie de chunlian “couplet [poetry] that celebrated the New Year”). On the other hand, many Object-gapped RCs in Packard’s experiment, especially those Object-gapped RCs in subject-modifying positions (in matrix sentences), involve both [+animate] Object and Subject (e.g., “the student that everyone paid attention to”).

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and Chinese examples given in previous sections, while both English and Chinese RCs require a gap for Subject and Object RCs, English RCs are head-initial, i.e. the head noun precedes the relative clause, while Chinese RCs are head-final, i.e. the head noun occurs after the RC, immediately after the nominal marker de.

3.2.1 Methods Thirty-eight undergraduate students in an American university who were enrolled in a second semester Chinese course participated in the study. All participants were native speakers of English. Since placement tests and accumulative unit tests were conducted throughout the semester, and all participants, as judged from test scores and by oral interviewers, were proficient enough to be in First Year Chinese II (yet not advanced enough for Second Year Chinese), learners fell in approximately the same range of proficiency. Admittedly some individual variations existed, but with national standards such as American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) proficiency levels as the guidelines, those participants had similar proficiency levels. All participants had received approximately 5.5 months of instruction in Chinese, with approximately 140 hours of in-class time in total. Prior to the experiment, participants received one and a half hour of training in Chinese relative clauses immediately before the experiment. (All participants received the training; one participant arrived late to the training session and that particular participant performed exceptionally poorly and his data were excluded from analysis. See Section 3.2.2). Because the acquisition of relative clauses was part of the curriculum and students were told that a unit test focusing on this structure would be conducted after the training session, students were attentive in both the training session and the main experiment. The training included grammar translation, repetition, sentence combination (combining two simple sentences into a complex sentence with a relative clause), and picture elicitation. No explicit instruction was given in class on the linguistic structure of Chinese relative clauses, but learners did have access to the textbook, Integrated Chinese, which gave grammatical explanations and examples as cited in Section II. In other words, learners could have been aware of the head position of Chinese RCs if they had read the textbook explanation carefully, but were unlikely to be explicitly aware of the necessity or the rules of a gap in Chinese RCs. The testing material includes 24 listening comprehension items. The method of using listening comprehension tasks to test L2 learners’ acquisition of relative clauses has been used in Kanno (2007), O’Grady, Lee and Choo (2003), etc. In

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an optimal context, as in those previous studies, pictures could be provided to participants for them to select the matching picture that describes the sentence that they hear. In the current experiment, however, providing multiple choices by pictures was proved to be difficult, with learners’ limited vocabulary taken into consideration. Therefore, multiple choices were provided with the correct English translation as one of the choices. To ensure that no other linguistic elements interfere with the participants’ comprehension of the relative clause tested, the test items were isolated complex noun phrases. Modeling after Kanno (2007), two types of items were included, one with a reversible pattern with two animate arguments, and the other with a nonreversible item, with an animate Subject and an inanimate Object. The following is an example of a reversible ([+R]) test item: (15)

不喜欢男孩的医生 bu-xihuan nanhai de yisheng neg-like boy DE doctor ‘the doctor that dislikes the boy’ Participants were to select the right answer from the following four choices:

a. b. c. d.

the the the the

boy that doctors don’t like doctor that dislikes the boy boy that dislikes doctors doctor that the boy dislikes

head error Correct mixing reversal

The correct answer to (15) is (b). Other choices contrast with the correct answer in some aspects. Specifically, those choices are provided to match with comprehension errors that learners were found to make in Kanno (2007)’s experiment with the picture selection task. Learners selecting (a) would be making a “head error”, as they comprehend the RC except for the aspect of recognizing the correct head Noun. Learners selecting (d) were making the error of reversal, i.e., those learners correctly recognized the RC head, but have reversed the semantic roles of the doctor and the boy in the event described by the relative clause. Learners selecting (c) were making the two errors, head N error and reversal, at the same time. Therefore, this type of error is categorized as a “mixing” error. The experiment has a counter-balanced design. That is, for an item like (15), there is an Object RC counterpart which has the same lexical items but a different structure:

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(16) 男孩不喜欢的医生 nanhai bu-xihuan de yisheng boy neg-like DE doctor ‘the doctor that the boy dislikes’ A participant will receive only one of the pairs of items, either the Subject RC, like (15), or the Object RC, like (16). In contrast with those items with two animate NPs, i.e., [+R] items, half of the items are [–R]. Through this design, one can consider any possible effect of animacy in learners’ acquisition of RCs. Due to the participants’ vocabulary knowledge, it is possible to have inanimate NPs only in the Object position in the relative clauses. (17) shows an example of a Subject RC involving an inanimate NP. (17)

喜欢水果的女孩子 xihuan shuiguo de nvhaizi like fruit DE girl ‘the girl that likes fruit’

a. b. c. d.

the the the the

girl that likes fruit fruit that girls like fruit that the girls want to have girl that wants to eat fruit

correct head error others others

An Object RC counterpart of (17) is (18): (18)

女孩子喜欢的水果 Nvhaizi xihuan de shuiguo girl like DE fruit ‘the fruit that girls like’

Because errors of reversal and mixing (a combination of reversal error and head N error) are not likely to occur given the inanimate nature of the Object NP, in those items, two alternative choices provided vocabulary items that did not correspond with the Chinese sentence to assess if learners’ errors could be related to their vocabulary knowledge.2 2 The best way to assess the effect of animacy is to have both animate and inanimate NPs in Subject positions. That is because studies such as Ozeki and Shirai (2007) have suggested that the animate nature of the Subject, instead of the syntactic structure of Subject relativization, may be the reason why learners of Japanese, for instance, make fewer errors on Subject RCs.

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While 12 items are bare relative clauses followed by a head Noun, 12 other items have a Determiner (Det) immediately preceding the head Noun, such as (19). (19) 男同学介绍的那个女孩。 nan-tongxue jieshao de na-ge nvhai. boy-classmate introduce DE that-CL girl ‘the girl that (my) male-classmate introduced’ The purpose of including the Det as a factor is to see if the availability of a Determiner immediately before the head N could have a possible effect on learners’ comprehension, especially of the RC head. Given previous studies that investigate the factor and sequence of the Determiner-classifier such as Chiu (1996) and Kuo and Vasishth (2006), it is possible that the Det could have an effect on learners’ RC comprehension. In other words, the test items encompass three factors: Subject versus Object RCs, animate NP as Object or inanimate NP as Object, and the availability of a Det. All vocabulary used in the materials have been taught to the participants as part of the regular course curriculum. The test was conducted in a 10-minute session during a regular class period. The participants listened to a recording and chose the answer that they thought was the correct translation of the Chinese sentence that they heard. Each item was read twice, with approximately 7 seconds in between readings, before the recording moved on to the next item. The 7-second interval time was determined by modeling after previous studies and pre-tests of the same learner group.

3.2.2 Results Four participants’ data were not analyzed: two participants in the counterbalanced Group 1 made a large number of errors, with only two or three correct answers. To balance participants in each group, data from two participants in the other group were also excluded from analysis: One of these participants has immediate family members who speak Chinese, and the other was simply a participant numbered last in Group 2. But the purpose of including animate NPs in this project is not to discuss whether animacy or syntactic structure has a predominant effect on learners’ processing, but rather whether using animate NPs or inanimate ones could facilitate learning. Therefore, even though the test items include no RCs with inanimate NPs in Subject positions, the inclusion of this factor is still meaningful given the current purpose. This design is also roughly the same with Kanno (2007)’s study, with the difference of using English translations instead of pictures as selection choices.

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Participants received 1 score for each item that they answered correctly. The two groups (for the purpose of the counter-balanced design) were found to be comparable in terms of their overall scores, with Group 1 getting 300 out of a possible 408, and Group 2 getting 304/408. Participants made 98 head errors in total, 55 in Group 1 and 43 in Group 2. The error of reversal was also frequent, with 76 cases in total (35 and 41). Note that because the error of reversal is only applicable to only half of the items (i.e., RCs with two animate NPs), the percentage of such errors is calculated based on 204 total items per group. There are 22 errors (10 and 12) of the “mixing” type, and 15 errors (8 and 7) related to vocabulary, termed as “others” in Table 1. Correct

Head error

Reversal

Mixing errors 10

2.5%

17.2%

Others

Group 1

300

73.5%

55

13.5%

35

8

2.0%

Group 2

304

74.5%

43

10.5%

42

20.6%

12

2.9%

7

1.7%

Total

604

74.0%

98

12.0%

77

18.9%

22

2.7%

15

1.8%

Table 1: Error Distributions

The following reports the mean scores for each type of RCs (the full score being 3, as each of the eight RC type has 3 items for each participant). For bare relative clauses (no Determiner), Subject RCs with two animate NPs (B-AS) has a mean score of 2.29, and Object RCs with two animate NPs (B-AO) has a score of 1.74. For bare relative clauses, Subject RC with an inanimate Object NP (B-IS) has a mean of 2.59 and Object RC with an inanimate Object NP (B-IO) has a mean of 2.53. For RCs that have a Determiner immediately preceding the head N, Subject RCs (D-AS) with two animate NPs has a score of 1.82, and Object with two animate NPs (D-AO) also has a score of 1.82. Also for RCs with a determiner, Subject RC with an inanimate Object NP (D-IS) has a mean score of 2.44 and Object RC with an inanimate Object (D-IO) has a score of 2.53. Paired-sample t-tests were conducted in between pairs of comparisons between the eight types of RCs. The difference between B-AS and B-AO is significant by participant analysis (p = 0.039, t[1,33] = 3.1), but not significant by item analysis (p[1, 5] = 0.067, t = 2.34). In Table 2, this difference is signaled by one asterisk. The difference between D-AS and D-IS is significant by both participant and item analyses (p = 0.0037, t[1, 33] = –3.12; p = 0.0009, t[1, 5] = –7). The difference in scores of B-AO and B-IO is significant (p = 6.1E-05, t[1, 33] = –4.59; p = 0.007, t[1, 5] = –4.39), and the mean scores of D-AO and D-IO is significant (p = 0.0001, t[1, 33] = –4.39; p = 0.0027, t[1, 5] = –5.48). All these significant differences are marked by two asterisks in Table 2.

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Other pairs of comparisons do not yield statistically significant results. Those include comparisons between B-AS and B-IS types (p = 0.115, t[1, 33] = –1.62; p = 0.07, t[1, 5] = –2.19), B-IS and B-IO types (p = 0.786, t[1, 33] = 0.274; p = 0.638, t[1, 5] = 0.5), D-AS and D-AO types (p = 1, t = 0 for both analyses), and D-IS and D-IO RC types comparison. Table 2 summarizes the results of those paired comparisons. Bare RC

RC-Determiner

Subj. Animate Obj. NP

Inanimate Obj. NP

2.29

2.59

Obj. *

1.74

Subj.

Obj.

1.82

1.82

**

**

**

2.53

2.44

2.53

Table 2: Mean Scores of Different Types of RCs

The following figure presents the mean scores of each type of RCs.

Figure 1: Mean Scores for Different Types of RCs

3.2.3 Discussion The difference between bare Subject and Object RCs when both NPs are animate was close to significance. That could possibly point to some ease of acquiring a

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Subject relativization structure. However, it is not clear why when a Determiner is available, there is no observable preference for a Subject relativization structure. It is noticeable from Figure 1 that the mean scores for RCs with an inanimate Object NP are generally higher. There is also no discernable difference between the scores of Subject RC structure and Object RCs in those types of relative clauses. It could be the case that for RCs involving an inanimate Object NP, participants relied on semantic cues (animacy and vocabulary knowledge) heavily enough that the differences in structural preference could no longer be evident. In other words, the inanimate Object NP made the Subject RC and the Object RC equally easy to comprehend, given that learners could comprehend the semantic relations of the NPs based on their vocabulary knowledge. While this suggestion does rely somewhat on our assumptions of the learners’ thought process, it was not unreasonable given the data and interpretations of other scholars in similar studies: the learners’ reliance on semantic knowledge was also what Kanno (2007) had suggested when reporting a particularly low accuracy rate for [+R] (reversible) type RCs, but less so for the [–R] type. Therefore, the statistical data of the scores for each type of RCs showed some, but not strong enough evidence for a preference for Subject RCs in acquisition. Looking back at the existing literature in acquisition studies of RCs in Chinese and other East Asian languages, such a lack of strong preference for Subject RC is common (Ozeki and Shirai 2007; Jeon and Kim 2007; Yip and Matthews 2007) In Xu (2010)’s study using a self-paced reading task, however, processing preference was found for Subject relativization for intermediate-mid to intermediate-high CFL learners. Using a variety of different tasks (online processing task, written and oral production task, etc.) and different proficiency groups in the future could contribute to the findings in this project. It is equally important to note that there were not many “mixing” errors. This type of error would indicate that participants understood the vocabulary items but did not acquire the relative clause structure in any way. It is likely that learners who made this error were attempting to construct the meaning of the item solely based on their vocabulary knowledge. The relatively small number of such errors (as compared to the large number of head errors and reversal errors) indicate that most learners, despite the fact that they were only trained in the relativization structure for 1.5 hour and had not fully acquired the head position of Chinese RCs, or the syntactic relation of the “gap” and the NP within the relative clause, were not merely relying on semantic knowledge to construct the meaning of the RCs, as otherwise we would be expecting many more “mixing” errors. Finally, the very small number of vocabulary errors or errors of the “other” type confirms that comprehension of the lexical items was not a factor that could have contributed to the result.

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3.2.4 Error types In this section, errors that learners made will be discussed in further detail. The relatively large number of head errors (98) were similar to Kanno (2007)’s study of learners’ comprehension of Japanese RCs. Interestingly, the current study finds that this error was mostly restricted to participants who achieved particularly low on the task in general: Among the five lowest “achieving participants”, with the two lowest-achieving participants who achieved only 2 or 3 out of a possible 24 taken into consideration in this case, the largest number of errors that they made were always the head errors, ranging from 10 to 19 errors for those participants. In addition, among the other six participants who also achieved low scores (lower than or equal to getting a score of 15 out of 24), they almost always made most errors in recognizing the correct head. Other participants made no more than 5 head error out of the 24 items. Therefore, it seems reasonable to suggest that head position appears to be a “stumbling block” for CFL beginners whose first language is English. With English RCs being head-initial, learners have not realized that Chinese RCs are head-final. Particularly, there were more errors of such head error associated with reversible Object RCs than reversible Subject RCs (32 versus 16). Presumably this could be related to the fact that learners tend to rely on English word order to process Chinese RCs. Examine the following pairs of sentences: (20)

a.

不喜欢男孩的医生 bu-xihuan nanhai de yisheng neg-like boy DE doctor ‘the doctor that dislikes the boy’

b. 男孩不喜欢的医生 nanhai bu-xihuan de yisheng boy neg-like DE doctor ‘the doctor that the boy dislikes’ It can be hypothesized that the N-V-N sequence in (20b) might be interpreted as “the boy that dislikes the doctor” if learners were to construct the meaning of (20b) based on the English RC order with head N occurring first. Such an attempt would not have been successful for Subject RCs like (20a), since the relative clause starts with a Verb. Of course, this hypothesis would remain an assumption, until online processing experiments could provide support. Note that at this stage, learners have had exposure to many examples of Modifier-Noun structure and Possessive-Noun structure, but have not learned

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noun-modifying clauses in which a head noun is modified by a whole clause. This indicates that without explicit instruction on the head position of Chinese RCs, learners cannot always generalize the head final structure of a complex noun phrase, or the function of de preceding N as a nominal marker. Although in the context where this experiment was conducted, explicit explanation of the head position was provided in the textbook, such brief explanation was apparently not sufficient. As for the error type of reversal, the occurrences of 77 errors should draw our attention. It was found that learners who made relatively more errors of reversal made very few head errors: the seven participants who made five or more errors of reversal made no more than two head errors. This is interesting to note, as it could be taken as evidence that once learners have passed the stage of recognizing the RC head position in Chinese, their difficulty with the relativization structure is to realize the different roles of the gap and the NP within the clause. In Kanno (2007)’s study where he finds that the accuracy rate for the [+R] type RCs was particularly low for learners of Japanese, the author concludes that most of the learners could not even process the structure [+R] type RCs; instead, participants in that study relied on L1 word-order strategy or semantic knowledge to make meaning of the relative clause (and they would often fail to construct a correct structural representation of the target language). In the current study, there was evidence that while learners did rely on semantic cues or vocabulary knowledge when that is available to them (evidenced by the higher means of RCs with an inanimate Object), learners did not randomly construct the meaning of Chinese RCs simply based on vocabulary knowledge. There was some evidence of an attempt to either process the structure based on L1 order, or establish the appropriate head position in the target language.

4 Conclusion Findings from this experiment point to several interesting things that researchers and teachers could consider. First, it seems reasonable to suggest that there could be a slight preference for the Subject relativization structure of Chinese RCs when other factors are the same. Second, learners undoubtedly rely on semantic knowledge to process RC structures, and the use of nonreversible RCs could help facilitate their comprehension. At the same time, the role of the Determiner in Chinese RCs was still unclear from the results of this study. In terms of pedagogy, the project also points to some different teaching methods that could be implemented: First, through an examination of the current CFL textbooks’ treatment of Chinese RCs, and with a look into the learners’

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errors, we conclude that treating Chinese relative clauses as a mere type of noun-modifying clause is not sufficient for learners to develop explicit knowledge of the structure, and may even hinder their acquisition. Second, without explicit and focused instruction, some learners may experience difficulty, in the initial stage, generalizing the head N position in complex Noun Phrases in Chinese. While there is evidence from this study that many learners could nevertheless realize the correct head position in Chinese through simple grammar explanation and implicit instruction (where no grammar explanation was offered), giving explicit grammar explanation of the Head N position and the available gap positions in Chinese could help some learners to acquire the structure more efficiently in the initial stage. In other words, explicit instruction on the structure of RC-de-N could help beginners. Third, because the nonreversible RCs were found to be much easier for learners, teachers might find it helpful to start giving RC examples with inanimate Object NPs. This could be a way to ease learners into actually acquiring the complex RC structure. At the same time, one must realize that a higher accuracy rate for RCs involving inanimate Objects, could not be directly taken as evidence of positive acquisition of the relativization structure itself. It should be noted that some CFL textbooks have given detailed illustrations of the RC structure. Table 4 is featured in the textbook of Interactions. This very explicit table could ensure learners’ awareness of the grammatical forms of the Chinese RC structure and could be very beneficial for learners. However, Interactions does not refer to those structures as relative clauses but as “nounmodifying” clauses instead. Structure

Gloss

S V 的/de O (Lesson 10)

The O that SV

S V 的/de N

(Lesson 11)

[The N which S V]

V O 的/de N

(Lesson 12)

The one that V (O)

Table 3: Illustration of Grammatical Form: Relative/Noun-modifying Clauses

Based on the findings of the current study, I would like to venture some proposals for pedagogical implementations. First, introducing RCs as a special type of de-N phrase, separated from other noun-modifying clauses, may help learners to realize the unique structure of relativization. Systematic introduction of the Subject RC and Object RC, with examples showing different gap positions could also help. Since Chinese RCs of the Subject and Object types are similar to English RCs (in terms of the obligatory gap) but different in terms of head position, one may also find it helpful to compare Chinese RCs with the English ones to help learners internalize the grammatical form of Chinese relative clauses.

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Appendix: Listening items The following 24 items are the Chinese relative clauses on which Group 1 participants were tested. B-IS = bare Subject relative clause, with inanimate Object B-IO = bare Object relative clause, with inanimate Object B-AS = bare Subject relative clause with two animate arguments B-AO = bare Object relative clause with two animate arguments D-IS = Subject RC with inanimate Object, followed by a Determiner D-IO = Object RC with an inanimate Object, followed by a Determiner D-AS = Subject RC with two animate arguments, followed by a Determiner D-AO = Object RC with two animate arguments, followed by a Determiner Group 1 1

介绍男同学的那个女孩

D-AS

2

爱男孩的女孩

B-AS

3

学生喜欢的那个老师

D-AO

4

男孩不喜欢的医生

B-AO

5

接朋友的男学生

B-AS

6

同学买的那个电脑

D-IO

7

女孩子喜欢的水果

B-IO

8

医生打的那个电话

D-IO

9

看见服务员的那个女孩

D-AS

10

喜欢中国菜的男孩

B-IS

11

男同学送的那个女学生

D-AO

12

等朋友的女孩

B-AS

13

吃苹果的那个男同学

D-IS

14

男同学帮的女孩

B-AO

15

同学送的花

B-IO

16

等学生的那个老师

D-AS

17

等公共汽车的男孩

B-IS

18

看电影的那个朋友

D-IS

19

朋友用的那个手机

D-IO

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20

男孩认识的女学生

B-AO

21

男孩找的书

B-IO

22

写字的那个学生

D-IS

23

男孩找的那个朋友

D-AO

24

送礼物的同学

B-IS

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References Chiu, Bonnie Hui-Chun. 1996. The nature of relative clauses in Chinese-speaking children. National Science Council Research Report, National Taiwan Normal University. Comrie, Bernard. 2002. The case of relative clauses. In Typology and second language acquisition, Anna G. Ramat (ed.), 19–37. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Doughty, Catherine. 1988. The effect of instruction on the acquisition of relativization in English as a second language. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. University of Pennsylvania. Doughty, Catherine. 1991. Second language instruction does make a difference: Evidence from an empirical study of SL relativization. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 13: 431–469. Eckman, Fred. R., Lawrence Bell and Diane Nelson. 1988. On the generalization of relative clause instruction in the acquisition of English as a second language. Applied Linguistics 9: 1–20. Gass, Susan. M. 1979. Language transfer and universal grammatical relations. Language Learning 29: 327–344. Gass, Susan. M. 1982. From theory to practice. In On TESOL ’81: Selected papers of the fifteenth annual Conference of Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Mary Hines and William Rutherford (eds.), 129–139. Washington DC: TESOL. Gibson, Edward, Timothy Desmet, Daniel Grodner, Duane Watson and Kara Ko. 2005. Reading relative clauses in English. Cognitive Linguistics 16 (2): 313–353. Hamilton, Robert. L. 1994. Is implicational generalization unidirectional and maximal? Evidence from relativization instruction in a second language. Language Learning 44 (1): 123–157. Hsiao, Franny and Edward Gibson. 2003. Processing relative clauses in Chinese. Cognition 3 (27): 3–27. Huang, Chu-Ren. 1989. Cliticization and type-lifting: a unified account of Mandarin NP de. Bloomington: Indiana University Linguistics Club. Izumi, Shinichi. 2003. Processing difficulty in comprehension and production of relative clauses by learners of English as a second language. Language Learning 58 (2): 285–323. Jeon, K. Seon and Hae-Young Kim. 2007. Development of relativization in Korean as a foreign language: The noun phrase accessibility hierarchy in head-internal and head-external relative clauses. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 29 (2): 253–276. Kanno, Kazue. 2007. Factors affecting the processing of Japanese relative clauses by L2 learners. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 29 (2): 197–218.

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Kuo, Kueilan and Shravan Vasishth. 2006. Processing relative clauses: Evidence from Chinese [manuscript]. http://www.ling.uni-potsdam.de/~vasishth/vasishth2.html (accessed 10 January 2007). Lin, Chien-Jer Charles. 2006. Grammar and parsing: a typological investigation of relativeclause processing. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. University of Arizona. O’Grady, William, Miseon Lee and Miho. Choo. 2003. A subject-object asymmetry in the acquisition of relative clauses in Korean as a second language. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 25 (3): 433–448. Ozeki, Hiromi and Yasuhiro Shirai. 2007. Does the noun phrase accessibility hierarchy predict the difficulty order in the acquisition of Japanese relative clauses? Studies in Second Language Acquisition 29 (2): 169–196. Packard, Jerome L. 2008. Relative clause processing in L2 speakers of Mandarin and English. Journal of the Chinese Language Teachers Association 43: 107–146. Xu, Yi. 2010. The syntax, processing, and second language acquisition of Chinese relative clauses. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. University of Arizona. Yan, Margaret Mian Yan and Jennifer Li-chia Liu. 1998. Interactions: A cognitive approach to beginning Chinese. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Yip, Virginia and Stephen Matthews. 2007. Relative clauses in Cantonese-English bilingual children: Typological challenges and processing motivations. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 29 (2): 277–300. Yuehua Liu, Yao, Tao-Chung, Nyan-Ping Bi, Liangyan Ge, Yaohua Shi (eds.). 2008. Integrated Chinese. Level 1, 3rd ed. Boston: Cheng and Tsui.

Zi-Yu Lin

Conceptual similarities in languages – Evidence from English be going to and its Chinese counterparts Abstract: This study of the grammatical and semantic behavior of be going to and its Chinese counterparts attempts to open up a cognitive and comparative perspective in Chinese language pedagogy and Chinese/English translation education. It applies relevant grammaticalization principles to the explanation of the complicated relationship between be going to and its numerous Chinese grammatical equals. Related topics are also discussed, including metonymy and inferencing, embodiment, prototypicality, de-categorization, frequency, relevance and iconicity. It is argued that English and Chinese native speakers share many conceptual similarities in the development of future and modality grams. The revelation of these commonalities contributes to the study of language universals as well as the pedagogy of the Chinese language.

1 Introduction For English-speaking students learning Chinese and Chinese college students majoring in Chinese/English translation, it is a challenge to accurately understand and correctly use English and Chinese future and modal verbs. One prominent example is the relationship between the English verbal and grammatical phrase be going to and the numerous Chinese counterparts it has, which collectively traverse a wide range of meanings, including movement, intention, future, and modality. A typical traditional teaching method is to show students the Chinese definitional entries for be going to in an English/Chinese dictionary and ask them to memorize each Chinese version in different contexts. Nevertheless, students are curious why an English verbal phrase can be rendered into so many different Chinese versions. A good teacher, or rather, a good grammar, should provide a reasonable explanation for the existence of such one-to-many complexity and how their meanings and uses are related, so as to make the learning process more effective. Based on data retrieved from an English-Chinese parallel corpus, this research attempts to explore the rationale that may clarify the seemingly chaotic interchangeability between be going to and its Chinese equivalents. It is argued that

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many developments in cognitive linguistics, particularly in grammaticalization and polysemy studies, can shed some penetrating light on the semantic opaqueness that appears in the question. This investigation involves such issues as grammaticalization paths of future and epistemic markers, categorization, embodiment, semantic extension, relevance, and iconicity.

2 Methodology 2.1 Data source This research is data driven, utilizing the English/Chinese parallel corpus developed by Lu Wei of Xiamen University, China, at http://www.luweixmu.com/ec-corpus/ logon1.asp, which contains 215,713 parallel English/Chinese sentences, 3,290,670 English word tokens, and about 5,370,429 Chinese character tokens.

2.2 Data retrieval and sorting The search string was “going to” and all of the 765 valid hits thus generated were used. The acquired data was filtered through a home-grown computer program, whereby a number of individual Chinese characters or character strings were keyed in to parse the data and sort them.1 The results are listed in Table 1 of the Appendix. In addition, since many be going to tokens are found to appear in many subordinate object clauses, the verbs that occurred in the main clauses of the same complex sentences were also examined. These verbs and their frequencies are listed in Table 2 of the Appendix.

2.3 Semantic classification of data The lexical or grammatical meanings expressed by the Chinese equivalents of be going to listed in Table 1 of the Appendix are classified into the following six categories:

1 The author wishes to thank Lu Wei of Xiamen University, China for his generous permission enabling the author to use his online corpus at http://www.luweixmu.com/ec-corpus/logon3.asp, and Terence Tai of Macao Polytechnic Institute, Macao, for the programming of the data sorting utility.

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The apparent movement senses, such as 去 [qù ‘go’], 到 [dào ‘go, arrive’], and 上 [shang ‘ascend, go, attend’]. The movement can be towards a concrete physical location or, more abstractly, to an event or occasion. In addition to horizontal, the movement can be vertical in some Chinese idiomatic expressions. The examples include the following (with the key Chinese characters boldfaced): (1) As chance would have it he was going to London as well and was able to give me a lift.

赶巧他也去伦敦, 所以能载我一 程。 (Location) Gǎnqiǎo tā yě qù lúndūn suǒyǐ néng zǎi wǒ yī chéng coincidentally he also go London so able take me one leg (2) We are considering going to Canada.

我们正考虑到加拿大去。 (Location) Wǒmen zhèng kǎolü dào jiānádà qù we just consider go Canada go (3) Are you going to Linda’s birthday party tomorrow night?

你明天晚上去参加琳达的生日晚会吗？ (Occasion) nǐ míngtiān wǎnshàng qù cānjiā lín dá de shēngrì wǎnhuì ma you tomorrow evening go attend Linda POSS birthday party INT (INT = interrogative) (4) Going to college changed him a lot. 上大学使他改变了许多。 (Idiomatic Expression) shàng dàxué shǐ tā gǎibiàn le xǔduō ascend college make him change PFV much 2.

(PFV = perfective)

The combination of intention and movement senses, such as 要去 [yào qù ‘want + go’], 打算去 [dǎsuàn qù ‘plan + go’], and 会去 [huì qù ‘intend + go’], 将 +v [ jiāng, ‘will’], as in: (5) “I’m going to town,” she said. “我要去城里,” 她说。 wǒ yào qù chéng lǐ tā shuō I want go town inside she say (6) I’m going to London, too.

我也打算去伦敦。 wǒ yě dǎsuàn qù lúndūn I also plan go London

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(7) Are you going to go anyplace this year?

你今年会去什么地方吗? nǐ jīnnián huì qù shénme dìfāng ma you this year intend go what place INT (8) I’m not going to any more of these conferences – they’re always so disorganized.

