Exploring China and East Asia - Research Paper Example

Exploring China and East Asia Table of Contents 1.0.Introduction 2 2.0.Review of the Literature 3 3.0.Discussion 5 4.0.Conclusion 11 5.0.Recommendations 12 6.0.References 12 1.0. Introduction Title of this research seems both too narrow and broad. On the one hand, Chinese dialects have been researched and found to be as diverse as Romance language (Bargiela‐Chiappini, 2003). On the other hand, when Australian English is related to the very many Chinese dialects, a number of issues are found. For instances, the study of syllables are closely related to the studies of stress, phonemes and tone. When comparing Chinese language and Australian English the discussion cannot only be confined to syllable structure without considering some of its relations to other areas such as showing politeness, making invitations and requests. Additionally, there is argument that that Chinese syllables if compared to Australian English seem less complicated than those in English (Haugh, 2006). However, the distinction between theories and facts is not always clear. For instance, the word ‘outside’ in Chinese, which sounds same way as the English why can be transcribed as [waj], [uai] and [ua] (Haugh, 2006). When comparing between Chinese and Australian speakers in terms of the language, then it is also necessary to factor Sinclair (2001) view that the syllable can have two glide phonemes as well as a vowel phoneme. Conversely, such comparisons must also recognize the fact that Chinese is ambiguous term in the sense that there are a number of dialects such as Min, Wu and Mandarin. In that connection Australian English as it stands means one language, instead of what can be family language. Though there is existence of some dialects of English like the American English, the Manx English and even the British English, just like Australian, they are largely intelligible. These are the issues that are inherent when comparing Chinese and Australian English. It can be noted that Chinese and Australian English differs sharply when it comes to writing and speaking thus contrasting one another in aspects such as speech act of invitations, requests, politeness among others. Whether there exist other similarities in the areas aforementioned is a theoretical and empirical question this study is interested in. in view of this, the focus of the study will be to compare Chinese and Australian English with aims of finding the cross-language patterns when it comes to aspects such as requests, patterns and invitations. This study seeks to explore a general theoretical issue: how does the relationship existing between Australian English and Chinese compare or contrast to the expression of aspects such as requests, patterns and invitations? Are there common trends or abilities in writing phonology, speaking as well as orthography, which can be transferred at what time alternating through systems which vary both of them in scripts and principles? 2.0. Review of the Literature Both Chinese and Australian English have a vast variety of regional dialects and variations. However, the written language has remained mostly the same. Under the ‘umbrella’ of Chinese there are many dialects, such as Wu, which is spoken in the Yangtse Delta; Gan, which is spoken in the Jiangxi Province; Kejia, which is spoken in the Fujian Province; and Cantonese, the most common of them all, which is spoken in all the provinces of China. Australian English also has many regional varieties (Hong Kong Polytechnic University, 2013). There are striking similarities between the word order of Australian English and Chinese. For instance, the word order arrangement, subject-verb-object (SVO), is common to both languages. The following sentences exemplify this similarity: ‘I have a computer’ in Australian English is ‘Wo you yigejisuanji’ in Chinese. ‘They are not engineers’ in Australian English translates to ‘Tamenbushigongchengshi’ in Chinese. ‘She has seen that film’ corresponds to ‘Ta kan le nagedian ying’ (Li, 1998). From these sentence pairs, it is clear that both Australian English and Chinese employ the SVO structure. While both Australian English and Chinese have suffixes that denote various aspects of language, inflection only exists in Australian English but not in Chinese. However, if there are any inflections, they are simple and straightforward. For instance, to express the idea of something that takes place in the past, a suffix is added to the end of the word. In Chinese, a suffix such as ‘了’ is added at the end of a verb to change its tense. Similarly, in Australian English ‘ed’ is added to the end of a verb to show past tense (Haugh&Hinze, 2003). There are also striking similarities in the semantic extension of color terms. Xing (2009) states that ‘white’ in Australian English—‘bai’ in Chinese—is used in both countries to imply cleanliness or purity. It also stands for cowardice in Australian English, but this implication is not commonly used. Chinese also uses white to symbolize funerals or ‘bad luck’. Nevertheless, the use of this approach for understanding similarities in semantics is limited. For instance, some lexicons in these two main language groups have extended abstract meanings that are completely different from the other language. Xing also states that a semantic function developed first has the ability to influence semantic functions developed subsequently (Xing, 2009). This is easily seen in the previous example; Chinese speakers