從多元語言能力角度分析台灣英語學習者敘事寫作策略

An Analysis of Chinese EFL Learners’ English and Chinese Narrative Writing Strategies: A Multi-competence Perspective

周怡君(Yi-Chun Chou)

指導教授 ： 蘇怡如

國立清華大學/人文社會學院/外國語文學系/碩士(2014年)

摘要

過去在敘事言談(narrative discourse)分析的研究發現人們的敘事風格因文化而異，且第二外語學習者的母語知識與能力會影響其外語的敘事表現，但鮮少研究探討外語的知識是否會反過來影響其母語的敘事表現。因此，本研究以台灣英語學習者為研究對象，以Cook (1991) 提出的「多元語言能力」 (multicompetence) 觀點探討他們在外語習得中，其中語及英語的敘事寫作策略是否有雙向影響的現象。
本研究有四組受試者：英語及中語的單語人、以及依照英語托福成績分成中級和高級的台灣英語學習者。所有受試者需要書寫一個令他們害怕的經驗，兩組單語人只寫一次作文，台灣英語學習者共寫兩次，一次英文、一次中文。其敘事寫作內容依敘事結構(narrative structure)及評價方法(evaluative devices)兩個層面作分析。我們將中語與英語單語人的敘事文做為比照組，將英語學習者的英文和中文敘事文分別和英語與中語的單語人的敘事文做比較，探討兩個語言間相互影響的模式。另外，本研究也探索台灣英語學習者在寫中文和英文敘事文時，兩個語言所使用的敘述策略是否相同。
研究結果顯示學習者的母語敘事風格會影響其英語的敘事表現。寫英文敘事文時，英語學習者比英語單語人傾向提供開場白(prologue)和結尾(coda)，特別是跟道德訓誡(moral lesson)有關的結尾，而在評價方法上，英語學習者也比英語單語人使用較多的引述結構(reported speech)，這些現象都是受到母語的敘述文化所影響。然而，英語學習者的英語影響母語的敘事表現比較不明顯，且只在英語程度較高的學習者身上發現，他們受到英語的影響，在寫中文敘事文時，評價子句(evaluative clause)的使用比例較高，但整體而言，不論英語程度為何，英語學習者的中文敘事寫作結構和評價方法的使用與中語單語人的風格相似。另外，比較英語學習者的中、英文寫作，我們發現基本上英語學習者兩個語言的寫作策略沒有太大差異，不論在書寫英文還是中文，他們都是採用母語敘事寫作風格。
整體而言，我們發現英語學習者習慣倚賴母語的敘事寫作風格，可能的原因是在台灣的環境裡，學習者較少機會直接接觸目標語文化，且在英語教室裡，敘述寫作的教學鮮少被安排在課程裡，因此英語學習者較無法習得目標語敘事寫作技巧，因此母語敘事風格不易受到外語的知識所影響。本研究結果讓我們對英語學習者的母語與外語之間的互動有更一步的了解，也就是說，文化、外語學習環境、及寫作教學對於英語學習者兩個語言的敘述寫作表現有密切關係。

關鍵字

敘事結構 ； 評價方法 ； 多元語言能力 ； 語言移轉

並列摘要

Previous research on narrative discourse has indicated that there are cross-cultural differences in narrative construction, and shown that L2 learners tend to carry their L1 narrative style over to their L2 narrative performance. However, little is known about whether L2 learners’ knowledge of the L2 in turn influences their L1 narrative performance. The present study was undertaken to explore bi-directional cross-linguistic influence (i.e., L1 influence on L2 and L2 influence on L1) in Chinese EFL learners’ written narrative styles of their two languages from a multicompetence perspective.
Four groups of college students were recruited. They were English native speakers, Chinese native speakers, and Chinese EFL learners at the intermediate and advanced levels. There were 25 people in each group. The participants were asked to write about a frightening experience they had ever had. Their narratives were analyzed in terms of the use of narrative structure and evaluative devices. As regards data analysis, the Chinese EFL learners’ English and Chinese narratives were compared to those of English and Chinese native controls to examine the possible cross-linguistic influence from both directions. In addition, the Chinese EFL learners’ written narratives in their L1 and L2 were compared to see if they adopted the same or different sets of narrative writing strategies in the two languages.
The results indicate the strong L1 influence on L2 but weak L2 influence on L1. In terms of L1 influence on L2, like the Chinese native controls, both intermediate and advanced EFL learner groups provided a prologue and a coda significantly more often than the English native controls when writing L2 narrative essays. As for the use of evaluative devices, similar to the Chinese native controls, the advanced EFL learners employed significantly more expressions referring to reported speech in their L2 English narratives than the English native controls. L2 influence on L1, on the other hand, was less evident and was only observed in the advanced learners. When writing their L1 narrative essays, the advanced learners produced significantly more evaluative remarks than the Chinese native controls to express their personal feelings and comments on the story, as the English native controls did. However, the EFL learners’ overall use of narrative structure and evaluative devices in their L1 was basically similar to that of the Chinese native controls. Moreover, within-group comparisons reveal that the EFL learners at both proficiency levels tended to adopt L1-based narrative rhetorical styles in writing both their L1 and L2 essays.
The results of the present study indicate that both intermediate and advanced EFL learners basically had not yet acquired the L2 written narrative styles. This is probably because the EFL learners learned English in a non-native environment, where they did not have enough opportunities to interact with L2 native speakers in their daily lives and learn the L2 narrative conventions from them. In addition, L2 narrative writing instruction is seldom taught in the foreign language classroom. Due to these factors, it may not be surprising to see that the EFL learners had difficulty acquiring the L2 narrative writing conventions, and so their knowledge of the L2 was less likely to influence their L1 narrative writing performance. Taken together, the present study suggests that the socio-cultural values, language learning/use environment and writing instruction may play a role in the bi-directional interaction between the L2 learner’s written narrative competences of the two languages.

並列關鍵字

narrative structure ； evaluative device ； multicompetence ； bi-directional language transfer

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