探究文化语言学的学术渊源的论文

转摘More and more scholars are now showing an interest in adopting linguistic approaches to translation studies. Between 1949 and 1989, an incomplete survey by the author revealed that there were only about 30 textbook passages discussing the relationship between linguistics and translation, including aspects of general linguistics, pragmatics, stylistics, text linguistics, rhetoric and machine translation. From 1990 to 1994, there was an incredible increase in the number of passages looking at translation from a linguistic point of view. Almost 160 articles published over these five years concerned translation and general linguistics, stylistics, comparative linguistics, semantics, pragmatics, sociolinguistics, text linguistics, rhetoric, etc. New terms such as discourse analysis, hermeneutics, dynamic equivalence, deep structure and surface structure, context, theme and rheme, cooperative principles, to mention just a few, appeared in the field of translation studies. We can definitely identify a trend of applying linguistics theories to translation studies in these years. Today, we are at the point of questioning whether linguistics is a necessary part of translation. In recent years, some scholars who are in favour of free translation, have repeatedly raised this question to the public and appealed for an end to the linguistic approach to translation. Some firmly believe that translation is an art and that therefore linguistics is neither useful nor helpful. Such a claim is wrong if we look at translation as a whole, including scientific translation where meanings are rigid and restricted and the degree of freedom is limited. Flexibility, in this case, is neither required nor appreciated. But even in literary translation, linguistics is hardly a burden. Wang Zongyan pointed out that « If one sees linguistics as a body of rules regulating language, translators most probably will yawn with boredom. If it signifies the use of words and locutions to fit an occasion, there is nothing to stop translators from embracing linguistics » (Wang 1991: 38). The controversy over « literal » versus « free » translation has a long history, with convincing supporters on each side. For example, ancient Western scholars like Erasmus, Augustine, and others were in favour of literal translation. Among early Chinese translators, Kumarajiva is considered to be of the free school, while Xuan Zuang appears as literal and inflexible. In modern China, Yan Fu advocated hermeneutic translation, while Lu Xun preferred a clumsy version to one that was free but inexact. There is nothing wrong in any of these stances. When these translators emphasized free translation they never denied the possibility of literal translation, and vice versa. Problems only arise when the discussion turns to equivalent translations. The problem of equivalence has caused much controversy. Some people believed that there could be an equivalence of language elements independent of the setting in which they of occurred. Based on this assumption, some « literal » translators tried to decompose a text into single elements in hopes of finding equivalents in the target language. This is a naive idea. Jakobson (1971: 262) notes that « Equivalence in difference is the cardinal problem of language and the pivotal concern of linguistics. » He does not refer to « equivalence » but to « equivalence in difference » as the cardinal problem. Nida was also misunderstood by many for his notion of « equivalence, » which he took to mean that « Translating consists in reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of the source-language message, first in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style » (1969: 12). He further concluded that « Absolute equivalence in translating is never possible » (1984: 14). De Beaugrande and Dressler believed that the success or failure of either free or literal approaches was uncertain: an unduly « literal » translation might be awkward or even unintelligible, while an unduly « free » one might make the original text disintegrate and disappear altogether. To them, equivalence between a translation and an original can only be realized in the experience of the participants (cf. de Beaugrande and Dressler 1981: 216-217). Catford (1965: 27) expressed the same concern that equivalent translation is only « an empirical phenomenon, discovered by comparing SL and TL texts. » In citing the above examples, I have absolutely no intention of insisting on untranslatability. What I mean is that a translator should incorporate his or her own experience and processing activities into the text: solving the problems, reducing polyvalence, explaining away any discrepancies or discontinuities. Linguistic knowledge can help us treat different genres in different ways, always with an awareness that there are never exact equivalences but only approximations. Therefore, amplification and simplification become acceptable. If we agree that texts can be translated, then, in what way does linguistics contribute to translation? To answer this question, we must look at the acceptance of western linguistics in China and its influence on translation. Systematic and scientific study of the Chinese language came into being only at the end of the last century, when Ma Jianzhong published a grammar book Mashi Wentong «马氏文通» in 1898, which was the first in China and took the grammar of Indo-European languages as its model. The study of language was, in turn, influenced by translation studies in China. In Mashi Wenton, the main emphasis is on the use of morphology, which takes up six-sevenths of the book. Influenced by the dominant trend of morphological studies, a word was regarded as the minimum meaningful unit, and a sentence