do not derive the same Metaphorical or pragmatic from ‘bai’ as Australian English does from ‘white’. This is simply because the color has already developed its meaning in each language, and the acquisition of additional meanings for a word can be difficult. Moreover, it is very difficult to change the connotation of a word once a person has associated a strong meaning with it (Xing, 2009). Hypothetically, Chinese nouns can be classified, as is done in English. Proper and common nouns may be divided into individual nouns, material nouns, collective nouns and abstract nouns. Similar to Australian English, in Chinese it is possible to divide nouns into those that are countable and those that are uncountable. However, it would be pointless to classify nouns using this formula because Chinese does not use inflections in its plural forms (Shaoxian, 2013). Politeness is practiced worldwide, and it mirrors particular cultural values. Conversely, the term ‘politeness’ has diverse connotations in different language groups. In Chinese and Australian English, there are many ways to express apologies. For instance, Yin (2009 writes that Chinese uses phrases such as ‘baoqian’ and ‘dui bu qi’ to apologise for any mistakes that are made (p.155). Similarly, Australian English has words and phrases that communicate apologies for mistakes and such words have been expressed in a number of instances. Generally, Australian English speakers apologise more often than speakers of most other languages, including Chinese (Chang, 2008). 3.0. Discussion The first discussion that can be made is that there is one distinct relationship between the two languages. That is, as a language, Chinese tends to be more dynamic in its approach and in so doing and verbs are often used. On the other hand, English speakers in Australia tend to be static therefore its users in Australia will always use fewer verbs. Contrariwise, Suszczynska (1999) realizes that there is frequency in the way the speakers use prepositions and nouns especially when expressing abstract concepts. Looking at a sentence as this; “洪水来袭,对这片区域造成了很大的破坏,同时上万的村民变得无家可归” it can be noted that it has three verbs but the same sentence if translated in English it will be possible to apply or insert a single verb and still make the sentence read, “As a result of great damage caused by the flood in the area, millions of villagers became homeless.” In addition to this, Watts (2003) noted nouns categorized as abstract that are commonly in usage in English is so in wide range and alleged generally in meaning when it comes to Chinese. This tendency mostly affects the expression of the aspects such as apology and politeness in Chinese speakers. Therefore, to apply this concept within the framework of the study is that Australian English speakers when compared with Chinese they have different perception of a polite apology and in such case Australians will in likely scenario, make a polite request or just for the sake of appeasing oneself or rather in the event termed as a ‘face-saving act.’ The best way to interpret the relationship between the two English is the tone processing which also affects expression of aspects such as love, hate, affection, colour, invitation and politeness. When analyzing tone processing a general auditory processing skill should be the guiding principle, which links the two together. Scholars discovered proof that can return a connection between auricular observation as well as the ability to express words such as love. For instance Suh (1999) realizes correlation between tone order judgment ability and pseudo-word between the two languages. However, it is worth to note there is difference in terms of tone when it comes to Chinese as opposed to those expressed in English. That is the tone is not only complex but also an auditory process thus making expression of aspects such as politeness and love difficult to be conceptualized in an ordinary circumstance especially where English-speaking audient is present. But more significantly, this discussion notes that such tones as expressed in Chinese are phonetic process and in so saying, they are carried in a vowel with a lexical function. Therefore for the sake of comparing how Australian English and Chinese speakers will express love or hate the argument is; relevant skill that is included in the tone operating is coding as phonological material. Just like Olshtain and Cohen (2001) noted, our finding through researches previously reviewed that Chinese tone may to some extent, predict English alphabet readings which can make good toward the established role of phonemic which is already processed in the reading of English and speaking process. Thirdly, an act of politeness when compared between the two languages should be based on apologies made between the two languages. Both languages recognize that apologizing is an important element of maintaining relational and social harmony. Apologizing is therefore create a significant part especially with the social dealing of politeness with regard to both languages. The reason for this is what Félix‐Brasdefer (2006) describes that linguistic politeness can be realized through ‘semi-formulaic and formulaic utterances’ (p. 382). Relating this argument within the context of the two languages; Chinese contain politeness languages such as “…may I’ are more than what exist in Australian English. The point is, Chinese language marks such expressions as illocutionary force pointing out devices (IFID); they characterized systematic routinized terminologies. Therefore Chinese language is compost more of actions, which are polite, addressed to the listener, which is done through linguistic markers. The reason for this difference is that unlike Australian English, the standard Chinese, in this case Mandarin has most of syllables with a full or VX rime (V is a consonant and X is either the second part provided vowel or diphthong). Examples are as shown below. Syllables with VX rimes in Standard Chinese: [njau] [wa:] [mau] [ai] [ɤ:] [m:] ‘bird’ ‘frog’ ‘cat’ ‘love’ ‘goose’ ‘yes?’ Syllables as one shown above, when used in standard Chinese to denote expressions such as love bear a lexical tone thus making the act of politeness come out clearly as compared with Australian English where they have reduced rime and the consonant coda has already been deleted or the vowel has been shortened thus not carrying a lexical tone. Unsurprisingly, it can be noted that the sounds of English and Chinese are associated in terms of vocalic and consonantal. An example, k, p, d, b, and t (according to Hanyu Pinyin romanization system as cited as Haugh, 2006) share basically identical pronunciation in both English and Chinese. In as much, sounds for instance ü, q, and x do not exist in Australian English’s phonetic inventory. Additionally, a number of Chinese syllables like xiong, dun and pang are not found in English. Conversely, consonant clusters like backed, thread and train which are not available in standard Chinese. Due to these variations it can be summed up that Chinese can be a tonal language. This insinuates that the understanding of a Chinese word from the vocalic and consonantal sounds provided above depends not only on the phonemes which make up the pronunciation of the word, but also the contour and the pitch they use when pronouncing the words. On the other hand, Haugh (2006) argue that English is as used by Australian is not a tonal language therefore users are likely to apply stress and intonations. Comparing this with Chinese words such as, “You like pudding?” and “You like pudding” is that while the former is a sentence, and a latter is a question that finishes with rise the intonation. This intonation is unique and different to tone as can be used in Chinese language. Such variations differ significantly when speaker from Chinese community tries to make requests to show politeness in the speech. To compare how colours, happiness and speech act of invitation is exhibited in both languages; such need analysis of casual speech. That is, voiceless syllables and new syllables as expressed in both languages. In casual speech, there is a possibility of creating new syllables owing to sound change or deletion. To be specific, in careful speech no syllable in Chinese that ends in (m), however, when referring to casual speech such syllables are present, for example (wom) as indicated below. New syllable created by syllable merger wo mən wom ‘I plural (we)’ This is a development which is not present with Australian English speakers. Similarly, devoicing of non-low vowels in most cases takes place for syllables that have an inspired onset---something that is true with respect to voiceless fricatives as well as a tone. Therefore when a Chinese speaker is asked to make speech acts of requests or invitation the tone may not come out clearly. Finally, unlike the case of English spoken in Australia is can be presented that there is no grammatical tense that is present in Chinese. To give an example, while the English verb ‘do’ can be pronounce as ‘did’ to mean past tense, Chinese verbs have no ability of changing in this manner. Instead, Chinese language depends on expression of aspect. That is to mean, the aspect particle “le” can be used at the end of a sentence or after a verb to signify that an action has been completed. Therefore as Félix‐Brasdefer, (2006) noted, it becomes difficulty for Chinese speakers to express themselves on issues such as love, affection colours since expression of tense and expression of completion are different things. Similarly, words such as “we love you all and would like to invite you to the party” might not be expressed explicitly in Chinese since the language do not pluralise words. When Australian is speaking, there can be expressions such as “one invitation” or “two invitations” or even “one dog” or “two dogs” (the two instance) s indicating plural. This is not true in Chinese where expressions such as “one invitation” or “two invitation” or even “one dog” or “two dog.” In Chinese language, the noun “dog” or invitation cannot be changed when the number is altered. In as much, the suffix “---men” can be attributed to Chinese to indicate plurals when discussing pronouns like “it”, “he” and “she” and in some words such as “classmate.” Therefore in as much as both languages are both subject verb object (SVO) languages the differences highlighted above cannot allow speakers in Chinese to express statements of love and affection with the tone Australian English speaker would have otherwise done. 4.0. Conclusion To conclude, the discussion above supports the hypothesis and research questions developed in the introduction. For instance, in attempts to find the relationship between Australian English and Chinese in expressing aspects such as requests, patterns and invitations the discussion has revealed that both languages share phonological processes as well as orthographic-specific skills that make utterances of words of love same but with different