我将再也不参加这些会议了－它们总是非常混乱无序。 wǒ jiāng zàiyě bù cānjiā zhèxiē huìyì le tāmen zǒngshì I will again not attend these meetings PFT they always fēicháng hùnluàn wúxù very messy no order 3.

(PFT = perfect)

Stronger intention senses, such as 要 [yào ‘want’], 会 [huì ‘will’], 打算 [dǎsuàn ‘plan, intend’], 准备 [zhǔnbèi ‘prepare, intend’], and 想 [xiǎng ‘think, want’] . In these situations, the English be going to is usually followed by a verb that does not indicate a movement and so are its Chinese counterparts, as in: (9) “Get down on your knees,” said the genie, “for I’m going to kill you.” “跪下,” 魔鬼说, “因为我要杀死你。 ” Guì xià móguǐ shuō yīnwèi wǒ yào shā sǐ nǐ kneel down genie say because I want kill you (10) Are you going to have dinner at home tomorrow night?

你明天晚上会在家吃晚饭吗? nǐ míngtiān wǎnshàng huì zài jiā chī wǎn fàn ma you tomorrow evening will at home eat dinner INT (11) After I retire I’m going to locate in California.

退休后我打算在加州定居。 tuìxiū hòu wǒ dǎsuàn zài Jiāzhōu dìngjū retirement after I plan at California settle down (12) Are you going to have dinner at home tomorrow night?

明天晚上你准备在家吃饭吗？ míngtiān wǎnshàng nǐ zhǔnbèi zàijiā chī fàn ma tomorrow evening you prepare at home eat meal INT

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(13) I was going to phone his wife but didn’t have the guts.

我想给他的妻子打电话，但没有那个胆量。 wǒ xiǎng gěi tāde qīzi dǎdiànhuà dàn méiyǒu nà gè dǎnliàng I think give his wife call on phone but not have that CLF guts (CLF = classifier) 4. The grammatical senses of futurity and modality: (14) A new subject is going to be given next week.

下星期将给一个新课题。 (Future) xià xīngqī jiāng gěi yī gè xīn kètí next week FUT give one CLF new subject (FUT = future or modal gram) (15) By all accounts, he is going to resign.

据说，他将辞职。 (Possibility) jùshuō tā jiāng cízhí allege he FUT resign (16) It’s getting very dark out there – there’s going to be a storm.

那儿正变得非常黑－将会有一场暴风雨。 (Prediction) nà ér zhèng biàn de fēicháng hēi jiāng huì yǒu yī there right now change into very dark, FUT FUT have one cháng bàofēngyǔ CLF storm (17) “They are going to be encamped near Brighton.” “他们就要驻扎到白利屯去。 ” (Immediate Future) tāmen jiù yào zhùzhā dào báilìtún qù they immediately FUT station at Brighton go (18) I think it’s going to rain.

我看要下雨。 (Future/Prediction) wǒ kān yào xiàyǔ I think FUT rain 5.

Combinations of the grams (grammatical morphemes), such as 将会 [ jiānghuì ‘future gram + future gram’] in (16), and 将要 [ jiāngyào ‘future gram + future gram’] in the following:

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(19) Some were going to be hanged in the next few days.

有些犯人将要在以后的几天中被绞死。 (Future) yǒuxiē fànrén jiāngyào zài yǐhòu de jī tiān zhōng some prisoners FUT FUT at afterwards POSS several day inside bèi jiǎo sǐ PASS hang die

(POSS = possessive, PASS = passive)

(20) It’s going to rain tomorrow.

明天将要下雨。 (Prediction/Possibility) míngtiān jiāngyào xiàyǔ tomorrow FUT FUT rain 6.

The collocations of temporal adverbs with the grams, as in 就会 [ jiuhui: right now + future gram], and 肯定会 [kendinghui: certainly + future gram], as in: (21) I was going to pay the money back as soon as I saw you.

我一见到你就会还那笔钱的。 (Immediate Future) wǒ yī jiàn dào nǐ jiù huì huán nà bǐ qián de I once see you immediately FUT return that CLF money AFF (AFF = affirmative) (22) Milan is going to win the cup for sure.

米兰队肯定会赢得这个锦标赛。 (Strong prediction) mǐ lán duì kěndìng huì yíngdé zhè gè jǐnbiāosài Milan team certainly FUT win this CLF tournament Now the question to be answered is why be going to has commanded so many Chinese lexical and grammatical items when its kaleidoscopic meanings are translated.

3 Rationale 3.1 The cross-linguistic development of future grams (grammatical morphemes) One of the important findings in semantic extension is that meanings tend to change from the concrete to the abstract (Kronasser 1952, from Greenberg 1978:

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430; Makkai 1972). This tenet applies well in grammaticalization, which refers to a diachronic process whereby a lexical item or a sequence of items gradually change into a grammatical morpheme (i.e., gram) or a gram becomes more grammatical as it gains newer and more general grammatical meanings. This process is characterized by semantic extension and phonetic reduction, as from going to to gonna. (see Hopper and Traugott 2003, Bybee 2002) Many cognitive linguists (e.g., Bybee et al 1994, Bybee 2002) point out that grammaticalization of future grams cross-linguistically often originates from the movement verb path, which is movement toward a goal > intention > future, and the volition verb path, which is volition or desire > intention > future. In addition, epistemic modals may arise from verbs of volition, as with will. (Hopper and Traugott 2003: 97). Modality refers to the speaker’s attitude toward a proposition. It covers such epistemic notions of truth, belief, certainty, evidence, valuative notions of desirability, preference, intent, ability, and obligation (Givon 1994, from Mortelmans 2007: 870) With regard to the grammatical evolution of be going to in particular, several stages are identified (cf. Traugott n.d.; Hopper and Traugott 2003: 2–4, 69; Bybee 2010): I.

Expressions of motion with intent to act in the 16th C., as in: (23) I am going to visit the prisoner. Fare you well. (Exit) (1604 Shakespeare, Measure for Measure III.iii.273)

(23) can be interpreted as a bridging example of either motion or planned future. II. Intentional non-motion expressions in the 17th C., as in: (24) I ha’ forgot what I was going to say to you. (Intentional) (1663 Cowley, Cutter of Coleman street V.ii) III. Expressing speaker’s assessment of the future in the 18th C., as in: (25) I am afraid there is going to be such a calm among us, that we must be forced to invent some mock Quarrels. (1725, Odingsells The bath unmask’d V.iii.) In comparison, Fan (2009) reports that it is generally believed that 要 [yào] was originally a noun meaning “waist.” Then it experienced the following four stages before it started to grammaticalize into a future and modality gram along the volition path:

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a. 要 [yào] became a verb meaning “to carry around the waist”, as in (26) 纡皇组, 要干将。 yū huáng zǔ yào gàn jiàng wear grand sash carry imperial sword ‘In a grand sash, he carried an imperial sword at his waist.’ (Gongyang’s commentary, 507 B.C.–156 A.D.) b. The meaning in a. was extended “to purposefully intercepting in the middle,” as in (27) 吴人要而击之。 wú rén yào ér jī zhī Wu people intercept and attack them ‘The Wu people intercepted and attacked them.’ (Zuo Zhuan, 722–453 B.C.) c.

“To purposefully intercepting in the middle” was further extended to “to seek,” as in: (28) 今之人修其天爵, 以要人爵。 jīn zhī rén xiū qí tiān jué yǐ yào rén jué now POSS people cultivate POSS heaven nobility with seek man nobility ‘The men of the present day cultivate their nobility of Heaven in order to seek for the nobility of man.’ (Works of Mencius, 289 B.C.)

d. Finally, the meaning evolved to “to desire,” as in: (29) 云英，擎一瓯浆来，郎君要饮。 yún yīng qíng yī ōu jiāng lái láng jūn yào yǐn take one bowl/cup wine come my husband want drink ‘Get a cup of wine, Yunying. My husband wants to have it.’ (Extensive records of Taiping era, 977 A.D.) After that, 要 [yào] continued with its grammaticalization towards one of the most active future and modality grams in contemporary Chinese. The large number of examples in this research is merely one more piece of evidence showing how extensively and frequently this gram is being used.

3.2 Embodiment and de-categorization The principles of embodiment and de-categorization can be used to describe the grammaticalization changes of 要 [yào ‘want’]. Simply put, embodiment here

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means that our conceptual and linguistic structures are often motivated and shaped by our body parts and their functions. As Lakoff and Johnson (1999) claim, we normally project image-schematic patterns of knowledge unidirectionally from a more embodied source domain to understand a less well understood target domain. De-categorization refers to processes by which a noun or verb loses its morphosyntactic properties in the process of becoming a grammatical element (Bybee 2007). With regard to embodiment, the etymology of 要 [yào] appears to be a good example: it originated from a word indicating part of our human body “waist,” which is the embodiment source. Gradually, it found its way to mean “carrying at the waist,” where 要 [yào] was de-categorized from a noun to a verb. Then there was a conceptual shift from “carrying at the waist” to “intercepting,” bringing in a strong purpose sense as one of its semantic shades. After inferencing and conventionalization of this meaning, the meanings of “seeking” and “desiring” developed, the conventionalized meaning of “desire” becoming the new lexical source for the later development of future and modality. It is interesting to note, however, that while the use of the noun “waist” has faded into history, other early meanings like “seeking” and “desiring” remain active in the Chinese language. The grammaticalization path of be going to can also be characterized by a semantic extension that originates from embodiment: the movement of a human being from point A to point B. Movement in a spatial domain then can extend to a temporal domain, which is natural because movement of a human from one physical location to another takes time. In addition, when an intelligent agent moves towards a goal, he often has an intention to cover the distance in between. Therefore, the intentional sense can emerge. Thus an intention to do something, which can be either in the past or present, is logically linked with the future, Intended actions or states are often located in the future. In this way, the future sense can be derived from intention.

3.3 Categorization and prototypicality In the development of future grams, intention is where the original movement sense and volitional sense begin to coalesce, from which future and epistemic meanings can further evolve. The common ground shared by the two paths falls within the domain of intention, future, and modality, as in: i.

Movement towards a goal > Intention I Future + Modality

ii. Volition or desire > Intention I Future + Modality

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It is in this domain that the English be going to comes across its numerous Chinese counterparts. Apparently, be going to and the Chinese grammatical words such as 要 [yào ‘want/future gram’] and 打算 [dǎsuàn ‘plan’] have different original semantic substances and etymological histories. However, when they converge on their grammaticalization paths, they virtually become semantic equals, with, of course, some fine variations in flavor. Consequently, they are interchangeable in translation. In terms of categorization and prototypicality, if we consider the members within the domain of intention, future and modality as forming an ad hoc category, then only be going to and 要 [yào], 将 [ jiāng], for example, can be used for all three of the meanings. Therefore, they are the prototypical members. Some of the grammatical words in Table 1 of the Appendix, nevertheless, could express only one or two of these meanings, and therefore they can be considered more peripheral with regard to the prototypicality of their membership. For instance, in non-personification language 想 [xiǎng ‘think’], 打算 [dǎsuàn ‘plan’], and 准备 [zhǔnbèi ‘prepare’] cannot be used with an inanimate subject to indicate such epistemic notions as possibility or prediction. For example, (30) is ungrammatical. (30)

天*想 /*打算/*准备下雨了。 tiān xiǎng dǎsuàn zhǔnbèi xiàyǔ le sky think plan prepare rain PFT ‘It’s going to rain.’

These three Chinese grammatical words are still mainly at the stage of desire and intention. A grammaticalizing word or structure can accumulate more grammatical uses as it develops, as with the evolution of be going to, 要 [yào], and 将 [ jiāng]. The development of modal usage can be regarded as an indicator of the maturity of a future gram. Conversely, when a grammatical word is still young in the large domain of intention, future and modality, it cannot indicate modal meanings.

3.4 Metonymization and pragmatic inferencing The translated versions of be going to in the target language Chinese can help to determine if the semantic extension in grammaticalization is directly powered by metaphor or progressively by its close cousin metonymy, which has been a controversy in the literature of cognitive linguistics (Gooseens 2000; Robinson and Ellis 2008). Metonymization refers to a semantic shift or extension within

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the same conceptual frame, as from 手 [shǒu ‘hand’] to 熟手 [shúshǒu ‘experienced worker’]. Both can be seen as being in the human frame. Metaphorization means a semantic shift or extension across different conceptual frames, such as 口 [kǒu ‘mouth’] and 山口 [shānkǒu, ‘mountain pass’]. While the former is in the frame of human beings, the latter moves to the frame of mountains. Svorou (2007) argues that grammaticalization is often featured by small meaning adjustments induced by context. Such accumulated minute changes in language use would result in observable changes. Hopper and Traugott (2003: 124–126) call these phenomena “layering,” which means coexistence of several meanings at the same time. The Chinese versions of (5), (6), (7) and (8) support the arguments in favor of metonymization, small adjustments, or layering, where be going to is translated into a combination of the intention meanings expressed by 要 [yào ‘want/ will’], 打算 [dǎsuàn ‘plan/intend’], 会 [huì ‘will’], and the movement meanings of 去 [qù ‘go’] or 参加 [cānjiā ‘attend’]. The Chinese translation hence brings to the surface the semantic ingredients embedded in the opaque English polysemous be going to structure. Similar mixed readings can also be found in (31) 要下雨了。 yào xiàyǔ le FUT rain le ‘It is going to rain.’ where 要 [yào] can have both an immediate future reading and a possibility/ prediction reading. Therefore, it is difficult to draw a clear demarcation between future and possibility, so much so that the two are often inextricable in a future gram. Inference, or “pragmatic strengthening,” in Bybee’s terms (2007: 976), means that some budding meanings of a grammaticalizing item can be inferred from the context and usage situation. Inferencing from an utterance happens when a speaker is able to mean more than what he says and a hearer tries to figure out more than he hears. There are at least two sources that induce inferencing. The first is through metonymic inferencing. Panther and Thornburg (2003: 8) argue that metonymy can have a natural inference power that may easily activate associations among concepts used for inferential purposes. In fact, the meaning categories of movement, intention, future, and prediction carried by be going to can form a semantic cline, thanks to their semantic interconnections. However, no category has a clear-cut boundary with respect to its adjacent ones. The relationship in between

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is not discrete, but continuous. This continuity is built up by metonymic inference, such as from intention to future. Intention itself contains the ingredients of futurity. The other source of inferencing emerges when be going to co-occurs with certain cognitive verbs that hold epistemic contents (e.g., think) in the discourses, as in: (32)

I think it’s going to rain. 我看要下雨了。 wǒ kàn yào xiàyǔ le I see/think FUT rain le

(Prediction/Possibility)

Note that the modal meaning of prediction/possibility is partially motivated or strengthened by the verb think in the main clause. Table 2 in the Appendix lists some of the cognitive verbs that appear in the same syntactic structure as in (32). The collocations of the cognitive verbs with be going to actually functions as a device that lends epistemic inference to the whole sentence. (cf. Bybee and Scheibman 1999; Thompson and Mulac 1991).

