-
Cultural Differences and
English Reading
Comprehension
[Abstract] With English teaching and
learning prevailing in China, we have made
great progress in this field. However,
there are still many problems in our English
teaching and learning. A critical one
is that students frequently make comprehension
mistakes when reading English texts.
This kind of comprehension barriers is caused
mostly by the cultural differences
between Chinese and English language. This paper
first
illustrates the effects of
cultural differences on reading comprehension,
then analyzes the
causes of cultural
differences, and finally develops some tentative
methods to help to
improve reading
comprehension both in English teaching and
learning.
[Key Words] cultural
differences; reading comprehension; English
teaching and
learning
uction
In our traditional English learning and
teaching classes, especially in the reading
part, the teachers always emphasize the
language points and the grammatical structures of
the reading texts by analyzing the
sentences one by one. As a result, most of the
students
can only get a superficial
understanding of the meaning of the reading
material, which
means that the
students’reading ability cannot be actually
improved. As a matter of fact,
English
reading comprehension is more of a process of
intercultural communication than
a
material of grammar and language points learning.
Consequently, teaching culture in
English reading classes is very
important. Generally speaking, it is found that
whether or
not the students can get a
complete comprehension of a text and a complete
mastery of a
foreign language depends
on their knowledge of the target culture. This
paper focuses on
the effects of Chinese
and Western cultural differences on English
reading
comprehension, trying to arouse
the echo in English teaching and learning: how
cultural
content can affect us when we
learn a foreign language? We should involve
cultural
education in English teaching and
learning in order to teach or learn it better,
which is
very significant. To elaborate
my opinion, this thesis first illustrates the
effects of cultural
differences on
reading comprehension, then analyzes the causes of
cultural differences,
and finally
develops
some tentative methods to help
to improve reading comprehension both in English
teaching and learning.
s of
cultural differences on reading comprehension
2.1 The comprehension of words
Words can reflect cultural differences
widely. Not only does a word have a direct
and superficial meaning in the
dictionary, it can also have an implied and
affective
meaning, which can always be
the barriers in reading comprehension (Luo
Xiaoling,
2008:114. Consequently, if we
learn new English words, it is of great importance
for us
to know not only their
denotations, but also their connotations.
Generally speaking, the
words that can
cause barriers in reading comprehension because of
cultural differences
between China and
the West can be divided into two types: words that
have ambiguous
meaning and words that
have specific meaning.
Words that have
ambiguous meaning refer to the ones that have the
same denotation
but different cultural
connotations. For example, the English word
“dragon” has its
equivalent
“
龙
” in Chinese. Although
their denotation is similar, they
diff
er greatly in
their
connotation. In Longman Dictionary of Contemporary
English, we can find two
explanations
of the word “dragon”: (1 an imaginary
fire
-
breathing animal in
children’s
stories. (2 a fierce older
woman, esp. one who allows too little freedom to a
young girl in
her charge. From these
two definitions, we can know that “dragon”is not
liked in the
English culture. And just
because of this, “dragon”is always used as a
negative word in
the western countries.
To the contrary, Chinese people are particularly
fond of the word
“
龙
”. We call
ourselves “Descendants of the Dragon”. The word
“
龙
”in Chinese culture
is a noble and
auspicious symbol. It symbolizes authority, power,
wealth and future. If we
know the
cultural difference in this respect, we will not
misinterpret the term “t he old
dragon”, which actually means “the
devil”, as “the dragon that is old”when we
encounter
it in our reading
comprehension. In consequence, we should not
simply equate some
English word with a
Chinese word in reading.
Words
th
at have specific meaning refer to the
ones that don’t have their equivalents
in another language. That is to say,
they only express things and
phenomena
that are peculiar to a certain language, and we
cannot find any
equivalents in another
language both in form and in example that is
often
cited is the word “hippe”. The
word “hippe”is a peculiar well
-known
product of
American society which
refers to the decadent and passive American young
people who
are rebellious and
discontented to the social reality. They vent
their dissatisfaction by
wearing long
hair, dressing in unusual clothes, believing in
sexual freedom and taking
illegal drugs
and excessive drinking. There is no Chinese
equivalent for “hippie”. If we
translate it directly as
“
嬉皮士
”in Chin
ese,
it will lose its own cultural connotation.
