The Importance of Background Culture Knowledge in Reading

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  Abstract:As achieving cross-culture communication is the final aim of learning English, it turns out to be inefficient to attach more importance on the ability of listening, speaking, reading, writing and knowledge system. Background culture knowledge is supposed to be an important way to reach the aim of language teaching,and help readers understand articles. Considering the effects of background culture knowledge and its importance, this article will do a research on it and try to help both readers and teachers aware of the importance of background culture knowledge and take note of it.
  Key Words: background culture knowledge, importance, reading
  According to English teaching syllabus, it announces that reading is a good approach to master language points and to strengthen the basic of communication. Also it is main technique used in future career.
  And most linguistics have proved that it is extremely complex to discuss the relation between language and culture. One contributor of this is Nida—language and culture two symbolic systems, everything we say in language has meanings, designative or associative, denotative or connotative. Every language form we use has meanings, carries meanings that are not in the same sense because it is associated with culture and culture is more extensive than language.
  Here are evidence to respond to the effects and its importance of cultural knowledge in reading.
  Language is a carrier to represent culture, and culture is reflected from language. To understand a piece of text completely, cultural knowledge helps a lot.
  It help grasp English grammar and increase the accuracy of expression.
  Take If winter comes, can spring be far behind? and “打得赢就打,打不赢就走,还怕没办法?”for example. The two famous sayings are something common in structure. However, it seems difficult to understand the very shot sentence by no connection words. To make readers know the cultural distinction of thinking style and its influence on expression is very helpful to decrease the mistakes of Chinese English and increase the accuracy of expression.
  Even though words and phrases are clear when reading, sometimes it occurs to readers to the confusion that cultural connotation and denotation of words and phrases.
  For example:
  Being a teacher is being present at the creation, when the clay begins to breath.
  This sentence is hard to understand without the background culture knowledge. Because “clay begins to breath” is very strange to Chinese readers or even some English spoken people who are not familiar with the Bible. According to the Bible, the god created man in the light of his shape and then he created woman by a rib of man. The god blew the clay men then they became alive. Thereupon the god’s project of creating human beings was over. This sentence implied readers could be inspired to become real man.   Of course, native readers are likely to read more rapidly than non-native readers. Especially , in literature. A context comparison is suggested to deal with that. great task. As Valdes points out “Intercultural understanding is recognition of the ways in which two cultures resemble one another as well as the ways in which they differ. Resemblances usually surface through an examination of the differences. General discussions and theories regarding cultural differences are necessary for consideration of specific cultures in their relationship to the target culture, and the one without the other is like a river without a current”.
  Another example, many foreigners are confused about whether zaodian (早点) refers to breakfast or earlier. Such kind of comparison not only makes culture acquisition possible in language use but also helps Chinese learners convey their own culture to foreigners better.
  As mentioned above, the possession of knowledge about foreign culture takes great advantage of reading comprehension. Therefore, to realize this, it must adapt the cultural background in reading and implement it carefully in the long run.
  Bibliography
  [1] Camilleri.C. Cultural Anthropology and Education. Paris: Kogan ociation with UNESCO 1986.
  [2] Eli Hinkel. Culture in Second Language Teaching and Learning. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press. 1999.
  [3] Robinson. G. L. N. Cross-cultural Understanding: Processes and Approaches for Foreign Language, English as a Second Language and Bilingual Educators. New York: Pergamon Press, in Chenshen: 1999.
  [4] Steffensen, M.S. & Joag-Dev C. Cultural knowledge and reading [A]. New York: Longman. 1984: 48-61
  [5] 陈申. 《外语教育中的文化教学》 [M] 北京:外语教学与研究出版社 1995
  [6] 邓炎昌. 《语言与文化》 [M] 北京:北京外语教学与研究出版社 1996
  [7] 胡文仲. 《文化与交际》 [M] 北京:北京外语教学与研究出版社 1998
  [8] 廖道胜. 《中国学生英语阅读中的文化障碍》[J]. 外语教学. 2001. (4).
  [9] 庄智象. 《文化与阅读理解》[J]. 外语界. 1988. (3).
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