3.5 Use frequency and extensiveness of grammatical functions The Chinese data show that there are a number of grammatical words indicating intention, future, and modality, and some appear to be more grammaticalized than others. This phenomenon deserves an explanation. Researchers in language use note that the frequency of use is the essential factor determining the outcome in the competition of grammaticalizing items (Bybee 2007, 2010). Our data demonstrates that 要 [yào] has the 2nd highest frequency (n = 130). This high frequency is a testimony of the wide semantic extension that this grammatical word has undergone. Apparently, there exists a positive correlation between frequency and extensiveness of grammatical functions. 要 [yào], for instance, now covers the whole continuum of desire, intention, futurity, and modality. In comparison, 打算 [dǎsuàn] (n = 91) still cannot be used for prediction or possibility for non-human subjects, as in (30). This is because the canonical meanings of “calculate” and “plan” of 打算 [dǎsuàn] are still too strong and too transparent in contemporary Chinese. Different times may have different grams to express the same or similar grammatical meanings. It is often the case that new ones start to appear while older ones are still in use. During the last three thousand years, the Chinese language has witnessed such repeating cycles.

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In Archaic Chinese ( 9th C. B.C.–2nd C. B.C.), 将 [ jiāng] was the dominant marker for intention and futurity, as in (33)

留子国, 将其来食。 liú zǐ guó jiàng qí lái shí retain want him come eat ‘Some one is there detaining Ziguo; – Would that he would come and eat with me!’ (Desire/Intention) (Book of songs, c. 600 B.C.)

(34) 简兮简兮, 方将万舞。 jiǎn xī jiǎn xī fāng jiāng wàn wǔ easy alas indifferent alas about FUT all dance ‘Easy and indifferent! Easy and indifferent! I am ready to perform in all dances.’ (Immediate Future) (Book of songs, c. 600 B.C.) (35)

曾子言曰：鸟之将死 , 其鸣也哀; 人之将死, 其言也善。 zēngzǐ yán yuē niǎo zhī jiāng sǐ qí míng yě āi rén zhī jiāng sǐ say bird NOM FUT die its cry sad person NOM FUT die qí yán yě shàn his word nice ‘Zengzi said: “When a bird is going to die, its crying is sad. When a man is going to die, his words are good.”’ (NOM = nominalization) (Prediction) (Confucius analects, 5th C. B.C.)

When a younger gram, such as 要 [yào] began to develop in the 10th century and met its predecessor during the later times, one of the morph-syntactic options it had was to form a grammatical compound, whereby the two grams were combined to express the same grammatical meanings. As a result, 将要 [ jiāngyào] appeared. This merger can be considered as being motivated by the bi-syllabification trend of verbs in Chinese that started in the 7th C. B.C. and reached a prolific point in the 12th C. A.D. (Shi 2003). On further analysis, the bi-syllabification development can be explained by the iconic principle of proximity and the principle of relevance.

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3.6 Iconicity and relevance According to the iconic principle of proximity put forward by Radden and Dirven (2007), similar conceptual units that belong together tend to be closely integrated in the structure of language. Dissimilar concepts, on the contrary, tend to be distanced apart from one another. In the grammaticalization of Chinese future grams, the proximity principle is reflected in the formation of grammatical compounds, which are made of two or three conceptually similar grams. Each of them can be used individually to carry out the same or similar grammatical functions, as in 将要 [ jiāngyào] for futurity and modality, 既已 [ jìyǐ ] for perfective (PFV), and 已矣 [yǐyǐ] for perfect (PFT). The first two occur at a preverbal position while the third is post-verbal or sentence-final, as in: (36)

治天下, 天下既已治矣。 zhì tiānxià tiānxià jì yǐ zhì yǐ govern world world PFV PFV govern PFT ‘The king tried to put the country in good order. Now the country has been (is) well governed.’ (Works of Zhuangzi, 3rd C. B.C)

(37)

子遵道而行。半涂而废, 吾弗能已矣。 zǐ zūn dào ér xíng bàn tú ér fèi wú fú néng yǐ yǐ man follow way and move half way and abandon I not able PFT PFT ‘A gentleman conducts himself following a righteous way. Since I have abandoned my course the half way, I have become incapable of so doing.’ (Confucius Analects, 5th C. B.C.)

The principle of relevance says that the order in which grammatical elements occur is in part associated with the degree of relevance they have to the verb (Hopper and Traugott 2003: 151). In the Chinese grammatical compounds for aspect or modality, the grams that exert a greater semantic influence on the main verb tend to be spatially closer to the verb. As discussed above, 将 [ jiāng] is an older future/modality maker than 要 [yào]. Its semantic contents are weaker and more general after much of its earlier meaning of desire has been bleached away. In comparison, as a younger grammatical word, 要 [yào] retains more of its original contents of desire and intention. In total, of the four grammatical ingredients of desire, intention, future and modality, 将 [ jiāng] is weak with respect to the first two while 要 [yào] is strong in all four. In this sense, 要 [yào] is a semantically more powerful gram, and is able to have a stronger effect on

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the verb it modifies. Therefore, 将 [ jiāng] is placed further away from the verb, resulting in 将要 [ jiāngyào] rather than *要将 [*yàojiāng]. Lin (1991) reports that 既 [ jì] is a more mature perfective/perfect maker than 已 [yi] in the Archaic and Han Chinese periods (up to 2nd C. A.D.). For the same reason, therefore, we find 既已 [ jìyǐ ] rather than *已既 [*yǐjì] in Chinese. Similarly, because 矣 [yǐ ] is an older post verbal perfect marker than 已 [yǐ ], we thus have 已矣 [yǐyǐ ]. As the Chinese philologist Wang Yinzhi (1766–1834) pointed out, 已 [yǐ ] and 矣 [yǐ ] are grammatically synonymous. When they form a grammatical compound for perfect, the order has to be 已矣 [yǐyǐ ] (cf. http://cidian. xpcha.com/02763nxqds9.html, accessed 15 August 2010). Therefore, the iconic order of grammatical compounds in Chinese can be expressed as: a.

Gram1Gram2 + Main Verb

or b. Main Verb + Gram2Gram1 where Gram1 is older than gram2. This is comparable to the English iconic order of modality, tense, and aspect, as in: (38) George may have been drinking. where the weakest effect on the main verb drink is exerted by the modal verb “may” and the strongest by the aspectual marker “-ing”, with tense in the middle (see Radden and Dirven 2007: 173). This order mirrors the degree of relevance of the three grammatical functions to the main verb.

4 Summary This study of the grammatical and semantic behaviors of be going to and its Chinese counterparts is an attempt to open up a cognitive and comparative perspective in the pedagogy of Chinese language instruction and Chinese/English translation education. Such efforts can add to the development of a comparative cognitive Chinese/English grammar. The central issue discussed is the application of the principles of grammaticalization of future and modality grams to the explanation of the complicated relationship between be going to and its numerous Chinese grammatical equals. This leads to related topics such as semantic extensions through metonymy and inferencing, embodiment, prototypicality,

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de-categorization, frequency, relevance, and iconicity. In particular, it is found that once be going to enters the domain of intention, future, and modality, it inevitably rides along with many Chinese counterparts that are also on their own way of grammaticalization. For this reason, be going to is able to show up on a Chinese language stage in many colorful Chinese phonetic, semantic, and orthographic types of attire. Pedagogically, we can argue and tell Chinese language students whose native language is English that while English future grams evolved from both volitional verbs and movement verbs, Chinese future grams mostly developed from volitional verbs. For this reason, many Chinese volitional verbs are used to express the meanings of be going to, including intention, future, and various modal meanings. The relationship between be going to and Chinese volitional verb/ future grams is one-to-many. The former may be expressed differently in Chinese in different textbooks. Explanations as such have a solid grounding in cognitive linguistics in general and in grammaticalization theories in particular. This cognitive and comparative approach using corpus data also allows us to predict which Chinese future/modality grams are usually used to translate be going to. Table 3 in the Appendix is derived from Table 1, minus the tokens of pure movement verbs, such as 去 [qù ‘go’], 到 [dào ‘go, arrive’], and 上 [shàng ‘ascend, go, attend’]. The token frequencies of Table 3 of the Appendix give us a curve as displayed in Figure 1.

Figure 1: The distribution of the Chinese grams indicating be going to

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The curve in Figure 1 is similar to the following typical Pareto curves (cf: http:// en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_distribution#Definition, accessed 15 June 2011), as displayed in Figure 2.

Figure 2: Typical Pareto curves

The original Pareto principle, or the 20/80 rule, claims that 20% of the population controls 80% of the wealth. This principle is found extensively true in many social behaviors, such as the circulation of a library collection. It is often the case that only 20% of a collection could satisfy 80% of the library circulation needs. In terms of the Chinese future grams used to indicate be going to, the 20/80 distribution can be arrived through the following calculation: 20% of 21 future grams is about 4, and these four grams are listed in Table 1. 将 [ jiāng ‘future gram’]

136

22%

要 [ yào ‘want, future gram’]

130

21%

会 [huì ‘be able to, future gram’ [possibility/prediction]]

116

19%

91

15%

打算 [dǎsuàn: ‘plan, intend’]

Table 1: The four Chinese volitional verbs/future grams that express about 80% of the translation instances of be going to

These four volitional verbs/future grams constitute 77% (22% +21% +19 +15%) of the total of frequencies of 21 tokens in Table 3 of the Appendix. This shows that the human behavior in translating English be going to into Chinese can also

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be described by the 20/80 rule. In Chinese language instruction, we may inform students that it is important to learn these four words in Table 1, because they represent about 80% of the English be going to equivalents in Chinese. Finally, in terms of language family affiliation, English and Chinese are two remote languages, with very different morphological and syntactic rules. Yet, the evidence we have examined demonstrates that their native speakers share many conceptual similarities in the development of future and modality grams. The revelation of these commonalities contributes to the study of language universals, benefiting English-speaking students learning Chinese and Chinese-speaking students studying Chinese-English translation.

Appendix Table 1: Chinese equivalents of be going to and their frequencies Chinese equivalents of be going to

Frequency n

n/765 x 100%

将 [ jiāng ‘future gram’]

136

18%

要 [ yào ‘want, future gram’]

130

17%

去 [qù ‘go’]

119

16%

会 [huì: ‘be able to, future gram’ [possibility/prediction]]

116

15%

打算 [dǎsuàn ‘plan, intend’]

91

12%

准备 [zhǔnbèi ‘prepare, intend’]

23

3%

到 [dào ‘go, arrive’]

21

3%

上 [shàng ‘ascend, go, attend’]

20

3%

要去 [ yàoqù ‘want + go’]

19

2%

想 [xiǎng ‘think, want’]

18

2%

将会 [ jiānghuì ‘future gram + future gram’]

12

2%

将去 [ jiāngqù ‘future gram + go’]

9

1%

打算去 [dǎsuànqù ‘intend + go’]

8

1%

能 [néng ‘be capable of’]

7

1%

将要 [ jiāngyào ‘future gram + future gram’]

7

1%

正要 [zhèngyào ‘just + future gram’]

6

1%

要到 [ yàodào ‘future gram + go’]

5

1%

Conceptual similarities in languages

快要 [kuàiyào ‘fast + future gram’]

5

1%

打算到 [dǎsuàndào ‘intend + go’]

4

1%

正打算 [zhèngdǎsuàn ‘just + intend’]

3

0%

可以 [kěyǐ ‘can’]

2

0%

就会 [ jiùhuì ‘right now + future gram’]

2

0%

想要 [xiǎngyào ‘think + want’]

1

0%

肯定会 [kěndìnghuì ‘certainly + future gram’ [possibility/prediction]]

1

0%

Table 2: Verbs that introduce an object clause containing be going to Cognitive verbs think

Frequency 21

decide

3

doubt

3

know

3

look

3

believe

2

find

2

afraid

1

imagine

1

say

1

tell

1

Table 3: Chinese equivalents of be going to minus pure movement verbs Chinese equivalents of be going to minus movement verbs

Frequency n

n/605 x 100%

将 [ jiāng ‘future gram’]

136

22%

要 [ yào ‘want, future gram’]

130

21%

会 [huì ‘be able to, future gram’ [possibility/prediction]]

116

19%

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打算 [dǎsuàn ‘plan, intend’]

91

15%

准备 [zhǔnbèi ‘prepare, intend’]

23

4%

要去 [ yàoqù ‘want + go’]

19

3%

想 [xiǎng ‘think, want’]

18

3%

将会 [ jiānghuì ‘future gram + future gram’]

12

2%

将去 [ jiāngqù ‘future gram + go’]

9

1%

打算去 [dǎsuànqù ‘intend + go’]

8

1%

能 [néng ‘be capable of’]

7

1%

将要 [ jiāngyào ‘future gram + future gram’]

7

1%

正要 [zhèngyào ‘just + future gram’]

6

1%

要到 [ yàodào ‘future gram + go’]

5

1%

快要 [kuàiyào ‘fast + future gram’]

5

1%

打算到 [dǎsuàndào ‘intend + go’]

4

1%

正打算 [zhèngdǎsuàn ‘just + intend’]

3

0%

可以 [kěyǐ ‘can’]

2

0%

就会 [ jiùhuì ‘right now + future gram’]

2

0%

想要 [xiǎngyào ‘think + want’]

1

0%

肯定会 [kěndìnghuì ‘certainly + future gram’ [possibility/prediction]]

1

0%

References Bybee, Joan L., Revere Perkins and William Pagliuca. 1994. The Evolution of Grammar: Tense, Aspect, and Modality in the Languages of the World. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Bybee, Joan L. and Joanne Scheibman. 1999. The effect of usage on degree of constituency. Linguistics 37: 575–596. Bybee, Joan L. 2002. Cognitive processes in grammaticalization. In The New Psychology of Language, volume II. Michael Thomasello (ed.), 145–167. New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers. Bybee, Joan L. 2007. Diachronic linguistics. In The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Linguistics, Dirk Geeraerts and Hubert Cyukens (eds.), 945–987. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Bybee, Joan L. 2010. Language, Usage and Cognition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Fan, Jing-ling. 2009. On the grammaticalization of yao. Journal of Guizhou Normal University (Social Science) 161: 120–123. Gooseens, Louis. 2000. Patterns of meaning extension, “parallel chaining,” subjectification, and modal shifts. In Metaphor and Metonymy at the Crossroads – a Cognitive Perspective, Antonio Barcelona (ed.), 149–169. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Greenberg, Joseph H. (ed.). 1978. Universals of Human Languages, 3. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Hopper, Paul J. and Elizabeth Closs Traugott. 2003. Grammaticalization (2nd ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lakoff, George and Mark Johnson. 1999. Philosophy in the Flesh: the Embodied Mind and Its Challenge to Western Thought. New York: Basic Books. Lin, Zi-yu. 1991. The Development of Grammatical Markers in Archaic and Han Chinese. Ann Arbor: UMI. Makkai, Adam. 1972. Reviewed work(s): The Growth of Word Meaning by Jeremy M. Anglin Meaning and The Structure of Language by Wallace L. Chafe Source: American Anthropologist, New Series 74 (1/2) (Feb.–Apr., 1972), 92–94. Published by: Blackwell Publishing on behalf of the American Anthropological Association, http://www.jstor.org/stable/ 672048 (accessed 10 June 2010). Mortelmans, Janja. 2007. Modality in cognitive linguistics. In The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Linguistics, Dirk Geeraerts and Hubert Cyukens (eds.), 869–889. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Panther, Klaus-Uwe and Linda L. Thornburg (eds.). 2003. Metonymy and Pragmatic Inferencing. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Co. Radden, Gunter and Rene Dirven. 2007. Cognitive English Grammar. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Robinson, Peter and Nick C. Ellis. 2008. Handbook of Cognitive Linguistics and Second Language Acquisition. New York and London: Routledge. Shi, Yuzhi. 2003. The Establishment of Modern Chinese Grammar: The Formation of Resultative Construction and Its Effects. Beijing: Beijing Language and Culture University. Svorou, Soteria. 2007. Relational constructions in cognitive linguistics. In The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Linguistics, Dirk Geeraerts and Hubert Cyukens (eds.), 726–752. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Thompson, Sandra A. and Anthony Mulac. 1991. A quantitative perspective on the grammaticization of epistemic parentheticals in English. In Approaches to Grammaticalization (1), Elizabeth Closs Traugott and Bernd Heine (eds.), 313–329. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Traugott, Elizabeth Closs (n.d.). Where subjectification, intersubjectification, and grammaticalization meet. http://www.docin.com/p-189464193.html (accessed 10 June 2010).