Therefore, this also brings barriers to
reading comprehension.
2.2 The
comprehension of idioms
Besides words,
cultural differences are reflected by idioms as
well. And cultural
differences
reflected by idioms in Chinese and English can
also affect readers in English
reading
comprehension. Idioms are the pith and the marrow
of the language development
and they
constitute the kernel and cream of a language(Shen
Jun, 2005: Chinese
and English idioms
contain their own specific cultural information
and reflect their own
specific cultural
features. They are two kinds of different
productions of the life
experience in
different social and regional environment. Hence,
they are cultural specific
expressions
which contain profound cultural connotations.
Though idioms are
combination of single
words, their meaning cannot be simply determined
by the
meanings
of the individual words. Because of this, idioms
are hard to understand by
readers from
a different culture.
For example, in
the sentence “After playing football, he
drank like a fish”, “drank like a
fish”means that he drank a lot, which is
equivalent to
“
牛
饮
”in Chinese.
And it is inappropriate to understand it as “drank
as a fish” or “drank a
little”.
2.3 The
comprehension of texts
Cultural
differences are by no means confined to words and
idioms. They can also
be reflected by
texts. Language is the record of thinking.
Different ways of thinking may
result
in different types of language(Cheng Hongzhen,
2005:50. Since Chinese people
and the
western people are different in their mode of
thinking, the ways how their texts
are
structured are also different. And such
differences can also
cause barriers to
English reading comprehension.
Western
people’s mode of thinking
is linear.
Hence, an English text tends to follow
a straight line of development. It
often begins with a topic sentence which is
followed by
a series of subdivisions of
the central idea. That is to say, the central idea
is usually clear
at the very beginning
of the text and is gradually developed in a
deductive thinking
pattern. However,
Chinese people’s mode of thinking is roundabout.
Consequently, a
Chinese text is
inclined to follow a circular line of development,
which is always
developed in a
inductive thinking pattern. Take the following
paragraph as an example.
I believe that
I speak for every sincere and serious
representative in the
United Nations,
so I am encouraged to believe by the speeches to
which we
have already listened this
morning. When I say that the anniversary must be
an occasion for an honest assessment of
our failures in the past, matched by
an
equally determined will to do better in the
future, so that we can escape
from frustration and turn
the anniversary into an inspiration and
achievement.(Zhu Peiying, 2005:76
In this short paragraph, the speaker
first declares his attitude, and then he gives an
account of the background and purpose
of his statement. This is a typical speech of the
English thinking pattern. However, if
we turn it into Chinese, we usually put the
background and purpose before the
conclusion and declaration.
From what
has been discussed above, we can know that
cultural differences affect
many
aspects of comprehension: comprehension of words,
idioms and texts. “Every st
age
of comprehension involves readers’
background knowledge of culture.”(Anderson, 1997,
14:369 Therefore, it is of great
significance for us English learners to understand
the
culture of English, which is
helpful to reading comprehension. After knowing
the
influence that cultural differences
can have on cross-cultural reading comprehension,
let’s see what causes these
differences. The following section will illustrate
the causes of
these cultural
differences in detail.
3. Causes of
cultural differences in reading comprehension
3.1 Causes of differences by national
historical culture
Language itself is
not only an important component of culture; it is
also the carrier
of culture(Sun Yingxu
&Zhang Qi, 2006:160. Every kind of language is a
peculiar
production of a national
culture which all has its unique history.
Consequently, they all
have their own
specific culture-loaded words such as words,
idioms and illusions to
reflect their
things and conceptions. As foreign or second
language learners, we often
meet
barriers when we meet such words in our reading
comprehension.
For example, in the
sentence “I have let the cat out of the bag
already, and I might as
well tell him
the whole thing now.”, the expression “let the cat
out of the bag” is an idiom
which
originates from a story. In the old New Y ork
City, the peasants always put their