Study On Fictionality Of Non-fiction Texts In College English Textbooks From The Cognitive Poetics Perspective

English textbooks can be divided into fictional texts and non-fiction texts,of which non-fiction texts occupy the majority.Fictional texts are story texts,rich in rhetoric,flexible in sentence patterns,and abundant in subjective feelings.Non-fiction texts include science texts,cultural texts and rational texts;they have argumentative descriptions,rigorous sentences,and multiple use of terminology.Although non-fiction texts are based on facts,natural sciences,or social issues,they are permeated with many fictional factors such as figures of speech,metaphors,fables,and so on for the sake of readability,interest and feasibility in teaching.At present,the boundaries between non-fiction texts and fictional texts tend to be blurred.Non-fiction texts gradually move toward fictional texts.Literature reviews suggest that existing researches on non-fiction texts are mainly about non-fiction literature and non-fiction writing,rarely refer to textbooks,and the researches on textbooks are mainly about textbooks’ content and textbooks’ construction.Therefore,there is a research gap between textbooks and non-fiction texts.Based on that,this thesis puts out the following questions:1.Is there fictionality in the non-fiction texts in college English textbooks? If there is,how this fictionality expresses itself?2.What are the similarities and differences of the fictionality of non-fiction texts between New Horizon College English(NHCE)and New College English(NCE)?This thesis bases on Cognitive Poetics theories,uses Cognitive Poetics Approach and Content Analysis as research methods.Meanwhile,on the basis of the previous studies on fictionality,this thesis looks forward to building a new analytical framework of fictionality,and uses the 64 texts in NHCE and NCE as research subjects to make text analysis and comparative study.Some findings are summarized here: 1.There is fictionality in the non-fiction texts in college English textbooks.The fictionality can be expressed by the following seven categories: figures of speech,cognitive deixis,narrative skills,literature as parable,conceptual metaphor,prototype and figure-ground.2.There do have similarities and differences on the fictionality of non-fiction texts between NHCE and NCE.The similarities are both of them have the first six fictionality categories,figures of speech is the main fictionality category,and figure-ground has no appearance.The differences are NHCE has more fictional elements than NCE,about 1.52 times,and the fictional elements in NHCE are more diversified than NCE.This thesis can provide suggestions for college English teaching from the following three aspects: firstly,this study suggests teachers interpreting and teaching the fictionality during the teaching process,which can provide a new way to improve students’ humanistic quality and cultural accomplishment.Secondly,through foregrounding the fictionality in advance,specifically,teaching and inputting the fictional elements to students in advance,and defamiliarizing the non-fiction texts’ genre,teachers can help to attract students’ attention and stimulate their deep motivation of learning,and cultivate their long-term interest in reading.Thirdly,through teaching fictionality,teachers can help students to understand the beauty of language,the degree of thinking,the power of culture;and from stimulating students’ reading interest to improving writing ability,which can strengthen their creative consciousness of writing.