Abstracts of Papers in This Issue

s of Papers in This Issue

Cognitive linguistics should not concentrate only on the inside(p. 11)

NIUBaoyi(School of Foreign Languages, Henan University, Kaifeng 475001, China)

The present paper, based on the embodied “4E + S” model, recognizes cognition as a systematic event consisting of the interactions of mind, body, environment and culture. It argues that the development of cognitive linguistics should combine cognition with body, with environment and with culture. The study, on the basis of the cognitive analysis of linguistic expressions, indicates that the cognitive approach to the study of language should not only concentrate on the mental representation inside the head, but take sufficient consideration of the factors outside the head, such as body, environment and culture. The concentration on both inside and outside factors will surely broaden and deepen the study of cognitive linguistics.

A study on the models of monolingual and multilingual mental representation (p. 18)

JIAGuanjie(School of Foreign Languages, Soochow University, Suzhou 215006, China)

Mental representation is a form of knowledge in the brain, which is a category studied in cognitive psychology and psycholinguistics. The study of mental representation helps us to understand the relation between language and psychology as well as the relation between language and the brain. It also helps us to understand and explain how we produce and understand a language. This paper focuses on the development of mental representation, the models of mental representation and other related issues.

The syntactic projection of the semantic components of emotive verbs(p. 27)

ZHANGHong(School of Foreign Languages, Henan University, Kaifeng 475001, China)

There is a variety of emotive verbs in Russian, whose syntactic features are affected by their semantic components. The study of the effect of semantic appraisal on the syntactic collocation and the study of the syntactic projection of semantic components provide reference for emotive state and attitude verbs, facilitate the syntactic-semantic interface study and mirror the unique national world outlook of Russia.

“XingFu”(幸福) is not a Japanese Chinese word(p. 33)

SUNWen(School of Foreign Languages, Henan University, Kaifeng 475001,China)

The origin of Chinese and Japanese homographs is not only an important subject in the study of the history of Chinese vocabulary, but also an important content of contrastive studies of words in Chinese and Japanese and Sino Japanese cultural exchange history research. Not only contribute to the formation and evolution of the Chinese word understanding, also can provide theoretical support for the cross-cultural communication and two language teaching. From the case in Japanese and Chinese literature and word formation process of the “XingFu”，this paper thinks, “XingFu”is not a Japanese Chinese word, the origin of “XingFu” was a verb-object phrase in Chinese. It evolved gradually into a disyllabic words in the Ming Dynasty, because this phrase isn’t a typical verb-object structure. To a certain degree, outside interference promoted the process of lexicalization of “XingFu”.

An empirical study on the acquisition of English existential construction with expletives in the Chinese-English interlanguage grammar(p. 38)

MAZhigang(Center for Linguistics and Applied Linguistics，Guangdong University of Foreign Studies，Guangzhou 510420, China)

The L2 acquisitional extent of those grammatical phenomena involved in Englishthereexpletive constructions can serve as effective indicators to reveal whether the syntactic dependency in interlanguage grammar is established by way of resorting to linguistic hierarchy. The present study, based on the previous research, further investigates the L2 acquisition of syntactic constructions related to English expletivethere. Results show: Chinese EFL learners can generally acquire English expletive structures with low markedness, although they demonstrate acquisitional difficulty in identifying the source of relevant verbs’ unaccusativity. In addition, the two groups, whose L2 input differs in nature, perform significantly differently in terms of making judgment over expletive structures involving passivization and long-distance agreement. The present study proposes that in constructing an all-round interlanguage grammar theory, attention should be allocated not only to the structural differences between learners’ L1 and L2, but also to the external factors like the amount and frequency of the L2 input.

OnBa-sentences: A case study on the relationship between the object ofBaand the posterior Num-Cl NP(p. 49)

WANGTingting(Department of Chinese Language and Literature, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China)

The paper focuses on a typical sub-type ofba-sentences which has the characteristic that a numeral-classifier noun phrase is taken as the object of the following VP. It proposes that there are at least two semantic relations between the object ofbaand the posterior Num-Cl object which are Part-Whole relation and Identificational relation. The grammatical meaning of this sub-type ofba-sentences should be “source of effect +ba+ affected + action + object dominated”. Besides, there is another type ofba-sentences which should be taken differently from the perspective of structure. Compared with the former type of structure in which “ba NP” has a closer relationship with its predicate, this type of structure has a looser relationship between “ba NP VP” and the posterior Num-Cl NP. “Ba NP VP” as a whole and the Num-Cl NP constitute a topic-commt relationship.

Americanization of the gothic fiction: Reading the frontier narrative inTheLastoftheMohicans(p. 59)

CHENRong(Department of English, PLA University of Foreign Languages, Luoyang 471003, China)

James Fenimore Cooper is generally considered a writer uniquely American in his creation of the frontier myth, but conservatively British in art as he loves to borrow from the British genres. This is in fact a misunderstanding, especially when we investigate into his adaptation of the British popular genre of gothic fiction in hisTheLastoftheMohicans. In the novel, instead of strictly following the British conventions, he has the gothic genre innovatively Americanized in the aspects of setting, themes and characterization. It is he who transforms the British-born genre into an effective tool in expressing American experiences and re-examining the American national history.