was therefore the logical combination of words of various specific types. Translation was, then, principally based on the unit of the word. In the West, Biblical translation provided a very good example, just as the translation of Buddhist scriptures did in China. Not until the end of the 19th century did some linguists come to realize that sentences were not just the summary of the sequenced words they contained. The Prague School, founded in the 1920s, made a considerable contribution to the study of syntax. According to the analytic approach of the Functional Perspective of the Prague School, a sentence can be broken down into two parts: theme and rheme. Theme is opposed to rheme in a manner similar to the distinction between topic and comment, and is defined as the part of a sentence which contributes least to advancing the process of communication. Rheme, on the other hand, is the part of a sentence which adds most to advancing the process of communication and has the highest degree of communicative dynamism. These two terms help enlighten the process of translating Chinese into English. In the mid-1950s, the study of syntax peaked with the Chomsky's establishment of transformational-generative grammar. This theory of the deep structure and surface structure of language influenced translation tremendously. Nida relied heavily on this theory in developing his « analyzing-transfering-reconstructing » pattern for translation. Some Chinese linguists, in the meantime, tried to raise language studies to a higher plane. Li Jinxi (1982) enlarged the role of sentence studies in his book A New Chinese Grammar, two thirds of which was devoted to discussing sentence formation or syntax. He writes that « No words can be identified except in the context of a sentence. » The study was then improved by other grammarians, including Lu Shuxiang, Wang Li. With the development of linguistic studies, translation based on the unit of the sentence was put forward by some scholars. It was Lin Yu-Tang who first applied the theory to translation in his article « On Translation. » He claimed that « translation should be done on the basis of the sentence [...] What a translator should be faithful to is not the individual words but the meaning conveyed by them » (Lin 1984: r 3). The importance of context in the understanding of a sentence was therefore emphasized. Chao Yuanren, a Chinese scholar and professor at Harvard University, criticized scholars and translators who tended to forget this point and take language for something independent and self-sufficient. In fact, it is obvious that when we translate a sentence, we depend on its context; when we interpret an utterance we rely on the context of the speech (cf. Chao 1967). When a sentence is removed from the text, it usually becomes ambiguous due to the lack of context. Therefore, translation becomes difficult. In the 1960s, people began to realize that the study of language based on sentences was not even sufficient. A complete study should be made of the whole text. A simple sentence like « George passed » may have different interpretations in different contexts. If the context is that of an examination, it means George did well on a test; in a card game it would indicate that George declined his chance to bid; in sports it would mean the ball reached another player. Without a context, how could we decide on a translation? Linguists therefore shifted their attention to the study of texts and to discourse analysis. Text linguistics have become increasingly popular since that time. Van Dijk was a pioneer in this field, and his four-volume edition of the Handbook of Discourse Analysis is of great value. Halliday's Cohesion in English and Introduction to Functional Grammar help us to better understand the English language on a textual level. It is worth noting that de Beaugrande and Dressler (1981) provided an overall and systematic study of text, which is useful to translation studies. De Beaugrande actually wrote a book called Factors in a Theory of Poetic Translating in 1978. The book did not become very popular as it confined the discussion to translating poetry. At the same time, books on a linguistic approach to translation were introduced into China, such as the works of Eugene Nida, Peter Newmarks, J.C. Catford, Georges Mounin, and others. These books gave a great push to the application of linguistic theories to translation studies in China. Textual or discoursive approaches to the study of translation could not keep pace with the development of text linguistics. Some studies remained on the syntactic or semantic level, though even there textual devices were employed. In talking about the translation units of word and text, Nida wrote: ... average person naively thinks that language is words, the common tacit assumption results that translation involves replacing a word in language A with a word in language B. And the more « conscientious » this sort of translation is, the more acute. In other words, the traditional focus of attention in translation was on the word. It was recognized that that was not a sufficiently large unit, and therefore the focus shifted to the sentence. But again, expert translators and linguists have been able to demonstrate that individual sentences, in turn, are not enough. The focus should be on the paragraph, and to some extent on the total discourse. (Nida and Tabber 1969: 152) From that statement we can see that Nida regards a discourse as something larger than a paragraph, as an article with a beginning and an ending. Nida himself never applied text linguistics to translation, and there might be some confusion if we use his term in our interpretation of discourse, because discourse analysis is not merely a study based on a