Helen Charters

SLA of Mandarin nominal syntax: Emergence order in the early stages Abstract: The paper demonstrates that principles of universal grammar developed with reference to a number of typologically distinct languages can be applied effectively to account for acquisition order of nominal structures in Mandarin, an isolating Sinitic language. It is argued that an acquisition theory based on notions of universal grammar can effectively account for observed emergence order of nominal structures in the spontaneous speech of second language learners of Mandarin. Particular attention must be paid to developments in word order and collocation constraints, and the syntactic relationships they encode, rather than to the morphological changes that typically mark development in inflectional languages.

1 Introduction Over the last decades, interest in the acquisition of Mandarin has grown (Qian 1997; Wang 1997; Shi 1998; X. Wen 1995, 1997; Z. Wen 1998, 1999; Sun 1993, 1999; Zhang 2001; Charters 2004a, 2004b; Gao 2005) and one question that has attracted recent interest is whether theories developed to account for acquisition in Indo-European languages can be usefully applied to Mandarin, and by extension, other Sinitic and other isolating languages. In this paper I argue that an acquisition theory based on notions of universal grammar can effectively account for observed emergence order of nominal structures in the spontaneous speech of second language learners of Mandarin. However, the isolating nature of Mandarin means particular attention must be paid to developments in word order and collocation constraints, and the syntactic relationships they encode, rather than to the morphological changes that typically mark development in inflectional languages. In discussing this issue I first show that Processability Theory (PT) (Pienemann 1989, 2005), an established theory of SLA that has been applied to languages of various types (Pienemann and Hakansson 1999; Pienemann and Mackey 1993; DiBiase and Kawaguchi 2002; Gao 2009), goes some way to explaining the emergence order of Mandarin, but leaves some aspects unexplained. I then show how a new theory, based on similar assumptions to PT, but taking closer account of certain aspects of Lexical Functional Grammar, provides a more satisfying account. I call this new theory: Emergent Functional Grammar.

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The structure of the paper is as follows. Section 2 introduces a number of key nominal structures that emerge in the first two years of study of Mandarin as a second language (hereafter, MSL). These have been investigated in 3 independent studies in a PT framework. Section 3 introduces the key concepts and mechanisms of PT, outlining the methodology it employs to predict and account for emergence orders. Section 4 presents the results of the three studies (Charters 2005; Zhang 2001; Gao 2009) and Section 5 identifies some problems they raise for PT. Section 6 introduces Emergent Functional Grammar (EFG) and explains how its assumptions differ from PT, and Section 7 concludes the paper with a demonstration of how EFG accounts for all the data from the studies of MSL.

2 Nominal structures in MSL 2.1 Three independent studies in a PT framework At the time of writing there have been three relatively extensive studies of MSL within a PT framework, Zhang (2001), Charters (2005), and Gao (2009). In this paper I focus only on the nominal structures investigated in those studies. These are illustrated in Table 1. Syntactic structures often go by different names in different studies, so an example of each is given in the table, and I define them briefly below. (1) Simple words and phrases Pronoun Noun Incorporated Locative ‘Adj’-N Poss 0 (Affine)

wǒ, nǐmen etc huà, shū, háizi húbian dà shù wǒ māma

我, 你们 画，书，孩子 湖边 大树 我妈妈

nǐde huà hòubian de fángjiān, rìběn de shōuyīnjī hěn dà de zìxíngchē shù de hòubian tī zúqiú de rén, tā chàng de gē

你的画 后边的房间 日本的收音机 很大的自行车 树的后边 踢足球的人 他唱的歌

(2) X de N structures de (Poss/Gen) de (Att) de (Adj) de (Loc) de (RC)

(3) Structures with agreement between Classifier and N Num-Class N Dem-Class N

yī běn shū nà zhāng zhuōzi

Table 1: Nominal Structures in 3 MSL Studies

一本书 那张桌子

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Set (1) in Table 1 is characterized by the complete absence of functional words or morphs. It includes pronouns1 and nouns used alone, as well as combinations of two content words. The combinations are potentially open to analysis either as compound words, or as simple phrases. The structure called ‘incorporated Locatives’ is a highly conventionalized combination of a term like bian ‘side’ which denotes a locative relationship with a place-denoting noun like hu ‘lake’ to identify a region or place. Because of their conventional nature, these are best treated as compound nouns. On the other hand, ‘Poss 0’, also called the ‘affine structure’, refers to a clearly phrasal structure where a pronoun – a complete NP- directly precedes a kin-term or one of a small set of other nouns. The referents of the pronoun and noun are understood to be in a kin-like social relationship. ‘Adj-N’ refers to modification of N by a preceding word like da ‘big’; Zhang and Gao call such words ‘adjectives’ and argue that they are distinct from verbs because they can be marked with de. I consider them to be a subset of verb (i.e. stative), which like all verbs, can precede de in a relative clause (RC) i.e. as the lexical head – and possibly the only item – in a clause that modifies a noun. However this does not exclude the possibility that learners use them as if they belong to a distinct class from verbs. In the structure called ‘Adj-N’ however, de does not occur, so some instances of this structure might be considered compound words; others are not highly conventionalized, and seem best understood as phrases. The second set is characterized by the presence of the particle de before a noun. Zhang and Gao assume 4 distinct de morphemes: de(Att) includes all N de N structures; de(Poss) or (Gen) refers to N de N structures where N1 is interpreted as a possessor, effectively a subset of de(Att); de(Adj) refers to de used after an ‘Adjective’ or stative verb2, and de(RC) to de used after a transitive clause modifying N, that is a relative clause. Though Zhang assumes that each de is a distinct lexical item, with distinct syntactic functions, I suggest there is one functional head de which can link any modifier to N. In either case, it is the emergence of the different modifiers preceding de that is of interest in documenting acquisition order. 1 Since the plural marker ‘men’ is restricted to use only on pronouns in learner data, it is treated here as a (contentful) semantic marker of plurality rather than a functional inflection. Likewise, the pronoun wo in the affine structure refers to one party in a relationship, but does not itself express possession. 2 Zhang argues that Mandarin has a distinct lexical category of ‘Adjective’ that can be distinguished from stative verbs by being compatible with marking by ‘de’. I argue that, in fact, all pre-nominal modifiers in Mandarin can be marked by ‘de’, including stative and dynamic verbs, in an RC construction, so there is no need to posit a large class of ‘Adj’ in Mandarin (See Li and Thompson, 1981). However, learners could still treat certain lexemes as Adjectives, distinct from verbs, in their interlanguage grammar.

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The last set of structures involve a classifier and therefore at least one agreement relationship between the classifier and the noun, and arguably – since a numeral (Num) or demonstrative (Dem) (i.e. zhe ‘this’, na ‘that’) cannot collocate with most nouns except in the presence of a classifier – a second relationship between the numeral or demonstrative and the noun or classifier. There are other nominal structures that appear in learner speech in the first year of study, but I will discuss only those in Table 1, as they have been observed in all three studies. These structures allow us to test the validity of PT for Mandarin because, according to that theory, they represent at least four distinct stages of acquisition: the lemma, the lexical, the phrasal and the subordinate clause stages. These are explained in the next section.

3 Processability Theory 3.1 The theoretical framework PT combines 3 other theories to account for emergence order in SLA in terms of the processing demands that each syntactic structure places on the cognitive processing capacity of a language user. First, Levelt’s theory of lexical access suggests that certain ideas in a speaker’s mind can activate lemmas – that is stored information associated with lexemes – which in turn activate related word-forms. Over time, the links between a concept and a specific lemma and specific word-form become stronger, until thinking of the concept instantaneously and automatically activates the lemma, making it available for syntactic processing. PT adopts this as a model for the link between conceptualization of an intended message, and the selection of lexical resources with which to express that message. Since activation of lemmas is conceptually driven, it is considered to involve no syntactic processing demands. Lemma activation is therefore the first stage in language acquisition. Secondly, Kempen and Hoenkamp’s procedural grammar explains how activated lemmas are combined in mental procedures to make phrases and sentences. It proposes a distinct procedure for each lexical type, N, V, Adj etc, and for each constituent type, NP, VP, AdjP and the sentence S, all running in parallel as far as possible. However, because of the hierarchical nature of syntactic structure – with words within phrases within other phrases within sentences – procedures for higher level structures must sometimes wait for input from procedures for lower level constituents. This creates a demand on unconscious working memory. PT suggests that the speed of processing affects this demand, and only automatic processing allows all processes to be completed in the time available in fluent speech. Thus, as more of a learner’s procedures become automatic, information

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exchange between procedures becomes faster, and so a learner can produce more complex structures more fluently. The second stage of acquisition, the lexical stage is associated with the differentiation of words into distinct classes, which can access distinct categorial procedures as described above, and with the emergence of functional forms which reflect such class membership, such as plural marking on a noun, or tense or aspect marking on a verb. Whether free functional morphs like articles in English, or de in Mandarin belong to this stage or the subsequent phrasal stage – associated with phrasal procedures – is a point on which PT is not entirely clear. Finally, PT refers to Lexical Functional Grammar (LFG) to clarify when and how information must be exchanged during syntactic processing. The relationships between procedures are not limited to those that construct the hierarchical relationships between words, phrases and sentences, but also include exchanges of information like a value for a number or a gender feature that must be identical on two independent words, such as when a noun selects a particular classifier, or when a particular NP has the status of Subject of a verb, while another NP has the status of Object. LFG provides a model for identifying the significant relationships between words and constituents, and for tracking the exchanges of information through syntactic structures. According to PT, Information exchange within a phrasal procedure occurs in the third stage of acquisition, while information exchange in the sentence procedure marks the fourth stage. The fifth stage of acquisition is characterized by complex structures where one clause is embedded within another, such as when a relative clause modifies a noun within a larger clause.

3.2 The developmental stages In a nutshell then, PT suggests that syntactic structures emerge in the spontaneous speech of learners in an order which reflects the extent to which cognitive information must be accessed, stored and compared in syntactic procedures during production of the different structures. Development can be divided into stages, marked by the emergence of different morphological and syntactic features which reflect advances in processing capacity. This is illustrated in Fig. 1. At Stage 1, called the lemma stage, simple lexical forms respond to concepts ordered on putatively universal discourse principles. Utterances produced by learners of any language at this stage contain only simple content words (i.e. no inflections or function words) combined in a flat structure (i.e. no subconstituents larger than a word) in a consistent order (Topic First) (Pienemann, DiBiase and Kawaguchi 2005).

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Figure 1: Developmental stages in PT

At Stage 2, the lexical stage, information is said to be exchanged between conceptual structure and a categorial procedure which identifies the class of a lexeme, and in inflectional languages, selects the word-form appropriate to the context, such as a plural form of noun or a past tense form of a verb. In Mandarin the use of the plural marker – men on pronouns but not generally on nouns might be seen as evidence of classification, and therefore of categorial procedures at work. On the other hand the paradigm of pronouns is so small that a learner may simply store both singular and plural forms as complete wordforms, rather than as roots with an inflection added in a categorial procedure. In isolating languages like Chinese, the lexical stage is more clearly signalled by clear distributional differences between words of different classes. The use of a large but restricted set of words as pre-nominal modifiers is evidence of early lexical classification. Stage 3, the phrasal stage corresponds to the exchange of information between words in a single constituent, such as when a determiner, adjective or classifier must agree with certain values expressed by the noun it modifies (such as number or gender/class). While this is typically applied to inflectional agreement in Indo-European languages, the selection restrictions between a classifier and a noun are equally indicative of information encoded separately by two distinct words, but which must be compatible. Thus the emergence of two or more different classifiers combining with two or more different nouns should be a sign that Stage 3 has been reached in MSL.

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Stage 4, the inter-phrasal stage corresponds to the appearance of agreement between major constituents of a sentence, such as between the Subject and a verb. Since Mandarin lacks Subject Verb agreement as a general grammatical requirement, the clearest examples of this stage in that language would be structures where the verb or its complement are compatible only with a plural Subject (e.g. wǒmen hūxiāng bāngzhù ‘we help each other’). Since these fall outside the domain of nominal syntax they will not be discussed in this paper. Stage 5, the subordinate clause stage, corresponds to the production of structures that involve two clauses, such as relative clauses or complex sentences. We’ll be concerned only with the former.