“If you does well, shalt thou not be accepted?”: Johnson’s ethical admonitions to the black people inDreamer(p. 67)

CHENHouliang(School of Foreign Studies, Shandong University of Finance and Economics, Jinan 250014, China)

Among the works by contemporary African American novelist Charles Johnson,Dreameris the one that refers mostly closely to today’s social reality. Seemingly a biographical fiction about Martin Luther King, its real protagonist is Chayn Smith. Via such a fictional character based on Cain inTheBible, Johnson expresses his ethical admonitions towards the future of the black people. He wishes that people today could listen to Dr. King’s teachings and make nonviolence as a kind of basic principle of life. To Johnson, if only the black people could stop abandoning themselves to racial despair, eliminate hatred in their heart, and have the courage and will to do well, the black people would win hope and respect for their life.

“Logical games” inThroughtheLooking—Glass,andWhatAliceFoundThere(p. 73)

ZHANGJunping(School of Foreign Studies, Jiangnan University, Wuxi 214000, China)

SHIYanan(School of Foreign Studies, Jiangnan University, Wuxi 214000, China)

British mathematician, logician and philosopher Lewis Carroll’s children’s story,ThroughtheLooking—Glass,andWhatAliceFoundThere, presents interesting “l(fā)ogical games” in its situations, plots, as well as in characters’ languages and acts. Such “l(fā)ogical games” have two forms of expression: logical symmetries, including the symmetries in aspects of space, time and status, and logical paradox, containing logical absurdities, logical disarray, logical superposition and self-contradiction. In fact, both logical symmetries and logical paradox can be traced back to profound linguistic problems. This book is full of deep philosophy although it is coated with childlike charm.

Ideological maneuvering and dynamic reader positioning: A comparison of Dick Cheeney’s speech and its two Chinese versions from the perspective of appraisal theory(p. 78)

LIUZequan(School of Foreign Languages, Henan University, Kaifeng 475001, China)

LIUDingjia(School of Information Engineering, Yanshan University, Qinhuangdao 066004, China)

Adotping the Attitude system of the Appraisal Theory as a tool for a critical discourse analysis, this paper attempts to make a comparison of the two official Chinese translations of former US Vice President Dick Cheeny’s speech and his remarks in the following QA session on 15 April 2014 at Shanghai’s Fudan University. The study aims to find out how the translators were maneuvering their respective ideological control for the sake of dynamic reader positioning and what interpersonal strategies were exploited for their respective agenda. The study finds that a quantitative look at both the explicit and implicit Attitude resources in the source text and its two translations will not only illustrate how ideological manipulation was enacted by the speaker and the translators respectively via their choices of the mode of attitudinal evaluation. It will also shed light on the general picture of inter-subjective role of the speaker and the translators as well as their positioning of the reader’s point of view throughout the translation process.

On sense interpretation from the perspective of Fuzzy-trace Theory(p. 87)

ZOUDeyan(School of English Studies, Dalian University of Foreign Languages, Dalian 116044, China)

ZHANGHongyu(School of English Studies, Dalian University of Foreign Languages, Dalian 116044, China)

Fuzzy-trace Theory, the recent cognitive development, is the challenge towards traditional cognitive development theories, thus generating profound impact on the current academia of developmental psychology, as it explains plenty of anomalies that can’t be deciphered by classic cognitive development theories. Fuzzy-trace Theory takes dichotomous approach to information processing and memory, and it explicates fuzzy processing preference and output interference, which provides explanation to the process of sense interpretation during interpreting from the perspective of cognition. While enriching the advocates of the Interpretive Theory, Fuzzy-trace Theory offers theoretical support and explanation to factors of input, memory and output of the interpreting process from the perspective of cognitive psychology.

Howard Goldbaltt’s loyalty and treason to style: Based on the translation ofNotesofaDesolateMan(p. 92)

WANGWenqiang(Department of Public Courses, Bengbu Medical College, Bengbu 233030, China)

ZHENChanghui(Department of Public Courses, Bengbu Medical College, Bengbu 233030, China)

The unique writing style and the theme of the novel reached a perfect unity inNotesofaDesolateMan. Based on Howard Goldbaltt’s translation, the writer probed into the translator’s awareness of style. On one hand, he tries to show the different forms of language in translation to make the theme prominent. On the other hand, he also takes the readability into account, and makes the tokenization of the original novel standard. And the translation contributes much to Zhu Tianwen’s success in National Translation Award.

Good, better, best: Review of Munday’sIntroducingTranslationStudies(p. 99)

ZHAOZhimin(Department of Postgraduates, PLA University of Foreign Languages, Luoyang 471003, China)

IntroducingTranslationStudies:TheoriesandApplicationsis a coursebook written by the famous UK translation scholar Jeremy Munday for undergraduate and postgraduate translation studies. So far there have been three successive editions published respectively in 2001, 2008 and 2012. It is praised by Pym as “one of the best introductory works in the field”. This paper attempts to make a detailed evaluation of the third edition, with a focus on its improvement and deficiencies compared with the previous two editions, in the hope of gaining some insights for domestic translation studies.