tone. Additionally, the discussion has realized that contrastive Chinese phonological property; tone has significant contribution to unique variance to English pseudo-word utterances. Secondly the discussion and researches reviewed indicate that there exist a good number of differences in the perception of politeness, love, hate, invitation, and forgiveness across cultures in Australia and Chinese speakers. This realization provides further support that linguistic orientation of an individual can shape the perception of a speaker concerning expressions such as invitation and politeness. It is for this reason that this study realizes that other than culture, English as spoken in Australia is said to be a rational language, so concluding the thinking style of it, will appreciate reasonable analysis in method and make emphasis on the subject-orientation. Finally, to explain why expression of some aspects such as love in Chinese cannot easily be understood by English speakers it is because the former can be regarded as straight sense of wide-ranging in its expression also in many instances it leave grammar through putting emphasize on parataxis. 5.0. Recommendations First, the discussion has shown different levels of phonological processing between the two languages where Chinese tone also having a unique contribution on how one can express love or politeness. Therefore this study suggests that if indeed tone reflects on how one can express aspects such as love, hate or politeness it is likely to ponder that the tone is a good pre-literacy predictor of the expressing these aspects. It could be interested in upcoming researches to discern if this finding would be true to both natives and English second language learners. 6.0. References Bargiela‐Chiappini, F. (2003). Face and politeness: new (insights) for old (concepts). Journal of Pragmatics 35: 1456–1469. Chang, W. (2008). Australian and Chinese perceptions of (im) politeness in an intercultural apology. Griffith Working Papers in Pragmatics and Intercultural Communication Retrieved from April 7, 2014, from http://www.griffith.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0007/88171/7.-Issue-2-Weilin-Chang---Australian-and-Chinese-perceptions-of-politeness.pdf Department of Chinese and Bilingual Studies at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. (2013). MA in teaching Chinese as a foreign language. Retrieved April 7, 2014, from http://www.cbs.polyu.edu.hk/programmes/postgraduate-MATCFL.php Du, Z. (2012). Proceedings of the 2012 international conference of modern computer science. New York: Springer. Retrieved from http://books.google.co.ke/books?id=SVJxNsLWTZwC&pg=PA331&dq=similarities+between+Chinese+%26+English&hl=en&sa=X&ei=9qJCU_2FNKOO0AWim4DwDA&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=similarities%20between%20Chinese%20%26%20English&f=false Félix‐Brasdefer, J. C. (2006). Linguistics politeness in Mexico: Refusal strategies among male speakers of Mexican Spanish. Journal of Pragmatics 38: 2158–2187. Haugh, M. (2006). Emic Perspectives on the Positive–Negative Politeness Distinction. Culture, Language and Representation 3: 17–26. Haugh, M., & Hinze, C. (2003).A metalinguistic approach to deconstructing the concepts of 'face' and ‘politeness’ in Chinese, English and Japanese. Journal of Pragmatics 35(10–11), 1581–1611. Retrieved from April 7, 2014, from http://www98.griffith.edu.au/dspace/bitstream/handle/10072/14601/33409.pdf Li, L. (1998). A comparison of word order in English and Chinese. Papers and Studies in Contrastive Linguistics 34, 153–161.Retrieved from http://ifa.amu.edu.pl/psicl/files/34/08Li.pdf Olshtain, E. and Cohen, A. D. (2001). Apology: A speech act set. In Sociolinguistics and Language Acquisition, ed. N. Wolfson and E. Judd, 18–36. Rowley, MA: Newbury House. Shaoxian, W. (2013). An active modern Chinese grammar &translation (with simplified Chinese-English comparisons). Hong Kong: Ever flow. Retrieved from April 7, 2014, from http://books.google.co.ke/books?id=NdOcAQAAQBAJ&pg=PA11&dq=similarities+between+Chinese+%26+English&hl=en&sa=X&ei=9qJCU_2FNKOO0AWim4DwDA&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=similarities%20between%20Chinese%20%26%20English&f=false Sinclair, J. (ed.) (2001). Cobuild English Dictionary for Advanced Learners. Canada: HarperCollins. Sinclair, J. (ed.) (2001). Cobuild English Dictionary for Advanced Learners. Canada: HarperCollins. Suh, J.S. (1999). Pragmatics perception of politeness in requests by Korean Learners of English as a second language. IRAL (International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching) 37:195–213. Suszczynska, M. (1999). Apologizing in English, Polish and Hungarian: Different languages, different strategies. Journal of Pragmatics 31: 1053–1065. Trosborg, A. (1995). Interlanguage Pragmatics. Requests, Complaints and Apologies. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Xing, J. (2009). Studies of Chinese linguistics: Functional approaches. ed Aberdeen: Hong Kong University Press. Retrieved from April 7, 2014, from http://books.google.co.ke/books?id=WTv9AAAAQBAJ&pg=PA98&dq=similarities+between+Chinese+%26+English&hl=en&sa=X&ei=9qJCU_2FNKOO0AWim4DwDA&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=similarities%20between%20Chinese%20%26%20English&f=false Yin, L. (2009). Cultural differences of politeness in English and Chinese.Asian Social Science. (143-160). Watts, R. (2003). Politeness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Read More