3.3 Methodology In order to apply PT it is necessary to calculate the processing demands of syntactic structures both of the target language (TL) and the learners’ interlanguage: learner structures can provide evidence of information exchange, and thus reveal the learner’s developmental stage, even if the structures are not target-like. Figure 2 illustrates the application of PT to the Mandarin nominal structures identified in Table 1 above. The arrows indicate information exchange between different cognitive procedures for structures at different stages of development. Note that later emerging structures still involve procedures developed earlier but add additional procedures to them. At Stage 2 a Noun like ‘ge’ 歌 goes from the lexical procedure directly to output; at Stage 3 it is sent from the N procedure to a phrasal NP procedure. In fact, later procedures depend on the output of earlier procedures, hence the orderly and incremental manner in which language processing develops over time. At Stage 1 (column 1 in Fig. 2) a learner has lemmas, that is cognitive links between concepts and word forms, and once activated, forms are sent directly to be pronounced. Isolated thoughts can be expressed, but no grammatical information is stored in the system. At Stage 2 (column 2) grammatical information has been recognized and is now stored in special Categorial procedures (N V etc). Different lemmas now access different procedures to gain different affixes, forming morphological classes. Words may combine to express propositions, but only in a simple structure where the first word is both the topic and the grammatical Subject (Pienemann et al. 2005). At Stage 3 (column 3), output from categorial procedures is sent to phrasal procedures before being expressed. For the first time words can be combined in phrases according to language-specific rules, creating the syntactic context for modifiers and agreement within a phrase. As mentioned above,

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Figure 2: Application of PT to Mandarin Nominal structures

selection of appropriate classifiers is an example of processing at this stage. At Stage 4 (top of column 4) a language-specific sentence procedure has developed. This allows the Subject and Topic to become distinct, word order to vary, and sentence level modifiers to appear. The 5th and final stage (bottom, column 4) sees the emergence of a procedure which can construct a dependent clause and deliver it to a phrasal procedure making a relative clause, or to the S-procedure, creating complex sentences.

4 Emergence order: empirical findings Now let’s see how PT’s predictions are applied to Mandarin. In applying PT, it is necessary to elicit spontaneous spoken production through techniques that target key structures (to minimize avoidance) while providing no direct models of the target structures (to exclude mimicry). In addition, for each structure a minimum of two alternative expressions is required to exclude rote-learned ‘chunks’ and ensure the learner is able to process the structure at near automatic levels. Ideally we make longitudinal observations, but if we cannot observe learners over time, we can use implicational scaling to approximate an emergence order from cross-sectional data. PT has been applied to MSL in three independent longitudinal studies (Zhang 2001; Charters 2005; Gao 2009) each involving three learners in their

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late teens or early 20’s. Data was elicited from the learners through regular taped elicitation sessions, using tasks specially designed to encourage production of the target structures. The emergence orders found in each study for the structures introduced in Table 1 are compared in Table 2. The structures are ordered by emergence time, with the earliest at the top and the latest at the bottom. Numbers following the structure label indicate the developmental stage to which PT assigns these structures (according to Zhang, 2001). Nominal structures do not include any that clearly belong to PT’s Stage 4, but Gao investigated two non-nominal Stage 4 structures and these are also included to provide additional reference points: “Adv-First” where the initial constituent is an optional element, and “Top”, where the initial element is a non-Subject Topic.

T 1

W

Zhang

W 7

Charters N, Pron 1

W

Gao

Stage 1

2

5

Poss de 2

7

Num-Class 3

3–7

2

3

10

Num-Class 3

10

Poss 0 > Poss de 2 ‘Adj’-N (23)

11–17

Poss 0 > Poss de 2 Num-Class 3

4

13

5

16

de ADJ 2 Loc de 2 (de RC(D) 5) Dem-Class 3

16

(V-guo 2)

25

6 7

de ADJ 2 de RC (S) 5

3

11–17

de (ADJ) 24 (Adv-First 4)

21–25

de (ATT) 2 (Top 4)

4

RC 5

5

Dem-Class 3 de (ATT) 2 de (ADJ) 2 Loc-compound 2 Loc de 2 (*RC) 5

29

Table 2: Comparison of emergence time in 3 studies 3 At least some of these structures are unconventional combinations, indicating that phrasal procedures are functional in the learner’s system, but there is no evidence of information exchange. PT is not clear whether phrasal construction alone is enough to warrant classification as Stage 3, or whether it is only agreement in phrases that marks Stage 3 development. Zhang assumes it is not, see next footnote. 4 According to Zhang (2001) “-de is listed in the lexical entry of nouns, pronouns and ‘ADJ’; activated when they are nominal modifiers. Whether -de is a GEN or ATT marker is directly determined by conceptualization. No information exchange.” (Zhang, 2001, p. 74–76). On this basis, Zhang classifies all X de N structures as Stage 2 except de (RC).

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The columns labelled ‘W’ show elapsed time in weeks since the start of instruction, in each study; the first column shows the sequence of samples over time across all studies. Emergence order is broadly similar in all studies, forming 5 rough groups, as shown by the horizontal lines. In all studies, all the structures above a given line emerged before all the structures below that line. This shows that there is some consistency in the order in which nominal structures emerge in the spontaneous speech of learners. However, only the solid lines (top and bottom) correspond neatly to stage boundaries in PT; the dotted lines do not. Moreover, only one study (Charters 2005) captured evidence of Stage 1 nominal structures, so it is really only the last of PT’s stages, associated with the emergence of Relative Clauses (RCs) that is clearly attested in this data.

5 Problems for PT Most significantly, though structures from the first 10 weeks largely belong to PT’s Stage 2, numeric expressions with classifiers, emerge at that time too. Assuming these involve information exchange to match the classifier and the noun, they should be Stage 3 structures. This could simply mean the sampling did not capture the precise time at which the learners moved from Stage 2 to Stage 3. However a number of other structures classified as Stage 2 continue to emerge gradually over the subsequent 20 weeks. Similarly, while the Stage 4 structure Adv-first emerged between weeks 11 and 17, at the same time as the Stage 3 numeric structure, the Stage 4 Topic structure did not emerge till after week 21, the same period over which Stage 2 structures continued to emerge. This means if Zhang’s allocation of Mandarin structures to developmental stages is correct, PT’s stages 2, 3 and 4 cannot be clearly differentiated in this data. The only point clearly consistent with PT is the fact that the Stage 5 RC structure emerged either late or not at all, in all studies. This overlapping of stages is also apparent in the data from just one study. For example, in Zhang’s data, the numeric expression (stage 3) emerged 3 weeks before Locative ‘de’ (Stage 2) and 12 weeks before aspect marking on V (V-guo) (Stage 2). Despite this, Zhang concluded that the data do support PT on the basis that no structure emerged until at least one structure at an earlier stage had emerged. While this is true, it does not provide strong support for the rationale behind PT’s approach, which assumes that processing capacity develops across

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the system as each lexical category gains access first to a related phrasal procedure, and then, via that procedure, to the sentence procedure. Of particular note, Table 2 shows that Locative de structures, while superficially analogous to other de(Att) structures (and included as such by Zhang and Gao) emerged very late in Charters’ and Gao’s study, just prior to RC structures, or ungrammatical attempts at them (*RC). In the next section I suggest that this is a reflection of the more complex syntactic relations encoded by Locative structures. I argue that the assessment of processing demands made within PT, while paying due attention to information exchange associated with agreement processes expressed through inflectional morphology, and the processing demands thereof, do not take sufficient account of the exchanges of information associated with creating syntactic relationships, like complementation, thematic linking and Subjecthood, expressed through collocation or word order. When these are taken into account, as in the theory of Emergent Functional Grammar, proposed below, more of the observed emergence order can be explained.

6 Emergent Functional Grammar (EFG) Like PT and many other theories of SLA, Emergent Functional Grammar (EFG) assumes that processing in the early stages of SLA is largely semantically and pragmatically determined, and like PT, EFG adopts Levelt’s model of lexical access and Kempen and Hoenkamp’s procedural grammar model to account for the production of early utterances. Also like PT, it seeks to clarify the order in which specific syntactic processing capacities emerge. Where EFG differs significantly from PT is in implementing some key ideas from these theories, and from LFG, that PT largely overlooks. The relevant processes in EFG are presented in Table 3, in the order they are thought to develop, with the earliest at the top. These are discussed in more detail below. As the table illustrates, language processing develops gradually, from a system grounded exclusively in semantics and pragmatics, to one that becomes increasingly dependent on abstract syntactic constructs; each phase is marked by the development of a different type of processing, and crucially the later types allow greater flexibility in the relations between functional structure and constituent structure, including greater linear distances between functionally related items, but do so only through the involvement of more complex processing.

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A. The Pre-syntactic phase: 1. Semantic activation of individual word-forms by concepts; (cf PT’s stage 1); 2. Topic-Comment structure: Assignment of a Topic Function to a salient unit 3. Co-activation: compounds and semantic agreement B. The Local Syntax Phase: 4. Feature unification (cf PT’s stage 3) (syntactic agreement) 5. The Adjunct Function C. The Long-distance Syntax Phase: 6. Assignment of Argument Functions (Subject, Object etc). 7. Functional control: Linking Grammatical Functions Table 3: Phases in the emergence of syntactic processing

6.1 From semantic activation to a topic function Semantic activation is the most basic of the cognitive processes that underlie language use. It is the process proposed by Levelt (1989) where thinking of certain conventionally lexicalized concepts causes the grammatical and phonetic representations associated with those concepts to become activated in the cognitive system, and hence become available for linguistic processing. It is essentially a mechanism of retrieving lexical items appropriate to an active idea. However, even in early utterances, there are regularities in word order that cannot be explained simply by reference to semantic roles. PT suggests this regularity arises in response to two principles: the Topic Hypothesis (Pienemann et al, 2005) suggests that the default Topic, universally, is the grammatical Subject, and the Unmarked Alignment hypothesis of LFG suggests that the grammatical Subject is always assigned the first position in an utterance. Unfortunately, these proposals do not resolve the problem of how early learners can process the functions of Topic and Subject. Even if we accept the default alignments, of functions and of position, LFG requires the Topic Function to be licensed, by formal linking with a grammatical function (GF), such as the Subject GF, and requires the Subject GF to be licensed by comparing it to Functions introduced by a predicate. Both processes require an information exchange in an abstract representation of the sentence that we can understand as the rough functional equivalent of the sentence-procedure in a procedural grammar. In other words, to make the Subject formally into the default Topic and to make an NP formally into a Subject requires a process that PT identifies as a process of the fourth developmental stage. Does this mean that all the complex paraphernalia of GF assignment must be mastered in the early stages, before propositional utterances can be produced? Clearly, such a claim would

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radically undermine the rationale on which PT and EFG are based: that complex processing is beyond the capacity of early learners. At this point, EFG departs significantly from PT and from LFG. I propose that, far from being dependent on GFs, the Topic Function is actually the first Function to emerge as an ordering principle in early language processing. This does not mean that LFG is wrong about the nature of the relationship between Topics and GFs in a mature fully syntactic system. Rather, what I am proposing is that learners, as a matter of course, do not have a mature fully syntactic system, but they do have access to a cognitively grounded notion of topicality: of what is relevant to a given moment in discourse, and of what is likely to be familiar to the addressees and what is likely to be new or of interest. (For further discussion of such assumptions see Chafe 1976; Sperber and Wilson, 1986; Dubois 1987). Therefore in describing the early pre-syntactic processing system of learners, we should make reference to these notions, but accept that they are processed, and function in ways that depart from the norm for a fully-developed grammatical system. I propose we do this by assuming that the Topic function is assigned automatically, to the first nominal constituent that reaches an output procedure, by a process comparable to co-activation, described in Section 6.2 below. Explicitly, I suggest that the procedure which feeds the articulatory system activates positions in the linear sequence of sounds to be pronounced, and by default, delivers the first nominal constituent it receives to the earliest position to be pronounced. It stands to reason that the first nominal constituent to be processed will be that which is most easily activated, and this will be the one that is most conceptually salient, or relevant in a given context. This is roughly, the definition of a Topic (See Givon 1983 for a definition of Topic based on continuity in discourse, and Lambrecht 1987 for a more theoretically grounded definition). In fact, Kempen and Hoenkamp (1987), and later Pienemann (1998), make much the same suggestion. The error in PT is in trying to reframe this notion into the formal architecture of LFG, since that brings with it a substantial amount of procedural baggage that cannot be accommodated in the learner’s system at this point. The key then is that in these early stages, the pragmatic discourse function of Topic is not a grammaticalized discourse function as the formal DFs of LFG are said to be; it is a primitive function directly grounded in activation states of information in the speaker’s cognitive representations, detached from any abstract syntactic notions. There is thus no requirement in EFG, as there is in PT and LFG, that the Topic DF be linked to a GF. This makes the processing of a Topic ‘function’ comparable to the simple activation of lexical forms by semantic concepts, the difference being that topical

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concepts relate to pragmatics, that is awareness of the discourse context, rather than awareness of the basic semantic message.

6.2 Co-activation 6.2.1 Compounding A similar issue arises with compounds like hūbian ‘lake-side’ where one element of the compound (bian ‘side’) is a relational term, and the other appears to fill a grammatical function associated with it, in this case that of its complement. But again, this is to assume that lexical items in early stages of acquisition express the same abstract syntactic features as those in a fully developed system. It is simpler to assume that predicates in early systems express only semantic roles, in this case a role we might call ‘reference point’, and that the appropriate forms are activated directly by concepts associated with the word’s core semantic denotation. This leaves the question of how the two elements in such compounds come to be structurally combined. I suggest this occurs within a categorial procedure. Note that both elements of this compound are nouns, so both will seek to activate the N-procedure. The closer the conceptual relationship between the two nouns, the greater the chance they will activate that N-procedure at the same time. The N-procedure must then determine which of the two is to be the head, presumably by checking their semantic content, and if one (a predicate) identifies a relevant role for the other (the reference point) this would be a good semantic basis on which to make it the head. The categorial procedure can then order the two forms accordingly. This explicitly places compounding within the second stage of development, after Categorial procedures have developed. Information exchange is involved, but it is the exchange of semantic information, and it takes place at the lowest level of syntactic processing, closest to conceptual structure. This is one manifestation of a process I call co-activation, where structural and semantic relationships are formed between lemmas because they are activated by closely related concepts at the same time. The same process can help to explain early examples of agreement in simple phrasal constructions.

6.2.2 Simple phrase-construction On some occasions, two lemmas of different types may be activated at the same time by partly overlapping concepts, for example, a concept for a concrete

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object may overlap with and so be activated along with concepts of size, shape or other salient attributes of that object. If the two lemmas happen to express a feature relating to that area of conceptual overlap – size or shape etc, then they will necessarily express compatible values for that feature; they will agree. This is another example of co-activation. Rather than two lemmas simultaneously activating 1 categorial procedure, as in compounding, we have related, agreeing concepts directly activating independent lemmas, each with their own categorial procedure. For example, an object concept will activate a noun lemma, while a related attribute concept may activate a classifier lemma. As these lemmas each activate different categorial procedures, they will not necessarily form a compound; they may be combined in a higher-level procedure, minimally a phrasal procedure. When they do combine, no information exchange is required to check or transfer feature values; the noun and classifier necessarily agree because they have been selected in direct response to the same conceptual content. Co-activation contrasts with ‘unification’ which is the syntactic process by which LFG and hence PT assumes all agreement takes place (see below). However it is perfectly compatible with Levelt’s model of lexical access to which PT refers. The idea of agreement without unification also finds empirical support from observations of ‘semantic agreement’ in languages like Spanish (Vigliocci et al. 1996) and Russian (Corbett 2006), where words can agree with either the semantic gender or number of a source word, or with its syntactic gender or number. Vigliocci et al (1996) suggest that in Spanish, semantic agreement can occur because, as a pro-drop language, Spanish allows a verb to directly access a conceptual representation of the participants in the event it denotes; since the representation is conceptual, it does not include the specification of grammatical feature values encoded in specific lexical items. So, this process too circumvents the need for unification, and this explains why syntactic ‘disagreement’ can arise even in processing by fully competent adult native speakers, when semantic agreement takes precedence.

6.3 Feature unification In unification, a source lemma activated by a concept expresses a value that must be matched by values of a target lemma. The target lemma is linked to a set of word-forms, each with a different value for the relevant feature, but it is not connected to the same concept as the source lemma. So, the appropriate form of the target lemma can only be selected after the two lemmas are linked in a phrasal or sentence procedure. This means the target’s categorial procedure cannot conclude and the feature value of the source must be stored in the

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syntactic processor until the two lemmas can be linked, and it is this delay and storage that contributes significant processing demands. Co-activation does not involve any of this. It may not always be easy to determine when agreement arises through coactivation and when it arises through unification. One possible indication though is whether the feature for which the words agree is closely related conceptually to the primary meaning of both words, as in classifier-noun agreement, or of only one, as in Subject Verb agreement. Clearly agreement in values that depart from natural semantic values for one or more of the items can only be through unification. The idea that semantic processing precedes syntactic processing continues to have an impact throughout acquisition. Charters (2005) observed that in her data, unmarked combinations of words in a specific semantic relationship always emerged before the comparable structure marked by the function word de. That is, the affine structure emerged before possessive N de N (de Gen); the Adj-N structure emerged before Adj de N (de Adj), and the locative compound and incorporated locative emerged before locative de structures (a sub-type of de (Att) in Zhang’s (2001) typology). The discussion of co-activation above includes the idea that two content words can combine in a phrase with semantic factors determining their order and interpretation without recourse to abstract functions or procedures. This helps explain why the affine structure, which combines two nominal heads in a relationship loosely defined as “kinship”, emerges before the more generic relationship referred to as “possession” which is morphologically marked by a functional morph de and which actually encompasses a wide range of associations. However, it is an aim of Emergent Functional Grammar to clarify how learners move from a fundamentally pragmatic system to a more syntactic system. I suggest that in the acquisition of Mandarin nominals, it is the function word de that gradually brings abstract syntactic functions into play which require unification, or information exchange, minimally within a phrasal procedure, and sometimes in a higher order procedure. To understand how de impacts on processing and acquisition we need to review a few more key points from the theory of function assignment.

6.4 Assignment of the adjunct function LFG distinguishes between Grammatical Functions (GFs) and grammaticalized Discourse Functions (DFs). The Grammatical Functions are Subject, Object, Object θ (e.g. Indirect Object NP) Oblique (e.g. Prepositional complement, or Indirect Object PP), collectively called Argument functions, and the Adjunct function;

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the grammaticalized discourse functions are the TOPIC – loosely what the proposition is about – FOCUS – information that is new or unknown, either to the speaker (as in a question) or to the addressee (as in contrastive focus, emphasis etc), and the Subject (as the default topic). The purpose of functions in a theory of grammar is to allow or explain how constituents that have no semantic similarities can create identical pragmatic or syntactic effects. These effects include things like occupying a specific location, triggering agreement on certain other constituents, allowing omission, or controlling the interpretation of an omitted element etc. The assumption is that constituents that produce identical pragmatic or syntactic effects have the same DF or GF, respectively, even if their semantics differ significantly. We saw above that formal licensing of a Subject or Topic function entails advanced processing capacity. However, assignment of an Adjunct function is not quite so demanding. The Adjunct GF is licensed simply by being contained in a structure that has meaning. In terms consistent with an incremental procedural grammar, this means a constituent (say a pronoun, like wǒ ‘I’ or a word like dà ‘big’) can have the function of Adjunct as long as it has been sent to a procedure that contains a head word with semantic content (such as a content word like māma ‘mother’ or shù ‘tree’), not a function word like de, that has no such content. For the procedural grammar, ascertaining that a word is contained within a meaningful constituent requires a search for semantic content, formalized in LFG as a feature called PRED, for ‘predicate’, within the syntactic processor. In other words, when optional modifiers emerge in phrases, this indicates that semantic information is being used, for the first time, to license an abstract grammatical function (GF) called ‘Adjunct’ that can be freely associated with a range of semantic meanings and roles.

6.5 Assignment of argument functions (Subject, Object etc) Later the semantic roles introduced by a predicate are themselves replaced by more abstract grammatical functions, Subject and Object. The use of these abstract functions allows the NPs denoting entities that fill a certain semantic role to appear in a range of locations in the sentence and still be linked back to the appropriate predicate. However, to implement this linking of an NP to a GF and hence to a role, the grammar must check that the function assigned to each NP matches one introduced by a predicate. This is more demanding than simply checking for semantic content, which is all that is required to license adjuncts. Formal Topic fronting structures involve this kind of GF assignment, because the grammar requires that the topic function be linked to a syntactic function like Subject or Object.

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The inclusion of DFs and GFs in any grammar significantly frees up the relationships between sentence structure and semantics. But for this very reason, their use must be licensed in a way that allows the connections between functions and semantic roles, and so between events and participants, to be reconstructed. We noted above that for the Subject function to be licensed it must be compared to functions introduced by a predicate. More specifically, any Argument Function can be licensed by being contained in a structure that also contains a predicate, as long as that predicate includes a reference to the same Argument Function in its lexical structure. These mentions would be found within the feature called PRED, whose value represents the meaning of a word. For example, the lexical entry for a verbal predicate like tī ‘kick’ contains the feature: [PRED: ‘kick ’], and this allows the verb to license the use of a Subject and an Object, as in (1): (1) wǒ I SUBJ

tī zúqiú play football OBJ

The observant reader may have noticed that, in fact, only the Object in (1) is immediately contained in the VP, which suggests the Subject function is not properly licensed. However a fundamental premise of LFG is that unification and the licensing of GFs occurs not in the hierarchical c-structures that represent spoken constituent order, but in a more abstract representation of functional relationships, called f-structure. In f-structure the verb is recognized as the head of the sentence, and so VP and the sentence, S are functionally equivalent. Because of this both the Subject and the Object are contained in the f-structure of VP, which is, at the same time, the f-structure of S: VP PRED: ‘kick ’ S

SUBJ [PRED ‘PRO’ Person 1st Num Sg] OBJ [PRED ‘zúqiú’]

In procedural terms however, licensing of a complement function such as an Object can take place in the phrasal procedure of the predicate, in this case in the VP procedure, while licensing of the Subject function can only take place in the Sentence procedure, because that is where the constituent with the SUBJ GF label first becomes accessible to the verb. This delay in licensing of a SUBJ GF means it should be more demanding than licensing of an OBJ GF.

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It is also important to realize that the presence of GFs in the lexical entry for a predicate does not simply allow those GFs to appear, it requires them to be supplied. This means GF assignment requires information exchange in two directions: each GF mentioned by a predicate must be matched to one linked to a constituent; conversely each GF assigned to a constituent must be matched to one mentioned in the PRED value of a predicate. In addition, each constituent that has a GF must be checked to ensure it has semantic content. Clearly this involves considerably more information exchange and time delays than licensing an adjunct function. This is the most straightforward way in which Arguments functions can be licensed. On occasions though, a constituent required by a predicate is not available in its own f-structure. In that case there is the option of linking or equating that GF with the GF assigned by another predicate. We’ll return to this when we consider relative clauses.

6.6 ‘De’ as a functional head Turning back now to the impact of the function word de, my proposal is that, in the course of SLA, de develops in the learners’ grammars from a semantic suffix marking possession, into a functional head that introduces a DF (specifier) which fills an Adjunct function in NP. The semantic marker of possession is added in the categorial procedure of pronouns (early possessive structures all have a pronominal possessor), and later in the categorial procedure of other nouns (the structures that are ‘ambiguous’ between de GEN and de ATT). However, as the learner discovers that de appears in more contexts than can be included under the semantic label of possession, they seek to replace its semantic value with a more open, variable label that can be linked to a range of semantic roles, that is, a grammatical function label. In doing so, they are obliged to accommodate de in their syntactic system, as a functional head that heads its own categorial procedure, and introduces a function for the word it follows, rather than as an affix dependent on the categorial procedure of that word. And with this change comes the possibility that de can activate a phrasal procedure as well as a categorial one, and so comes to follow not just a pronoun or noun, but a phrase of any kind that can serve the function it introduces. I suggest the function introduced by de is that of Specifier, and that Specifier is in fact a grammaticalized Discourse Function associated primarily with nominal structures, one not recognized explicitly as such in LFG. My reason for proposing this is that in sentence structure, the Topic DF refers to the participant about

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which further information is to be given, while in nominal structure, the Specifier DF serves to identify that referent, the topic, as the noun following de. It does this by associating that noun with a more familiar or retrievable referent, an anchor, that the Specifier itself refers to. Thus the use of a constituent preceding de is directly related to establishing the discourse function of Topicality, not to any grammatical function. Furthermore, I suggest the formal licensing of the Specifier DF should emerge at the same time as successful licensing of an Adjunct function, and shortly after semantic licensing in phrasal structures, because the early process of assigning any DF simply requires that it is linked to the first constituent to arrive in a given procedure, and that constituent is naturally, the most accessible constituent In other words, where Adjunct is the easiest GF to license because it only needs to be contained in a meaningful structure, the Specifier’s function as an anchor is the easiest to process because it goes to the NP whose referent is most accessible. The formal process of licensing a DF on the other hand, requires it be linked to a GF that is itself licensed by matching to one introduced by a predicate. This similarity in the processing demands of the Specifier and Adjunct functions explains why soon after a category appears as a semantic modifier of N, the same category appears as Specifier of de, and Adjunct of N, in a less restricted range of semantic roles.

6.7 Functional control: Linking grammatical functions The last syntactic process to develop is the linking of functions assigned by two different predicates, as in RCs. This occurs when a constituent is not found in the f-structural location where it is normally located. When that occurs, the procedure that is lacking a constituent must communicate with other procedures, either those to which it delivers its contents, or those from which its contents were received, until it finds a GF associated with a meaningful constituent to which the unsatisfied GF can be linked. The result is a single constituent serving GFs for two predicates, as in a relative clause. This linking of two GFs entails all of the processes described above for basic assignment of an argument GF as well as the additional searching and linking of GFs. It is therefore the most complex of all. I suggest the same process is involved in the construction of the locative de structure. In these structures, the locative predicate introduces a complement function which is linked to the semantic role of reference point. However the reference point is not realized as the immediate complement of the locative, in the way it is in an incorporated locative like [[COMP shù] hòubian] ([behind

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[COMP the tree]]); instead it is linked to the specifier function of de: [ADJ [SPEC shù] de] [COMP t] hòubian]. This requires both the Specifier DF and the Adjunct GF to be licensed through feature checking in syntax. Unlike PT then, EFG predicts that, even in the absence of morphological agreement between a verb and its subject, the very process of assigning a Subject GF is cognitively more demanding than the process of assigning a complement GF. Moreover, the licensing of any argument function is more costly than the licensing of an Adjunct function, since the latter requires the presence of a PRED feature, but places no limits on the content of the PRED feature’s value. This means less information needs to be exchanged, and over a shorter syntactic distance than in licensing an argument function. Finally, processing of semantic relationships is held to be less demanding still, since it is directly supported by activation from conceptual structure, without recourse to retrieving abstract feature values from syntactic procedures. Let’s see then how well this model accounts for the emergence orders for MSL presented in Table 2 above.

7 EFG account of MSL Table 4 represents an analysis of the data from Table 2 in the EFG framework. The labels across the top indicate the specific syntactic processes described above, as they emerge (from left to right). Structures appear in the column below the most demanding process they involve, they are also in order of emergence, from top to bottom. The week in which they were observed is shown in column 1. It should be clear from Table 4 that the gradual emergence of syntactic processes of increasing complexity, as proposed in EFG provides a reasonable account of the emergence order of the nominal structures of Mandarin. Its ability to account for more of the variation than a PT account rests on the manner in which it employs semantic and pragmatic processing, implemented according to Levelt’s model of lexical access, in the early pre-syntactic phase of development, the attention it pays to the gradual increase in hierarchical structure, creating greater distances across which information must be unified, and the fine-grained distinctions in processing demands associated with local unification of features, licensing of DFs and the Adjunct function, licensing of argument functions, and managing long distance dependencies. This analysis demonstrates that principles of universal grammar developed with reference to a number of typologically distinct languages, can be applied

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Semantic Activation

co-activation

Unification / Adjunct Function

Argument Function

Functional Control

wk 7

N, Pron Poss 0, Pron-de

10

Num-Class 1

11

‘Adj’-N Num-Class 2

12

ADV-First

13

de (ATT/ADJ)

16

Dem-Class

Locative compound

25

Top Loc de

29

Ba RC LOCAL

PRE-SYNTACTIC

LONGDISTANCE

SYNTACTIC

Table 4: Application of EFG to MSL data

effectively to account for acquisition order of nominal structures in an isolating Sinitic language like Mandarin. In further research, it would be informative to consider how well EFG can account for the emergence order of optional modifiers, functional heads in sentential structures.

References Bresnan, Joan (ed.). 1982. The Mental Representation of Grammatical Relations. Cambridge, Massachusetts/London, England: MIT Press. Bresnan, Joan. 2001. Lexical Functional Syntax: Blackwell Textbooks in Linguistics. Malden, Mass: Blackwell. Chafe, Wallace. 1976. Givenness, contrastiveness, definiteness, subjects, topics, and point of view. In Subject and Topic, Charles N. Li (ed.), 25–55. New York: Academic Press.