larger language structure. Some Chinese scholars did make the effort to apply text linguistics to the theory and practice of translation. Wang Bingqin's article (1987) was the first academic paper of this sort. He stated his aim to study and discover the rules governing the internal structure of a text in light of text linguistics. He analyzed numerous examples using textual analysis, but unfortunately, all the samples he collected were descriptions of scenery or quotations from the books of great scholars--no dialogue, no illocutionary or perlocutionary forces in the language. He failed to provide a variety of examples. For this reason, his research findings are largely restricted to rhetorical texts in ancient China (cf. Wang 1981; Luo 1994). Scholars like He Ziran applied pragamatics to translation. He's article (1992) put forth two new terms, « pragmalinguistics » and « socio-pragmatics » which, in translation, refer respectively to « the study of pragmatic force or language use from the viewpoint of linguistic sources » and to « the pragmatic studies which examine the conditions on language use that derive from the social and cultural situation. » He discusses the possibility of applying the pragmatic approach to translation in order to achieve a pragmatic equivalent effect between source and target texts; that is, to reproduce the message carried by the source language itself, as well as the meaning carried by the source language within its context and culture. In this article he tries to distinguish « pragma-linguistics » from « socio-pragmatics » but finally admits that « Actually, a clear line between pragma-linguistics and socio-pragmatics may sometimes be difficult to draw. » Still he insists that the application of the pragmatic approach to translation is helpful and even necessary. Ke Wenli (1992) argued that semantics, which in a broad sense combines semantics and pragmatics, should be studied to help understand, explain and solve some of the problems encountered in translation. In this article, he examines four semantic terms--« sense and reference, » « hyponomy, » « changes of meaning » and « context »--giving many examples to illusrate the importance of having some general knowledge of semantics and of understanding the relationship between semantics and translation. This article is clearly written and readers can easily draw inspiration from it. These linguistics approaches shed new lights on the criteria of « faithfulness, expressiveness and elegance » defined by Yan Fu. Chinese scholars began to criticize the vagueness of these three criteria and endeavored to give them concrete significance through the theories of western linguistics. The result is that the content of these three traditional criteria has been greatly enriched, especially by the effect equivalence theory, which in a broad sense means that the target language should be equivalent to the source language from a semantic, pragmatic, and stylistic point of view. But we are still unable to evaluate translations in a very scientific way. Therefore, Chinese scholars like Fan Shouyi, Xu Shenghuan and Mu Lei embarked on quantitative analyses of translations and used the fuzzy set theory of mathematics in accomplishing their analysis. Fan published several articles on this field of study. His 1987 and 1990 articles evaluate translations according to a numerical quantity of faithfulness. Xu's article « A Mathematical Model for Evaluating a Translation's Quality » presents a normal mathematical model. He states that it is difficult to produce an absolutely accurate evaluation of translations with this model because of the uncertainty and randomness of man's thought process. Making such analysis more accurate and objective would require further research. The unit in translation is a hard nut to crack. Without solving this problem, no research in translation studies will ever be sufficient. To date, very few people have focused their research on this area. Nida holds that the unit should be the sentence, and in a certain sense, the discourse. Barkhudarov (1993: 40), Soviet linguist and translation theorist, suggests that: translation is the process of transforming a speech product (or text) produced in one language into a speech product (or text) in another language. [...] It follows that the most important task of the translator who carries out the process of transformation, and of the theorist who describes or creates a model for that process, is to establish the minimal unit of translation, as it is generally called, the unit of translation in the source text. Though he notes the importance of the unit of translation in a text and considers that this unit can be a unit on any level of language, he fails to point out what a text is and how it might be measured in translation. Halliday's notion of the clause might be significant in this case. To him, a clause is a basic unit. He distinguishes three functions of a clause: textual, interpersonal and ideational. According to Halliday, these functions are not possessed by word or phrase. But he is not quite successful in analyzing the relationship between clause and text (cf. Halliday 1985). In China, some people have tried to solve this problem. Wang Dechun (1987: 10) more or less shares Bakhudarov's view that the translation unit cannot be confined just to sentences. In some ways, the phoneme, word, phrase, sentence, paragraph, or even text can all serve as a unit. At this point, we cannot find anything special in treating text translation except for having text as the highest level among translation units. This is not the aim of text linguistics or discourse analysis. If we want to apply these to the theory and practice of translation, we will require a textual approach.

