从翻译角度探讨新加坡中学生的华语习得 = Chinese language acquisition by Singaporean secondary school students : a review of their learning effect through translation

英语在新加坡的社会地位显著，华语更是民族文化之根本，两者皆不可弃。但近年来，越来越多华族双语家庭倾向使用英语的现象令人堪忧。贯彻了半个世纪以来的非平行双语教育政策，见证了华语使用度的每况愈下，年轻一代的新加坡人对华文的掌控能力也日渐式微。教育决定着国家的发展，当初以英语为主，母语为辅的双语教育是否仍然适用？在面对全球的逐渐多语化的现象，我们应该如何继续在双语上持有优势？这应该是我们探讨的问题。 为此，本研究将面向有一定华文基础的本地中学生，通过使用新加坡权威报刊《联合早报》和英文报纸The Straits Times 节选报道中的词语、短语、句子、小段，让中学生进行翻译，从而了解他们在双语（英语和华语）上的语文以及语用能力，探讨并分析他们的华文习得。 研究的结果显示中学生在面对双语翻译时，对英文的使用更有把握。从语法上与使用的语言，可见中学生的华文语言掌握能力并不强。华文虽然以‘第二语言’称呼，但其文化价值与社会功能远超于此。本文印证了华文水平在本地中学生当中并不理想，以供读者进行反思，并且做更进一步的研究。 English being the official working language, Chinese being an important part of tradition and culture of Chinese Singaporeans, both languages are essential in Singapore’s society and neither should be forgone. The use of Chinese has since declined over the past half-century, since the adoption of the non-parallel bilingual education policy. Increasingly, younger Singaporeans have found to be weaker in their command of Chinese. It is now time to stop and reflect, if the bilingual education policy is still relevant in today’s context. How can our young generation still keep up with our competitiveness in bilingual competence, in the face of global multi-lingual phenomenon? To answer this question, this study aims to explore to find out the Chinese Language competency of Secondary School students in Singapore. A questionnaire was designed for data collection. It includes two parts, one for demographic information collection and the other an English-Chinese translation test for participants to take. Volunteer participants were invited to translate a series of words, phrases, sentences and paragraphs from English to Chinese and Chinese to English that were selected from the local newspapers, Zaobao(Chinese newspaper) and The Straits Times. Through analyzing their word use and expressions, this paper aims to find out the Chinese language competency of Secondary School students in Singapore. The study revealed that when faced with translation of both languages, the students showed more confidence when it came to the use of English. In the English-to-Chinese translations, the students showed that their Chinese Language capability was weaker. The results convinced us that it is high time that educators and language policy makers paid attention to Chinese language education in the schools in Singapore. This paper serves as a reference for future researchers who would be interested in further investigations of the Chinese language command and use by secondary students in Singapore.Bachelor of Arts in Chines