Analysis of the Phenomenon and Strategies of Reverse Transfer Between Chinese and English

Abstract

The reverse side of transfer that is second language effect on first language has not been paid too much attention to since the concept of language transfer has been brought up in 1972. And according to Cooks multi-competence theory, it indeed exists and studying it would have a significant meaning to the personal development of bilinguals and multilinguals. Based on Cooks multi-competence theory, this paper discusses the positive and negative transfer of English to Chinese, mainly focusing on students multi-competence in English classrooms in China and giving some guiding advice to English teachers in China. It finds out that the good things of Chinese-English transfer are the improvement of semantic awareness, expressions and logic. Besides, there are some negative impacts on the aspects of sentence order and culture. According to the findings, four main suggestions to Chinese English teachers are proposed. They are regarding L1 and L2 as each others resources ,attaching importance to logical words, building confidence of bilinguals and paying more attention to communication than accuracy.