语言既是人类社会进行交际的重要工具，又是文化的重要组成部分，语言和文化密不可分。下文是我为大家整理的关于英语语言文化方面论文的范文，欢迎大家阅读参考!

解读酒店英语中的语言文化

摘 要： 酒店服务人员应从与饭店英语相关的中西方文化知识出发，领会文化差异和语言差异，以矫正由于中西文化差异而带来的语言偏差，从而达到学习语言、吸收文化和服务客人的目的。

关键词： 酒店英语 语言文化 文化差异

一、引言

语言与文化密切相关，不同文化习惯的语言不可避免地会发生冲突，而跨文化语言沟通存在于涉外高星酒店服务的各个环节。因此，酒店英语不仅是语言知识的学习，而且是语言文化和交际技能的培训。语言的本质属性不是语言知识而是思维。当一个人不了解该语言所蕴涵的文化时，那必然会发生语用错误。

二、具有本质特性的酒店英语

酒店英语属旅游专业英语范畴，具有专业英语的针对性(pertinence)和服务英语的得体性(decency)。语言标准应为:明晰、通畅、表意得当。如：

Waiter:How would you like with your steak?Rare，medium or well-done?(请问您牛排要几成熟?三成，五成还是七成?)

Guest:Rare，please.(三成。)

通常，rare是“稀少”的意思;medium是“中间”的意思;well-done是“干得好”的意思。而出现在服务员为客人点菜的流程中，它的意思就非常具有专业英语的针对性了。语言学家吕叔湘先生对言语得体有这样的描述:“此时此地此人说此事，这样的说法最好;对另外的人在另外的场合说的还是这件事，这样的说法就不一定最好，就应使用另一种说法。”请看下面这组酒店客人和服务员之间的对话:

Guest:Hi，waiter，you speak beautiful English.

Waiter: Thank you，sir. Welcome to Holiday Inn.

Waiter顺应英语习惯欣然接受，而非按中文习惯去拒绝，说“No，no，My English is not good.”以示谦虚，否则只会使顾客感到莫名其妙，不知所云。由此看出，服务语言的得体性在酒店英语的情境应用中显现得淋漓尽致。

三、文化差异(Cultural Difference)在酒店英语中的体现

文化影响着语言学习的思维方式，因此中英两种语言文化交汇时，必然会发生冲突。语言学家M.Wolfson曾指出:“在与外族人交谈时，本族人对于他们在语音和语法方面的错误较宽容。与此相反，违反说话规则被认为是不够礼貌的。因为本族人不大可能认识到社会语言学的相对性。”这种情况又被称之为“社交语用失误”，它主要是指由于文化背景差异，交际时出现语用习惯错误。在酒店服务岗位的英语使用时，中英文化的差异将会给酒店服务中的语言交流带来不便。

(一)招呼(Greeting)用语

按照中国的文化习惯，问候和打招呼时，常爱涉及对方本身，询问的内容显得十分具体。中国人见面打招呼时最喜欢用的口头语如：

“吃饭了吗?”(Have you finished your dinner?)

“上哪儿去?”(Where have you been?)

如果将上面的招呼用语拿来用在老外身上，定会令他们感到丈二和尚摸不着头脑。例如:在酒店，初次见面对一位英美女客人说：“Did you have your lunch?”她会感到非常诧异。因为在他们的文化里，这样打招呼是暗示邀请的意思。这也是酒店英语服务中服务人员要引以为戒的。

与之不同，英语国家人打招呼，通常以天气(weather)、健康状况(health)、体育(sports)或兴趣爱好(interest/hobby)作为话题。如：

What a lovely day!(今天天气真好呀!)

I like hiking，and you?(我喜欢徒步旅行，你呢?)

(二)介绍(Introduction)用语

中国人小学第一节英语课便学了“What’s your name?”这句话。而这句话伴随许多人长大，考过了四、六级，TOEFL，IELTS，但对于它在何种情况下使用却鲜有解释。实际上，英语国家的人在第一次见面时一般先把自己的名字告诉对方，如“I am ...”，对方会自然地说出自己的姓名。因此“I’m ...”这里可以直接译成“请问贵姓?”。即使在填写表格、面谈等场合需要问及姓名时，一般也只说“Your name，please?”或“May I have your name?”如果使用“What’s your name?”会有一种被审问的感觉。一般只有海关人员、警察采用这种问讯句式。因此酒店员工在客人check-in(入住登记)或check-out(办理退房)的时候，一定要注意礼貌而得体的问询，以免冒犯客人。

(三)称赞(compliment)和接受赞扬

在人际交往中，谦虚和低调是中国人崇尚的表达方式，常会用“哪里哪里”、“不行，差远了”来回应别人的夸奖。而西方人则认为实话实说才能友好往来，而会欣然接受来自他人的赞扬。也常用赞美作为交谈的话题，如赞美对方出色的工作等。面对客人的赞美，员工的回答应是:“Thank you.”如：

Guest:You did a good job!

