新加坡的社会语言研究

【作者】 崔东红；

【导师】 游汝杰；

【作者基本信息】 复旦大学 ， 汉语言文字学， 2008， 博士

【摘要】 新加坡是个缺乏天然资源的岛国,国小民寡却多元种族并存。蕞尔小国能够取得世人瞩目的经济成就,是前瞻性规划、系统管理和人尽其才的结果。国家语言政策和教育制度的制定和实施,以立国、生存、发展为目标,从超前的角度进行设计,在利弊之间做出权衡、取舍,最终避免陷入小国不能承受的逆境。这是研究、理解新加坡语言政策和社会语言现象的大前提。在这个大前提下,论文从宏观社会语言学角度,对现有的社会语言状态进行研究与分析。通过梳理多语社会的发展历程,总结影响各语种竞争与层级的因素,探讨国家政策预期成效和实际结果之间的关系,发掘现实中潜在的问题,预测各语种未来的发展趋势,为新加坡的社会语言研究提供比较完整、全面的近期成果。本文采取抽样调查、典型调查、个案调查、资料搜集、观察法等方法,对社会语言的某些具体领域进行了详细分析。调查的取样过程注重全面性,从政治与民间领袖、企业家与专业人士、各行业的从业人员到青少年学生,涵盖社会各个阶层,使研究结果具有一定的代表性。调查分析的重点是职场语言、双语能力、不同社会阶层语码转换个案等以往研究成果较少涉及的领域。在分析了国情背景、国家政策和社会语言现状的情况之后,论文尝试对政务语言和商务语言的一些规律进行探讨和总结。这两个领域是社会语言生态的重要核心部分,语言问题在多元种族社会也是最为敏感的政治问题。政治领袖和政府机构在与民沟通的过程中,必须以大众的接受能力为出发点,同时平衡各语种之间的关系,这一背景形成了新加坡政务语言的独特之处。在商务领域,市场规模、成本考量是选用何种语言的决定因素,文化背景又为语言风格带来深刻的影响。论文的结论是,新加坡特殊的国情背景促使这个亚洲国家以英语为首要行政语言,政府为了强化人力资源的优势而实施双语教育制度。在多语社会,职场内不同行业对从业人员的语言要求标准不同,教育背景和工作环境往往造成双语人士在两种语言的能力方面存在一定的差异。一般的新加坡人都具备了不同程度的多语能力,谈话内容、对象、场合、群体归属感和谈话效率等因素都会引发语码转换的现象。内部场合、特别是群体背景相似的人之语码转换频率较高,正式场合、对外交流时语码转换频率较低。政务语言具有简洁、形象、亲切、便利等特征,商务语言强调沟通效果和效率。更多还原

【Abstract】 Singapore is a small island country with limited natural resources but different ethnic groups. Its remarkable economic achievements have resulted from strategic planning, systematic management and full tapping of everyone’s talent. The national language policies and pedagogy, which aim at the building, sustaining and development of the nation, have been formulated with a farsighted perspective and weighed meticulously to prepare Singapore against adversities that small countries cannot withstand. This initiated my research into Singapore’s language policies and social linguistic phenomena.This thesis, from the perspective of macro social linguistics, has conducted research and analysis on the existing social linguistic status in Singapore. It attempts an inclusive and comprehensive study on the contemporary social linguistics of Singapore, which has been achieved by means of tracing the development of a multi-lingual society, collecting factors which impact competition and hierarchy of different languages, observing the relationship between expected outcome of national policies and the actual results, exploring potential problems in practice, and foreseeing developmental trends of all languages.This thesis has conducted detailed analysis on some specific domains of social linguistics through sample survey, type investigation, case study, data collection and observation. The sample survey in this thesis is fairly comprehensive, covering all sectors of society and people ranging from political and civil leaders, entrepreneurs and professionals, to practitioners in various industries, as well as young students. The findings are representative of the linguistic status of different social strata in Singapore.Domains such as workplace language study, bilingual ability investigation, case study of code transformation between different social strata have not been explored by other scholars so far, hence innovation of my research.Based upon analysis of the national conditions, national policies and current social linguistic status in Singapore, this thesis attempts to explore patterns of political and business languages, since these two domains are the core of social linguistic ecology, and language is a very sensitive political issue in the multi-racial society. In communication with the people, political leaders and government agencies must take the acceptance of the people into consideration and at the same time accommodate between various languages, and this attributes to the uniqueness of Singapore’s political language. In the field of business, however, market scale and cost are the decisive factors for the choice of languages, and cultural background exerts a profound impact on business language style.The conclusion of this thesis is that in Singapore, an Asian country with unique national situation, English is the major official language, and the government implements bilingual education so as to strengthen human resources. In this multilingual society, different industries have different language requirements on the employees in the workplace, and educational backgrounds and work environment contribute to the differences in people’s command of languages. Singaporeans in general possess multi-linguistic capabilities with different levels of proficiency, and factors such as the content of conversation, the addressee, the occasion, the group solidarity and the efficiency of conversation are likely to trigger code transforming, the frequency of which is relatively high in familiar occasions, especially among people of similar background, and low in formal, official communication. Political languages are generally concise, vivid, amiable and efficient, while business languages highlight effectiveness and convenience in communication.更多还原