There are striking similarities between the word order of Australian English and Chinese. For instance, the word order arrangement, subject-verb-object (SVO), is common to both languages. The following sentences exemplify this similarity: ‘I have a computer’ in Australian English is ‘Wo you yigejisuanji’ in Chinese. ‘They are not engineers’ in Australian English translates to ‘Tamenbushigongchengshi’ in Chinese. ‘She has seen that film’ corresponds to ‘Ta kan le nagedian ying’ (Li, 1998).

From these sentence pairs, it is clear that both Australian English and Chinese employ the SVO structure. While both Australian English and Chinese have suffixes that denote various aspects of language, inflection only exists in Australian English but not in Chinese. However, if there are any inflections, they are simple and straightforward. For instance, to express the idea of something that takes place in the past, a suffix is added to the end of the word. In Chinese, a suffix such as ‘了’ is added at the end of a verb to change its tense.

Similarly, in Australian English ‘ed’ is added to the end of a verb to show past tense (Haugh&Hinze, 2003). There are also striking similarities in the semantic extension of color terms. Xing (2009) states that ‘white’ in Australian English—‘bai’ in Chinese—is used in both countries to imply cleanliness or purity. It also stands for cowardice in Australian English, but this implication is not commonly used. Chinese also uses white to symbolize funerals or ‘bad luck’.

Nevertheless, the use of this approach for understanding similarities in semantics is limited. For instance, some lexicons in these two main language groups have extended abstract meanings that are completely different from the other language. Xing also states that a semantic function developed first has the ability to influence semantic functions developed subsequently (Xing, 2009). This is easily seen in the previous example; Chinese speakers do not derive the same Metaphorical or pragmatic from ‘bai’ as Australian English does from ‘white’.

This is simply because the color has already developed its meaning in each language, and the acquisition of additional meanings for a word can be difficult. Moreover, it is very difficult to change the connotation of a word once a person has associated a strong meaning with it (Xing, 2009). Hypothetically, Chinese nouns can be classified, as is done in English. Proper and common nouns may be divided into individual nouns, material nouns, collective nouns and abstract nouns. Similar to Australian English, in Chinese it is possible to divide nouns into those that are countable and those that are uncountable.

However, it would be pointless to classify nouns using this formula because Chinese does not use inflections in its plural forms (Shaoxian, 2013). Politeness is practiced worldwide, and it mirrors particular cultural values. Conversely, the term ‘politeness’ has diverse connotations in different language groups. In Chinese and Australian English, there are many ways to express apologies. For instance, Yin (2009 writes that Chinese uses phrases such as ‘baoqian’ and ‘dui bu qi’ to apologise for any mistakes that are made (p.155). Similarly, Australian English has words and phrases that communicate apologies for mistakes and such words have been expressed in a number of instances.

Generally, Australian English speakers apologise more often than speakers of most other languages, including Chinese (Chang, 2008). 3.0. Discussion The first discussion that can be made is that there is one distinct relationship between the two languages. That is, as a language, Chinese tends to be more dynamic in its approach and in so doing and verbs are often used. On the other hand, English speakers in Australia tend to be static therefore its users in Australia will always use fewer verbs.

Contrariwise, Suszczynska (1999) realizes that there is frequency in the way the speakers use prepositions and nouns especially when expressing abstract concepts.

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