Waitress:Ah，thank you.

(四)关于隐私(privacy)

在中国，初次见面询问对方年龄、婚姻、收入是很自然随意的事情。而倾向自我、独立和自由的英语国家的人，会认为这些内容涉及个人隐私。如：

Are you married?(你结婚了吗?)

What’s your salary?(你的薪水是多少?)

以上内容涉及个人隐私，服务员切忌问及客人此类问题。因此，当酒店员工对入住客人的基本情况不甚了解时，“Is your husband/wife with you?”或“How many children do you have?”这样的问话是不得体的。

(五)搭配词语(phrase)表达

搭配词语指词与词的横向组合关系。搭配是民族文化中约定俗成的，不能用中文的搭配思维去套用到英语里面。在酒店用语中经常用到的如:“红茶”英语为“black tea”，而“black coffee”用汉语表示为“不加糖的咖啡”;“红酒”在英语中是“wine”(不是red wine);而white wine中文也不译成“白酒”。因此在搭配词语运用时，同样要注意词汇表达中的文化内涵。

四、尊重语言文化、提高饭店英语应用能力

世界各民族由于历史渊源、思想方式、生活习性、审美观念、价值理念、宗教信仰等不同，从而产生了文化上的差异。语用能力的提高离不开目标语国家的文化因素，因此要增强文化意识、主动自觉地吸收并融入他人文化环境中。

在培养文化意识(culture consciousness)，理解语言内涵的同时，还应注重不同的文化有着不同的语用原则，注重词汇文化差异、句法文化差异及日常习俗文化差异来强化文化意识，为提高正确语用能力奠定基础。不能视酒店英语为简单的口语交流，必须增强对英语文化背景知识的学习，要树立英汉语言差异意识，懂得英语在不同语境中的应用，即掌握一些文化语用知识。

五、结语

综上所述，酒店服务人员应改掉以往只重视语言本身而忽视语言文化的不合理做法，把文化因素纳入语言之中，用英语进行有效得体的交际。努力培养文化习得意识并使文化的规范与语言技能的培养同步进行。不仅注意语言形式的正确，还要重视语言运用是否恰当。既要有母语和英语两种语言的对比语言学修养，又要有两国比较文化背景学方面的知识，这才是成为国际化酒店具有跨文化意识人才的首要条件。

参考文献：

[1]Denney G.Rutherfordaf著.梁晓波，王才美，刘亚琴译.现代美国饭店经营与管理[M].湖南科技出版社，2001.

[2]鲍伯・里宾斯基著.李正喜译.专业酒水[M].大连理工大学出版社，2002.

[3]许元娜.提高大学生英语学习能力的研究[J].齐齐哈尔医学院学报，2009.

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浅析美式英语语言文化特点分析

摘要：美国文化是崇尚自由、平等和自我的文化，其包容性十分强，具有多元化的民族融合性。其核心文化特征是追求人人平等和自我价值的实现。这些文化特征在美式英语文化中有着深刻的体现。文章结合美国文化的产生背景对其语言分析特点进行分析探讨。

关键词：美式英语;语言文化;特点

引言

美国文化是一种非常独特的民族文化。从世界文化的区域和类型来说，美国文化属于西方文化范畴。但与其他西方文化相比，美国文化有着许多迥然不同的地方，它不但有别于与其有着亲缘关系的英国文化。而且有别于它的邻国加拿大和其他欧洲国家的文化。语言与文化的关系是水乳交融、不可分割的。

首先，语言体现了文化。一方面，语言是文化的一部分。根据文化的狭义定义，文化是从社会习得的知识。而语言则是人类对客观事实的认识和感受的反应，属于人类文化的一部分。另一方面，语言是文化的载体。因为语言是人类思维和交流的工具，也是人类形成思想的中介。本文试图从美国英语所反映的移民文化、价值观念、新文化等方面来分析美式英语语言文化的形成特点。

一、美式英语的形成背景

美国英语的形成与发展与美国的移民历史所带来的文化大融合有着密切关系。17世纪初，英国开始在北美进行殖民活动，在北美建立多个殖民地，而在殖民地的通用语言就是英语。之后不断有欧洲人移民到这片大陆上。自殖民地时期，美国英语就在多民族的接触与融合中从异族的语言文化中吸取营养，充实内涵，加快语言的多元化发展，形成美国英语的独特的融合特征。德语、法语、西班牙语、荷兰语和印第安语、黑人语言等移民群体的语言词汇不断渗透到美国人使用的英语里。

