2-1 大山——语言学习有感

Dashan’s Feeling about Language Learning 1

Zhao Wei: You have been in China for so many years, what’s your feeling about living in China? Do you enjoy it?

Dashan: Well, actually, I lived in China full time for 7 years, from 1988 to 1995. But now since 1995, I live half in Canada and half in China. I really enjoy that, because I enjoy my work in China and my friends and everything here. But I also enjoy Canada. So I find the best thing for me is to go back and forth 2, because that way I can continue with my career here and have my normal life in Canada where nobody recognizes me. For me, both of those together are really the best combination 3.

Zhao: I think Chinese people are more familiar with you speaking Chinese, but our magazine needs you to speak English. So it’s lucky for us to hear your English this time. I just wonder which language do you speak more in your daily life, Chinese or English?

Dashan: It’s hard to say, because sometimes it depends on what you are doing, whom you are talking with and what subject you are talking about. But I find talking about something very Chinese is difficult to do in English. And also from the opposite way, sometimes trying to explain something about western culture in Chinese is difficult too.

Zhao: You are considered a successful foreign language learner, could you share with us your experience in learning foreign languages?

Dashan: I studied Chinese for 4 years in my university in Canada. I think one of the things my teacher did very well was to get away from traditional textbooks as soon as possible. We used the standard textbooks for the first 2 years, because you have to learn the pinyin, you have to learn the basic characters and basic grammar. For those things, textbooks are the best, because they are very scientific. Everything is nicely arranged 4 for you to learn in order. But language itself is not like that. In many ways, it’s not really a very scientific thing. I think many people in China who study English have a mistake. They try to use very scientific methods to study something that itself is very unscientific. So in the third year, my teacher just showed us short stories or newspaper articles or just things for everyday life to learn. Anyway, it’s very difficult at first. But I think the biggest advantage is: textbooks are written by Chinese people for foreigners, while the novels or newspapers are something the Chinese people write for themselves. So the same thing, we will make textbooks for Chinese person probably different from the way we would actually speak to a native speaker. So I think once you get to a certain level, it’s good to get away from the textbooks and just go to the real living language that people actually speak.

Zhao: It seems that coming to China helped a lot with your Chinese. And many students believe that if they want to speak foreign languages very well, they have to go abroad. Do you agree with them?

Dashan: It helps! Certainly. My personal experience is that it’s possible to learn a language without immersion 51 environment, but it’s much better to have an immersion. When I first came to China, I could talk to people in the street, I could do the basic conversation with no problem, and I could do those skits 72 on television, but of course, my accent was very strong. I think even if you have the knowledge and the ability to communicate, you don’t have the feeling for the language. And the feeling for the language is something that you’ll get with immersion environment. So for young people, I hope everybody has the opportunity to travel overseas 8. I find there’s another great benefit 9 that you can understand your own country much better.

Zhao: Could you talk something about your mentor 103 Jiang Kun? What did he teach you on your class?

Dashan: We didn’t have a formal class together. I learn cross talk4 from him just by being together with him, watching his performances, talking about it and watching him in daily life.

Zhao: Cross talk is a traditional form of Chinese comedic dialogue, and is there any form of comedic dialogue like cross talk in Canada, or any other western country?

Dashan: You know I really just prefer to call it Xiangsheng. If you look into the dictionary, you look upon “Xiangsheng,” the dictionary will say “cross talk.” But if you ask a foreigner if he has ever heard of cross talk, he always says no. In English, we never talk about cross talk. Nobody ever calls comedy skits cross talk. But we have stand up5 comedy, we have comic dialogue, we have skit 6. Those are very similar to cross talk. It all depends on your definition 11. If you think cross talk is one person or two doing a comedy dialogue or talking jokes, every culture, every language in the world has a similar type of performances. One thing that makes cross talk very interesting is that it’s usually one complete story or one topic whereas 12 the western stand up comedy is usually just a series 13 of separated 14 jokes.

