News & Events
Topic: Seminar by Dr. Tao Hongyin
|
Posted - 24/02/2005 : 15:59:27
Dr. Tao Hongyin
Department of Chinese, Translation and Linguistics
Seminar
by
Dr. Tao Hongyin
Departments of Asian Languages and Cultures and Applied Linguistics, UCLA
"'The Chinese Eat Chopsticks; Westerners Eat Knives and Forks': On the Dynamic Nature of Language and Its Implications for Translation"
Venue: Lecture Theatre 8,Main Campus, City University of Hong Kong
Date: 7th March 2005 (Monday)
Time: 4:30 - 6:00 pm
About the Speaker
Dr. Tao Hongyin receives his PhD in linguistics from the Department of Linguistics, University of California at Santa Barbara in 1993. He has since taught at the National University of Singapore, Cornell University, and UCLA. He is Associate Professor of Chinese Language and Linguistics and Applied Linguistics in the Departments of Asian Languages and Cultures and Applied Linguistics, UCLA. He is presently a Visiting Research Fellow in the Department of Chinese, Translation, and Linguistics, City University of Hong Kong. His main publications are Units in Mandarin Conversation: Prosody, Discourse, and Grammar (John Benjamin 1996) and Current Trends in Sociolinguistics (co-author, Chinese Social Sciences Publishing House, 1997 and 2004).
Abstract
The behavior of the word chi 'eat' in Chinese has been a puzzle for many Chinese linguists, this is because utterances such as 在中国人们吃筷子,在西方人们吃刀叉 'the Chinese eat chopsticks; Westerners eat knives and forks' are acceptable to some native speakers but unacceptable to others. The noun-verb association (i.e. argument structure) in such cases is clearly 'abnormal'. Why such 'abnormal' patterns of noun-verb association exist in language in the first place? Why doesn't this happen to other verbs (such as the semantically similar verb 喝 'to drink')? This talk presents some discourse perspectives on this kind of linguistic phenomenon and shows how a understanding of the dynamic nature of language structure helps translation practices
Seminar Series by Dr. Tao Hongyin in the Department
http://moscow.cityu.edu.hk/~ctsemina/0405/hongyin.htm
Dr Tao's Contact Information at City U:
Office: B7528, Tel: 2784-4341
Email: hoyitao@cityu.edu.hk"
Enquiries: 2788-8705
All Are Welcome
|
|
|
Enquiry: LTenquiry@cityu.edu.hk