Language and Culture

 

语言与文化

Languages are marvelously complex

语言是极其复杂

and wonderfully complicated organs of culture:

难解的文化工具：

they embody the quickest and the most efficient means of communicating

它们是最快捷最有效的交流思想的手段

within their respective culture.

在各文化中。

To learn a foreign language is to learn another culture.

学习外语就等于学习另一种文化。

In a words of a poet and philosopher,

一位诗人兼哲学家曾经这样说过：

"As many languages as one speaks, so many lives one lives."

"你懂几种外语，你就过着几种不同的生活。"

A culture and its language are as inseparable as brain and body;

文化及其语言正像人脑与人体一样不可分割。

while one is a part of the other,neither can function without the other.

虽然其中一个是另一个的部分，但是失去一部分，另一部分就不能运作。

In learning a foreign language, the best beginning

学习外语最好的开始是

is with the non- verbal linguistic elements of the language,

从这种语言的非语言的语言成分开始，

its gestures,its body language.

即从手势，体语开始。

Eye contact is extremely important in English.

在英语中，眼神的接触极其重要。

Direct eye contact leads to understanding,

眼神直接接触导致理解

or,as the English maxim has it,seeing eye-to-eye.

或者正如英语格言说的意见完全一致。

We can never see eye-to-eye with a native speaker of English

我们和说英语母语的人会意交融

until we have learned to look directly into his eyes.

直到我们学会了他们眼中的意思。