中英法律语言被动语态对比研究——以关贸总协定为例.doc

LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES Figure1.1 Statistics of Comparative Pragmatic Use of Chinese and English Figure1.2 Translation of English Passive Voice Table 1.1 Main Classifications of English and Chinese Passive Voice Table1.2 Numbers and Percentages of the Three Kinds of Sentences vii CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION Research Question of the Study Passive voice has been widely acknowledged as a distinguished feature of English grammar. According to Curme(1935), it is a highly favored way of expression in English. Lian Shuneng observes that “frequent employment of passive voice in some English style has almost become a kind of passive habit”(1993:86)1. Besides, S, Baker points out in his monograph The Practical Stylist(1985:121) that “Our bureaucratic, massed society is so obsessed with the passive voice that you must continually alert yourself against its impersonal and drowsy pomp.” Great application of passive voice is also a crucial feature of legal English. High frequency of passive voice is accepted as a feature of legal English by many scholars. (Driedger, 1957:36; Jackson,1995:119-120; Tiersma 1999; Gibbons, 2003: 21,166; William 2004:228). William proposes that passive voice serves to “strengthen the idea of authoritativeness as well as impartiality”(William,2004a). Xin Bin also shares the idea that passive voice “helps to achieve thematization which may generate impersonal effect”( Xin Bin, 2005: 80). R.Quirk(1973:807) remarks that “The passive is generally more commonly employed in informative writing than in imaginative one, especially in objective, and non-personal style of scientific discourse and news items”. According to J. Perlmutter (1965:77), “It’s conventional among technical writers to keep themselves behind the scenes, to exclude personal pronouns and stress their work instead.” Legal English is both an informative and technical language and that’s why the passive voice is extensively used in legal English to highlight objectivity and neutrality. 1 Note: