A Study On The Application Of Textual Cohesion To English Reading Teaching In Senior High Schools From The Perspective Of Metonymy

According to the new English Curriculum Standards issued by the Ministry of Education,high school students need to master the ability to understand the text as a whole and the relationship between various parts of the text.Meanwhile,it also requires high school students to understand the deep meaning of text from the perspective of textual construction and context.However,the traditional teaching method can not meet the requirements of the new curriculum standards.The main reason is that the traditional reading teaching method only focus on the explanation of the meaning of sentences and important phrases,while it ignores the relationship between the various parts of the text and the overall interpretation of the text.Halliday and Hasan(1976)put forward that cohesion,as the relationship between the various elements,is the semantic concept in the text.Cohesion is considered as an important means to maintain the unity of the text in the functional linguistics,and many scholars explore cohesion from various aspects.In recent years,metonymy has been regarded as a basic cognitive and conceptual phenomenon by cognitive linguists.In addition,metonymy can explain cohesive devices in the text.Al-Sharafi(2004)proposed the textual metonymic model and believed that metonymy has cohesive function.Moreover,the study of textual cohesion from metonymic perspective can expound the cohesive phenomenon which can't be explained by the general cohesive devices,provide us with a more comprehensive as well as the detailed explanation of textual construction,and make students comprehend the text as a united whole and the deep meaning of text.Therefore,this thesis attempts to study the application of textual cohesion in English reading teaching in senior high school from the metonymic perspective to help students improve their English reading proficiency.Based on the textual metonymic model of Al-Sharafi(2004),this thesis attempts to apply the textual cohesion to senior high school English reading teaching.Taking 116 high school students as subjects,this paper discusses the feasibility and effectiveness of the application of textual cohesion in English reading class in senior high school from the perspective of metonymy by means the combination of quantitative and qualitative analysis.The purpose of this study is to solve the following two questions:1)How does the textual cohesion apply to senior high school English reading class from the perspective of metonymy?2)What are the effects of the application of textual cohesion to the English reading class in senior high school from the perspective of metonymy?The results of the study show that the English reading comprehension of the experimental class students who have received the new teaching method has been significantly improved,while the students in the control class have not made great progress.Thus it is effective to apply the textual cohesion from the perspective of metonymy to the English reading teaching in senior high schools.On one hand,this study can provide some enlightenment and suggestions for teachers to promote the improvement of teaching quality.On the other hand,it can improve learners' reading ability and interest.In a broad sense,this paper focuses on the combination of cognitive linguistics and functional linguistics.It is hoped that this thesis will be helpful to the study of English reading teaching in senior high schools.