1、<p>　　ICM and Its Implications of College English Reading Teaching</p><p>　　Abstract： Through the idealized cognitive model（ICM）， we can effectively fill the default values in the discourse， and constru

2、ct a deep structural link between the information in the discourse context in order to interpret a coherent discourse. In addition， the idealized cognitive model has a strong explanatory power to explain the coherence of

3、 grammatical structure formation. Besides， idealized cognitive model theory， through its implication in the deep structure can be applied to the college E</p><p>　　Key words： idealized cognitive model； impli

4、cation； coherence； college English reading </p><p>　　中國分類號：H31 </p><p>　　Idealized Cognitive Model（ICM） was first Proposed by Lakoff （1987）. As its name suggests， it is both cognitive and ideali

5、zed. It means that （a） it is characterized by the relation to experiential aspects of human psychology and （b） it does not necessarily fit the external world "correctly". Xiong Xueliang （2003） notes that ICM is

6、 based on the human experiences and constitutes the most part of experientialism. The question is what ICM actually is. </p><p>　　ICM refers to a comprehensive cognitive structure， or gestalt， that involves

7、background knowledge in various relevant cognitive domains and reflects people’s experiential， unified and idealized understanding about certain domains. Lakoff maintains that ICM is the basic way for our knowledge const

8、ruction. Its approach to the human categorization has been widely accepted. But further research is still needed to explore the potential significance of this approach. There are a few papers in professi</p><p

9、>　　1. Interpretation of Discourse Coherence by Using ICM </p><p>　　1.1 Interpretation of Filling Default Values </p><p>　　In the process of language use， there are a number of elliptical form

10、s. People's thinking often makes the speaker syntactically simplify and even omit the known and familiar concepts in the process of coding information. This is the principle of economy in language use. At the same ti

11、me， when understanding the discourse with some information omitted， the reader's ICM knowledge plays a vital role. After a word activates a cognitive microscopic world， of which the relevant information can be extra&

12、lt;/p><p><b>　　B： Sick. </b></p><p>　　Here， Mark is the subject. In the latter sentence， there is no subject （Mark）， but this does not affect the coherence of the discourse. The reason

13、is that this default information has been put in people's mental schema， just through the activation of cognitive inference so as to understand the discourse. </p><p>　　1.2 Interpretation of Grammatical

14、Coherence </p><p>　　In Halliday and Hasan’s study on cohesion， coherence created by grammatical relation is one of the most important subjects. However， there are many practical issues that cannot be explain

15、ed by the traditional grammatical rules. For example： </p><p>　　“Mary’s bus crashed into a guard-rail. When the ambulance came， it took her to the hospital.” </p><p>　　In this discourse， the wor

16、d “crashed” can bring about an ICM about an accident， and naturally the concept of “ambulance” and “hospital” will be drawn into our cognitive domain. Thus， a semantic coherence is constructed. In addition to this semant

17、ic coherence embedded in the deep structure of the discourse， the definite article “the” is the signal for coherence in the surface structure. “The + noun” is used to refer to something that has been mentioned before. Ho

18、wever， “ambulance” does not appear</p><p>　　From the above example， we can see that ICM can not only be used to construct the semantic coherence， but also interpret the surface coherence that is hard to unde

19、rstand with traditional rules. Additionally， ICM is especially helpful in determining the signified information of pronouns. </p><p>　　2. Implications of College English Reading Teaching by Using ICM </p&

20、gt;<p>　　College English reading is a complex interactive process between language and thought. The degree of reading comprehension depends largely on how ICM knowledge is mastered and how the reading skills are u

21、sed. Therefore， ICM knowledge plays an important role in reading comprehension and reading teaching. 　　2.1 Improvement of Students' Understanding </p><p>　　College English reading is not just the proces

22、s of translation， but a complex psychological interactive process between the readers' ICM knowledge and the contents of discourse. Language itself has a rich cultural sense. And the readers need to understand， guess

23、， analyse and synthesize， try to figure out the original discourse and resonate with the author to understand the author's true intentions. The richer ICM knowledge is， the faster and more accurate the readers unders

24、tand the discourse. </p><p>　　For example， in "College English Integrated Course" （Volume III， Unit 3）， there is such a sentence： "Who is going to make the psychic payment for the transformati

25、on of American from the Land of the Free to the Land of Lock？" From the phrase "from the Land of the Free to the Land of Lock"， we can see that the U.S. used to be "the Land of the Free"， but now

26、 is "the Land of Lock". Through this， readers can activate an ICM knowledge： Now the American people are more and more lack of sense of securit</p><p>　　2.2 Improvement of Students' Interest an

27、d Enthusiasm in College English Reading </p><p>　　Interest is a major driving force to promote students to learn， which is essential for students to master new knowledge. In college English reading teaching，

28、 it is not difficult to find that the more students interest in those topics， the faster and the more accurate they remember. Hence， teachers in their lectures can intersperse the appropriate ICM knowledge or allow stude

29、nts to positively search the relevant background material， which will undoubtedly and efficiently improve students' interes</p><p>　　For example， in Unit 5 "Writing Three Thank-you Letter"， &qu

30、ot;I got to thinking about Thanksgiving， of the Pilgrims， Indians， wild turkeys， pumpkins， corn on the cob， and the rest." （李蔭華， 王德明 2002） Teachers can ask students to find out the relevant information titled "

31、the source of Thanksgiving Day"， understand how Thanksgiving is linked with Pilgrims， Indians， wild turkeys， pumpkins， corn on the cob before class. Thus， it is helpful for students to understand the writing backgro

32、und and the theme. T</p><p>　　According to ICM's propositional structure theory， the knowledge structure of the brain is linked with each other， and is stored by the different categories in the brain. Th

33、e learning of new knowledge constantly organizes， summarizes the existing knowledge and accepts new knowledge thus to create the new concepts. This step is called comprehension， consolidation and unity by the psychologis

34、ts. In other words， only after integrated and idealized， the fragmentary knowledge of the brain can be used</p><p>　　Such as， Unit 1 "By then， Shawn and Amy， our oldest girls were attending expensive Iv

35、y League schools and we had only a few thousand dollars in the bank." （李蔭華， 王德明 2002） Teachers can introduce the "Ivy League" to the students， which represents the eight leading high institutions， such as，

36、 Harvard University， Yale University， Columbia University， etc.. After as long as the students see the phrase "Ivy League"， the relevant ICM knowledge in their minds will be immediately transferred out to under

37、</p><p>　　3. Conclusion </p><p>　　The ICM approach has been proved useful for college English reading comprehension teaching. The ICM view for discourse coherence can further be applied for othe

38、r linguistic studies. For example， discourse analysis has been proved useful for language teaching， stylistic studies and translation studies. A cognitive research into discourse coherence will undoubtedly provide import

39、ant reference for these linguistic studies. </p><p>　　Bibliography </p><p>　　[1]Halliday， M. A. K. & R. Hasan. Cohesion in English. London： Longman， 1976. </p><p>　　[2]Halliday，

40、 M. A. K. & R. Hasan. Language， Context and Text： Aspects of Language in a Social-semiotic Perspective. Victoria： Deakin University， 1985. </p><p>　　[3]Lakoff， G. Women， Fire， and Dangerous Things： What

41、Categories Reveal about the Mind. Chicago： The University of Chicago Press， 1987. </p><p>　　[4]李蔭華， 王德明. 大學(xué)英語綜合教程. 上海外語教育出版社， 2002. </p><p>　　[5]祁宗海. "背景知識與閱讀教學(xué)." 綠興文理學(xué)院學(xué)報(bào)， 12 （1998）：