注释：

1.immersion [i5mE:FEn] adj. （学习外语时）沉浸式强化训练的；n. 沉浸，浸没

2.skit [skit] n. 幽默（或讽刺）小品；滑稽短剧

3.mentor [5mentC:] n. 导师；指导者

4.cross talk <英> 巧妙的回答（或反驳）；机智的问答；相声

5.stand up [stAnd5Qp] adj. （喜剧或喜剧演员）单人表演的；滑稽说笑的

大山——语言学习有感

赵巍：你在中国生活了这么多年，对在中国生活有何感受？你喜欢这里的生活吗？

大山：哦，实际上，我完全在中国生活只有7年，是从1988年到1995年。自1995年以来，我有一半时间在加拿大，一半在中国。我很喜欢这样的生活，因为我喜爱在中国的工作、朋友以及这里的一切。同时我也喜欢加拿大。因此，我发现最好的方式就是来回跑，因为这样我既能继续在这里的事业，也能在加拿大过默默无闻的普通生活。对我来说，两种生活加在一起就是最好的结合。

赵：我想在中国，人们更习惯你说中国话，但我们的杂志需要你讲英语。所以这次我们能听你讲英语很幸运。我很想知道你在日常生活中哪种语言讲得多，汉语还是英语？

大山：很难说，因为这有时候取决于你在做什么，在和谁谈话，以及你在谈论什么事情。但我发现，谈论某些很中国化的东西时很难用英语讲出来。反之亦然，有时试图用汉语解释一些西方文化也很困难。

赵：人们都认为你是一个外语学习的成功者，那么能告诉我们你在学习外语方面的经验吗？

大山：我在加拿大读大学时学了4年中文。我认为，我的老师做得很好的一点就是尽早地摆脱传统的课本。在前两年，我们使用标准的课本，因为你必须要学拼音，必须要学基础的汉字和语法。要学这些东西，课本是最好的选择。因为它们非常科学，一切都安排得井井有条，供你有序地学习。但语言本身不是那样的，在很多方面，它实际上并不是很科学的东西。我认为在中国，很多学习英语的人都犯了一个错误，他们试图用很科学的方法学习某些本身并非很科学的东西。因此，到了第三年，我的老师就给我们看一些小故事或是报纸上的文章，或者只是学一些日常生活用语。不管怎样，开头很难。但我想最大的好处就是：课本是中国人为外国人写的，而小说或报纸是中国人为自己写的。同样，我们为中国人写的课本，可能跟我们实际上对以英语为母语的人所说的不一样。所以我认为，一旦你达到了一定的水平，最好摆脱掉课本，去学人们日常说的真正活的语言。

赵：看来，到中国来对你的汉语学习大有帮助。很多学生认为，要想说好外语，就要到国外去。你同意他们的观点吗？

大山：当然有帮助！我的个人经验是，没有本土语言环境学习一种语言固然可以，但如果有本土语言环境就好多了。当我第一次来中国时，我可以在街头与人交谈，可以毫无问题地进行基本对话，而且可以在电视上演幽默小品，但当然了，我的口音很重。我想，即使你具有与人交流的知识和能力，你还是没有对那种语言的感觉。而这种感觉你可以从本土语言环境中得到。所以，对于年轻人来说，我希望他们都能有机会到海外看看。我发现这样还有一个极大的好处，就是你可以更好地了解你自己的国家。

赵：你能谈谈你的老师姜昆吗？他在课上都教你些什么？

大山：我们并没有上过什么正式的课。我跟他学相声只是通过和他待在一起，看他表演，谈论表演，还有看他在日常生活中的一言一行。

赵：相声是中国一种传统的幽默对话形式，在加拿大或其他西方国家有没有像相声这样的幽默对话形式呢？

大山：要知道，我其实更愿意称它为“XiangSheng”（相声）。如果你在字典中查“相声”，它会告诉你是“crosstalk”。但如果你问一个外国人有没有听说过“crosstalk”，他们通常会说没有。在英语中，我们从来不说这个词。没有人管幽默小品叫“crosstalk”。但是我们有滑稽说笑表演，有幽默对话，有滑稽短剧。它们跟相声非常相似。这都取决于你对它的定义。如果你认为相声是一两个人做幽默对话或是说笑话，那么世界上每种文化、每种语言都有类似的表演形式。相声有一点很有意思的是，它通常是一个完整的故事或话题，而西方的滑稽说笑表演通常只是一系列互不相关的笑话。