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Charters, A. Helen. 2004a. Functional uncertainty in the Mandarin nominal: A unified analysis of relative clauses and locative structures. In Proceedings of the LFG04 Conference, Tracey Holloway-King and Miriam Butt (eds.), Canterbury, NZ. CSLI Publications, http://cslipublications.stanford.edu/hand/miscpubsonline.html (29 August 2011). Charters, A. Helen. 2004b. ‘Processing Grammatical Functions in Mandarin Locative Structures’. Paper presented at the Australian Linguistic Society Conference, University of Sydney, 13–15 July. Charters, A. Helen. 2005. The Second Language Acquisition of Mandarin Nominal Syntax. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Auckland. Corbett, Greville. 2006. Agreement. Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Di Biase, Bruno and Kawaguchi, Satomi. 2002. Exploring the typological plausibility of Processability Theory: language development in Italian second language and Japanese second language. Second Language Research 18: 274–302. Dubois, John. 1987. The discourse basis of ergativity. Language 63: 805–855. Gao, Xiaodan. 2009. Noun Phrase Morphemes and Topic Development In L2 Mandarin Chinese: A Processability Perspective. Saarbrücken: Lambert Academic Publishers. Givon, Talmy. 1983. Topic Continuity in Discourse. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Kempen, Gerard and Hoenkamp, E. 1987. An incremental procedural grammar for sentence formulation. Cognitive Science 11, 201–258. Lambrecht, Knud. 1987. Sentence focus, information structure and the thetic-categorial distinction. Paper presented at Proceedings of the 13th annual meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society. Levelt, Willem J. M. 1989. Speaking. From intention to articulation. Cambridge MA: MIT Press. Li, Charles N. and Thompson, Sandra. 1981. Mandarin Chinese. A functional reference grammar. Berkeley/Los Angeles/London: University of California Press. Pienemann, Manfred. 1998. Language Processing and Second Language Development: Processability Theory. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Pienemann, Manfred (ed.). 2005. Cross-linguistic aspects of processability theory. Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Pienemann, Manfred, Di Biase, Bruno and Kawaguchi, Satomi. 2005. Extending Processability Theory. In Cross-linguistic aspects of processability theory, Manfred Pienemann (ed.), 199–251. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Pienemann, Manfred and Hakansson, Gisela. 1999. A Unified Approach toward the Development of Swedish as L2: A Processability Account. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 21, 383–420. Pienemann, Manfred and Mackey, A. 1993. An empirical study of children’s ESL development and Rapid profile. In ESL development: Language and Literacy in schools, P. McKay (ed.), 115–259. Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia and National Languages and Literacy Institute of Australia. Qian, X. 1997. Riben liúxuéshéng Hànyu qùxiàng buyu de xidé shùnxu [The order of acquisition of Chinese directional complements by Japanese students (in China)]. Shìjiè Hànyu jiàoxué [World Chinese Language Teaching] 39: 94–101. Shi, J. 1998. Wàiguó liúxuésheng 22 lèi xiàndài Hànyu jùshı ̀ de xide shùnxu yánjiu [Research on the acquisition order of 22 modern Chinese sentence structures by foreign students in China]. Shìjiè Hànyu jiàoxué [World Chinese language teaching] 46: 77–98.

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Sperber, Dan and Wilson, Dierdre. 1986. Relevance: Communication and Cognition. Harvard University Press. Sun, D. 1993. Wàiguó xuésheng xiàndài Hànyu “le” de xidé guòchéng chu bù fenxi [A preliminary analysis of the acquisition of Mandarin “le” by foreign students]. Yuyán jiàoxué yú yánjiu [Language teaching and research] 2: 65–75. Sun, D. 1999. Wàiguó xuésheng Hànyu ti biaoji “le” “zhe” “guo” xidé qingkuàng de kaochá [Investigation of the acquisition of Chinese aspect markers “le” “zhe” and “guo” by foreign students]. In Beijing yuyán wénhuà dàxué lùnwén huibiàn [Collected studies of the Beijing University of Language and Culture]. Beijing: Beijing University of Language and Culture Research Office. Vigliocco Gabriella, Butterworth, Brian and Garrett, Merrill F. 1996. Subject-verb agreement in Spanish and English: Differences in the role of conceptual constraints. Cognition 61: 261–298. Wang, J. 1997. “Bù” hé “mei” foudı ̀ng jiegòu de xidé guòchéng [The acquisition of “bu” and “mei” negation]. Shìjiè Hànyu jiàoxué [World Chinese language teaching] 3: 92–100. Wen, Xiaohong. 1995. Second Language Acquisition of the Chinese Particle le. International Journal of Applied Linguistics 5, 45–62. Wen, Xiaohong. 1997. Acquisition of Chinese Aspect: An Analysis of the Interlanguage of Learners of Chinese as a Foreign Language. ITL, Review of Applied Linguistics 117–118, 1–26. Wen, Z. 1998. Biao shùxı ́ng fànchóu de “N1 (de) N2” jiegòu de yı ̀yı ̀ fenxi [The semantic analysis of possessive “N1 de N2” structures]. Shìjiè Hànyu jiàoxué [World Chinese language teaching] 43: 34–39. Wen, Zhen-Hui. 1999. “N1 (de) N2” piànzheng jiegòu zhong N1 yú N2 zhījiàn yu yı ̀ guanxı de jiandı ̀ng [The identification of the semantic relationships between N1 and N2 in the “N1 (de) N2” structure]. Yuwén Yánjiū [Chinese Language Research] 72: 22–27. Zhang, Yanyin. 2001. Second language acquisition of Chinese grammatical morphemes: a processability perspective. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Australian National University.

Index achievement 36, 71, 84, 154, 155, 160, 162, 163, 170 acquisition 1–4, 9, 10, 19, 29–31, 66, 67, 69, 82, 111, 115, 144, 146, 162, 166, 167, 185, 187–191, 193, 195, 197, 199, 201, 203, 205–213, 215, 217, 219, 221–225, 227–229, 231, 233, 234, 255, 257, 259– 261, 270, 272, 278–280 acquisitional pattern 207, 208 activation 123, 124, 260, 268, 269–272, 277, 278 Assumed Common Ground Theory 116, 122, asymmetrical style 2, 33, 35, 37, 39, 41, 43, 45, 47, 49, 51, 53, 55, 57, 59, 61, 63 asymmetries 2, 33 categorization 235, 236, 242, 243, 244, 250 CFL classroom 81, 83, 85, 87, 89, 91, 93, 95, 97, 99, 101, 103, 105, 107, 109, 111, 113, 171 Chinese acquisition 187 Chinese as a second language 1–4, 11, 13, 23, 30, 56, 67, 143, 147, 187, 209, 213 Chinese cultural marker (CCM), 117–121, 123, 124, 125, 127, 128, 133, 137–139, 141 Chinese culture 3, 61, 81, 86, 87, 89–94, 96, 98–100, 103, 104, 109, 115, 117– 121, 123, 125, 131, 133, 136, 141, 142, 172, 175, 177, 178, 181 cognitive process 65, 66, 69, 122, 129, 131, 133, 139, 140 common ground 3, 115, 116, 122–126, 129, 131–133, 135–137, 140, 142, 170, 182, 243 communication 1–5, 14, 21, 29, 30, 33–35, 37, 39, 41, 43, 45, 47, 49, 51, 53, 55–65, 73, 82, 85, 103, 108, 110–113, 116, 117, 122, 123, 129, 131, 133–135, 137, 138, 141, 143–147, 149, 151, 153–159, 161– 168, 170, 171, 181–183, 280 context 2, 3, 5, 13, 16, 29, 31, 33, 34, 36, 37–39, 43, 45, 47, 58, 61, 63, 111, 115– 118, 120–123, 134, 141, 144, 145, 165, 166, 169, 170, 172, 175, 178, 179, 181, 182, 193, 196, 199, 200, 203, 208–211,

218, 219, 223, 230, 245, 262, 263, 269, 270 contour 10, 16, 19, 23, 24, 26, 146, 151, 156, 158, 163, 165 conversational ground rules 170 Cooperative Learning 70, 71, 72, 74, 76 Cooperative Principle 122 CSL classroom 1, 2, 65, 67, 69, 71, 73, 75, 77, 143, 147, 153, 154, 156, 157, 164, 165 cultural knowledge 2, 3, 108, 169, 171, 173, 175, 177–179, 181–183 cultural marker 123, 125, 128, 129, 131 culture 1–5, 13, 14, 31, 34, 35, 38, 44, 56– 63, 79, 81–115, 117–123, 125, 126, 131, 133, 136, 137, 141, 142, 169–172, 174, 175, 177–183, 255, 280 culture component 82, 84, 109 culture-bound 85, 117, 121 de particle 96, 99, 217, 259 definition of culture 82–84, 96, 98, 100, 104, 105 developmental stages 212, 261, 262, 266 discourse marker 115, 119, 120, 142 duration 12, 19, 23, 148, 209 dynamic model of meaning (DMM) 122 embodiment 235, 242, 243, 249 emergence 2, 4, 31, 124, 133, 190, 191, 193, 195, 199, 206, 211, 257–262, 264–266, 268, 277, 278 emergence order 2, 4, 257, 260, 264, 266, 277, 278 emergent functional grammar 257, 258, 267, 272 epistemic modals 241 errors 10, 19, 20–22, 26, 59, 158, 159, 163, 189, 190, 212, 213, 217, 219–221, 223– 226, 228–231 future grams 240, 241, 243, 248, 250, 251 general discourse marker (GDM) 117, 120, 121, 135

282

Index

gesture 5, 14, 15, 26, 29, 30, 31, 42, 51, 143– 146, 150, 152, 153, 158, 163, 165, 167, 168 grammatical function 191, 268, 270, 273, 275, 276 grammaticalization 4, 235, 236, 241–245, 248–250, 254, 255 group work 71, 72 high status 35, 36, 39, 50, 55 high-context culture 8, 33, 34, 38, 58, 61 iconicity 235, 236, 248, 250 incorporated locatives 265 inferencing 244–246, 249, 255 information exchange 261, 263, 265, 266, 270, 272, 275 institutional talk 33, 63 intake and assimilation 66, 69 intention 3, 115, 116, 118, 122–126, 128–131, 133–135, 137–141, 180, 235, 237, 238, 241, 243–248, 250, 279 interactional goals 43 interlocutor dependent uses 192, 196–198, 205–207, 209–211 interlocutor independent uses 187, 192, 196, 199, 200, 203, 205, 207, 209– 211 intonation 12–14, 18, 19, 23, 26, 30, 200 intrinsic motivation 73 kinesic 12–15, 25, 29, 167 language and culture 4, 5, 57, 82, 83, 86, 88, 89, 94, 105, 107, 110, 111, 142, 255, 280 language development 14, 187–190, 209, 212, 213, 279 language learning 2, 4, 11, 13, 16, 26, 30, 77, 81, 83, 86, 102, 106, 109, 110, 112, 113, 143, 144, 146, 159, 164, 165, 167, 168, 213, 233 learner centered 145 learner errors 19, 217, 220 learning by teaching 70–72, 74, 76, 77 learning culture 92–94, 112

learning strategy 166 lexical functional grammar 257, 261 listening 4, 10, 23–26, 28, 47, 72, 87, 133, 146, 167, 171, 188, 221, 222, 232 low status 35, 36, 39, 55, 56, 137 low-context cultures 2, 33 Mandarin SLA 4, 257, 260 meaning 12, 16, 18, 22, 23, 26, 58, 59, 66, 67, 73, 74, 77, 84, 85, 90, 105, 107, 109, 115–122, 124, 125, 129–131, 139, 141, 142, 144–146, 154, 163, 165, 167, 169, 187, 189, 191, 193, 195, 196, 203, 204, 207–212, 228–230, 241–243, 245, 246, 248, 255, 272–274 metonymization 244, 245 modal auxiliary verb 187, 212 movie class 1, 3, 169, 171, 173, 175, 177, 179, 181–183 multilingual context 3, 143, 146, 158, 162, 164, 165 neng verb group 1, 3, 187–189, 191, 193– 195, 197, 199, 201, 203, 205, 207, 209, 211, 213 new common ground 3, 115, 122–125, 132, 133, 136 new intention 3, 115, 116, 122–131, 133 New Intention and New Common Ground Theory 3, 115, 122 nominal structures 4, 257, 258, 260, 263, 264, 266, 277, 278 non-tonal L1 69 nonverbal 2, 4, 5, 33, 34, 36, 39–42, 47, 49–51, 55, 56, 58, 60, 61, 63, 64, 143– 147, 154, 157, 162, 165–168 nonverbal dominance 49–51, 56, 60, 61 object relative clause 232 parallel corpus 235, 236 Pareto principle 251 pedagogy 3, 4, 10, 25, 26, 28, 65, 82–84, 86, 87, 109, 110, 112, 113, 143, 145, 147, 148, 150, 155, 164–166, 171, 183, 230, 235, 249

Index

perception 10, 13, 19, 20, 22, 24, 26, 28, 30, 95, 145, 147, 154, 163 phonological 9–11, 21, 22, 27, 146, 149, 164, 165 phonology 2, 3, 9, 167 phrasal stage 262, 263 pitch 10, 12, 13, 15–21, 23–26, 66–68, 146, 148, 149, 151, 155, 156, 158, 161, 163– 165 pitch entry 10, 16 pitch range 17, 19–21, 155, 161, 163, 164 power distance 2, 33, 34, 41, 44, 45, 60, 61 pragmatic function 124 procedural grammar 260, 267, 273, 279 Processability Theory 257, 260, 279 production 4, 10, 12–14, 16, 19, 20, 22, 24, 26, 28, 30, 31, 66–68, 145, 147, 155, 158, 160, 162–165, 187, 190, 192, 193, 198, 201, 202, 204, 210, 217, 219, 220, 228, 233, 261, 263, 264, 267 prosodic features 10, 12, 13, 19, 24, 31, 155 prosody 3, 12, 15, 23–25, 28, 30, 64, 143, 144, 167 prototypicality 235, 243, 244, 249 relativization structure 4, 228, 230 relevance 16, 101, 111, 115, 116, 141, 142, 235, 236, 247–250, 280 rhythm 12–15, 18, 20, 23, 24, 26, 28, 29, 31 rhythmic 14, 25, 30 Socio-Cognitive Approach 116, 122, 142 stage and phase 202 status 1, 2, 33–45, 47, 49, 50, 55, 56, 58, 61, 63, 98, 99, 120, 131, 134, 137, 201, 261 stress 12–14, 17–19, 24, 26, 46, 126, 144, 146, 149 stress timed 18

283

structure 3, 4, 14, 16, 23, 30, 44, 59, 70, 97, 120, 136, 142, 146, 164–166, 189, 191, 198, 206, 207, 210, 215, 218, 220–225, 228–231, 244–246, 248, 255, 258– 268, 270, 272–277, 279, 280 subject and object 217, 220, 222, 227, 231, 273 subject relative clause 216, 218, 232 symmetrical roles 133 synchronous 14, 146 synchrony 12, 14, 25, 26, 29, 145 talk-in-interaction 1, 2, 33–35, 37–39, 41, 43, 45, 47, 49, 51, 53, 55–57, 58–61, 63, 64 teacher-led classroom 72 teaching culture 3, 81–83, 85, 88, 89, 101, 105, 106, 110–112 tonal 3, 10, 14, 18–21, 23–25, 29–31, 65, 69, 72, 97, 143, 146–156, 158–160, 162–165 tone 9–11, 15–21, 24, 25, 30, 31, 39, 65–72, 74–77, 97, 99, 120, 121, 127, 128, 131– 133, 135, 139, 143–168 tone acquisition and production 66, 67 tone assimilation 66–69 tone intake 68 tone learning 65, 66, 68–72, 74–76 tone markers 3, 143–149, 151–165 tone teaching 76, 77 transactional goal 42, 43 268, 271, 272, 274, 277, 278 untranslatability 118 utterance 12, 18, 19, 23, 25, 30, 39, 47, 50, 115, 117, 140, 162, 169, 170, 196, 200, 204, 245, 268 verbal dominance 2, 33, 50, 51 vocalic 12–14, 25, 26 voice 13, 14, 25, 26, 29, 44, 55, 97, 99, 160