| Since the time when ESP was introduced into china at the end of1970s and early1980s until now, Chinese economic construction and social development have created afavorable environment for ESP in China to promote its development. Meanwhile, thereis an urgent demand for more and more qualified personnel who have high-levelprofessional knowledge as well as strong foreign language ability to cope with theever-increasing global economic exchanges and international cooperation. More andmore experts and educators have realized that ESP may be the solution to this problem.Moreover, ESP teaching and research has even been regarded as the main stream ofEnglish teaching in the21stcentury (Liu Runqing,1996; Qin Xiubai,2003; Cai Jigang,2004). However, domestic ESP research does not develop so well. Most researches onESP at home are more likely to introduce and promote ideas of ESP teaching from theview of theory. There are few comparative studies which are conducted throughsynchronic and diachronic perspectives to fully illustrate advantages and shortages ofESP research abroad and at home, leaving a shortage of researches with the aim topromote domestic ESP research and English teaching by absorbing advantages of ESPresearch abroad.Based on this situation, this study is aimed to investigate the similarities anddifferences between the ESP research abroad and at home through synchronic anddiachronic perspectives by establishing a corpus of1509Chinese and English ESPjournal articles, selected from Chinese core journals in foreign language research area(including1professional Chinese journal in the area of ESP) and professional Englishjournals in the area of ESP. It is beneficial to promoting the domestic ESP teaching andresearch on the basis of learning from advantages of ESP research abroad. Moreover,this comparative study will provide some implications to the current situation in CollegeEnglish reform.The study showed that, firstly, three similarities were found between the ESPresearch abroad and at home through the synchronic perspective. In the aspect of ESPresearch methods, more and more researches combine quantitative method withqualitative method; corpus-based researches abroad and at home are often associatedwith the genre analysis and quantitative research, focusing more on the written Englishthan oral English; besides, the ESP needs analyses both abroad and at home are in the area of teaching of social sciences.From the diachronic perspective, the other five similarities between the ESPresearches abroad and at home appeared. In the aspect of ESP research methods, bothESP researches abroad and at home are more qualitative researches than quantitative.Secondly, ESP corpus researches abroad and at home share the same increasingdevelopment tendency from1981-2011. Similarly, both ESP genre analyses abroad andat home have also showed an increasing trend from1981-2011. Fourthly, ESP needsanalyses abroad and at home take a small percentage while both ESP pedagogyimplications abroad and at home take the largest proportion. Finally, both English forEconomics and Business researches as well as English for Science and Technologyresearches abroad and at home are paid the same leading attention from1981-2011.Except these similarities, ESP researches abroad and at home have somedifferences. On the basis of synchronic perspective, five differences between ESPresearches abroad and at home were found. As the origin of ESP research, firstly, ESPquantitative researches abroad develop much better than such research in China;secondly, ESP corpus research abroad is more likely to apply specialist corpora; thirdly,ESP genre analysis abroad focuses on EAP analysis while domestic ESP genre analysisemphasizes EOP analysis. Fourthly, although the studies on the curriculum and coursedesign researches abroad have developed earlier and better than those at home, thestudies on domestic curriculum and course design develop extremely fast by benefitingfrom documents published by the Chinese government, especially the Ministry ofEducation. Fifthly, domestic English for Mass Media studies have overweighed thoseresearches at abroad, while English for Medicine research abroad has developed betterthan one in China.Through the diachronic perspective, the other three differences between ESPresearches abroad and at home were found. First of all, ESP research methods abroadand at home are different in the aspect of general tendency. ESP research methodsabroad have been mainly empirical researches since1981until2011. However, thedomestic ESP research methods are divided into two periods: from1981to2000,Chinese ESP research mainly focuses on non-empirical research; since2001, empiricalresearch in China has increased and overweighed its non-empirical research. Secondly,for the part of curriculum and course design, curriculum and course design researchesabroad developed consistently from1981-2011. In the aspect of evaluation, evaluationresearch abroad has won the overwhelming advantage from1981-2011. Lastly, in China, ESP disciplinary research focuses on English for Humanity and Social Sciences whileESP disciplinary research abroad emphasizes English for Natural Sciences.In order to improve domestic ESP development and promote English teaching, it isrecommended that:1) in the aspect of research method, combining quantitative methodand qualitative method is suggested;2) in the area of ESP corpus research, it isnecessary to establish corpora with real information materials in China and it will bebetter to share these specialist corpora in the academic field;3) More attentions areneeded to pay to EAP analysis so as to lay the theoretical foundation of college Englishteaching and promote the development of college English teaching;4) For domesticESP teaching, more empirical researches in the classroom are needed, especially theaspect of systematic teaching methodologies in ESP teaching and the training of ESPteachers;5) domestic ESP disciplinary research should not just focus on English forHumanity and Social Sciences, but also need to emphasize English for Natural Sciencesso as to promote college English develops comprehensively with balance... |
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