另一方面，美国政治、经济、人口结构和社会生活的特殊性，推动了作为社会交际工具的语言美国英语的独立与发展。在词汇、语音和语法结构等方面有别于英国英语的民族语言，美国英语的形成关键在于这个民族在新的社会和生活环境中不拘一格地创造和使用新词。而美国英语中丰富的新词都是出现在普通大众的言谈之中。

由于美国新社会特有的力量和群众性语言占据优势，因此，在美国，语言影响的流程是由下而上发展的。在美国英语中，最贴近生活和最能反映平民要求与社会生活特征的是俚语，俚语是美国英语词汇的主要来源之一。方言和俚语一样分布广泛，来自社会各个阶层，是美国民族语言的生命源泉，既有浓厚的民族文化内涵，又有丰富的表现力和多样性，大量的方言和俚语使得美国英语在较短的时间内区别于英国英语而成为美利坚民族的民族语言。

二、美式英语的语言文化特点

1、个体主义价值观及其在美国英语中的表现

美国文化以个体为本位，个人主义在美国发展到登峰造极的地步，是美国价值观的核心。它的主要内容是通过自力更生达到自我实现。与它联系最紧密的是自由平等竞争。机会均等和个人自由是实现自我价值的基本保障，而竞争是实现个人价值的根本途径。美国人在创造自己文化的同时，也创造了许多表现个人主义的词汇。最有代表性的如：self-absorption(自我专注)、self-limitation(自我制约)、self-cultivate(自我修养)、self-conquest(自我战胜)、self-admiration(自我赞赏)、self-control(自我控制)、self-dependence(自立)、self-reliance(自我依靠)、self-responsibility(自我负责)、self-advancement(自我发展)、self-salesmanship(自我宣传)、self-fulfilling(自我实现)、self-protection(自我保护)等。个体主义价值观特别重视对个人空间和私生活的保护和尊重。"privacy"(隐私)一词在美国人的意识中占有异常重要的位置。无论是在生活空间还是在情感处理上，哪怕是对一个未成年的孩子，都会尊重对方的选择和隐私。

2、美国英语与印第安文化

土著印第安人是美洲大陆最早的定居者，他们的祖先是具有亚洲蒙古人血统的游牧狩猎者，他们于后冰川时代跨过白令海峡来到北美大陆。从美国英语中可以找出许多反映印第安文化的词语。如山川、河流、湖泊等。美国英语吸收了约有2000个左右的印第安词语。

印第安人善于狩猎并拥有种植的技艺，因此很多动物和植物的名称都来自印第安语。如mose(麋)、pecan(美洲核桃)等。美国各州的名称，有一半是来自印第安语。如密苏里州(Missouri)、俄勒冈州(Oregon)、密西根州(Michigan)、马萨诸塞州(Massachusetts)、犹他州(Utah)等。另外，许多与印第安人的部落关系、生活方式、宗教习俗、农作物以及社会机构有关的词也来自印第安语。

3、美国英语使用的通俗化和标新立异的意识

美国人在词语的使用上有通俗化的特点，他们不喜欢咬文嚼字，说话力求形象、易懂。最能体现美国人用词通俗化的是美国俚语。美国俚语是平民百姓的语言，虽通俗形象不矫揉造作，但有些也难免流于粗俗，这些粗俗的俚语不宜登大雅之堂。但有时为了避免语言单调和落入俗套，上流人物甚至总统也敢离径叛道。贵为总统，出言粗俗，无非是想表明自己敢于向常规与正统挑战，在语言表达上突出自己的粗犷个性和创新意识。

汽车文化是美国社会的显著特点，美国人经常借用汽车的商标来比喻其他产品的质量和等级。如，美国Ford汽车公司曾生产一种滞销的Edsel牌汽车，于是，Edlse就常被用来比喻为"彻底失败的产品或人"。

结语

美国英语丰富多彩，反映了美国文化的千姿百态。而且，美国英语的每一个演变都有其社会背景和文化内涵，是与美国社会的发展齐头并进的。它们真实地反映了美国社会的发展历程，是美国各个历史时期社会活动和文化思潮的折射。在美国英语中，不仅蕴藏着美利坚民族特有的传统文化、价值观念和性格特征，而且也突出地体现了语言的时代特征。

参考文献

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