思阅读中的逻辑关系(Discourse Marker)

David

Discourse  marker，即英文文章中句子之间的逻辑关系。英文在词语之间和句子之间往往会借助各种逻辑关系词清楚表达思维逻辑和语意关系。因此了解和掌握逻辑关系词可以帮助考生把握文章中语意的转换和发展，理解文章重点表达的意思。众所周知，英文是一种形合的语言，需要逻辑关系将作者的思想前后连接，这样文章读起来才能前后连贯，而汉语为意合的语言，不太需要用这些逻辑关系起到连接的作用，靠内在的意思前后连接。笔者将在本文中浅谈雅思考试阅读中的discourse marker的应用。

任何一项考试，都是出题人用其同考生交流的一种方式，而在这种沟通和交流中，出题人是要考察出考生是否熟悉并掌握了这种交流的语言方式。雅思考试中的阅读，要求考生在60分钟内浏览三篇文章，平均每篇文章字数在800—1000单词（A 类，G类 600—800words 每篇），并要完成40道题。题量很大，时间很紧。但出题人考察考生的第一步既是searching ability ，为查找能力。通常情况下是要先找到同题干对应的原文有效空间，找到出题处后，答案通常都很明显。而原文出题的地方，多为discourse marker所在，即英文中的逻辑关系。所以笔者认为，如果考生抓住了原文中的discourse marker，即抓住了雅思阅读中的精髓。当考生看到一篇阅读文章的时候，就可以有主有次的看，并且可以预知阅读中的考点。因此，阅读中句子之间的逻辑关系为雅思阅读的命脉，考生们如能熟练掌握阅读中的逻辑关系 ，那雅思考试中的阅读应该是考生们觉得欢喜的一面。

先将常考到的 discourse marker列举如下。

One: Comparison 比较关系

prefer/ less than/ more than/ less / second only to

Two: Contrast  转折关系

but/ however/ while/ yet/ although

Three:  Adding ideas  递进关系

apart from/ besides/ in addition ( to )/ furthermore

Four: Order  顺序关系

first/ firstly   second/ secondly   finally / originally/ initially / prior to

Five: Cause and Effect 因果关系

contribute to/ attribute to/ lead to / because of / due to / thanks to / given

Six: Example 举例关系

for instance/ for example/ such as

Seven: Emphasizing

only/ especially

笔者建议，通常情况下，考生在做阅读题的时候应先用1—2分钟的时间将文章从头到尾做一遍skim（速读）阅读，在skim阅读时要尽量画出文章中的discourse marker，待下一步考生做文章后面的考题时，会很容易在原文找到出题处，并快速写出答案。下面以剑7 中test 2 中的reading passage two 中的几道题为例，做以详解。

The True Cost of Food

A   For more than forty years the cost of food has been rising. It has now reached a point where a growing number of people believe that it is far too high, and that bringing it down will be one of the great challenges of the twenty first century. That cost, however,（ 转折关系）is not in immediate cash. In the West at least, most food is now far cheaper to buy in relative terms than it was in 1960. The cost is in the collateral damage of the very methods of food production that have made the food cheaper: in the pollution of water, the enervation of soil, the destruction of wildlife, the harm to animal welfare and the threat to human health caused by modern industrial agriculture.

B  First mechanisation,（顺序关系）then mass rise of chemical fertilisers and pesticides, then monocultures, then battery rearing of livestock, and now genetic engineering – the onward march of intensive farming has seemed unstoppable in the last half-century, as the yields of produce have soared. But （转折关系）the damage it has caused has been colossal. In Britain, for example, （举例关系） （18） many of our best loved farmland birds, such as the skylark, the grey partridge, the lapwing and the corn bunting, have vanished from huge stretches of countryside, as have even more wild flowers and insects. （19）This is a direct result of the way we have produced our food in the last four decades. Thousands of miles of hedgerows, thousands of ponds, have disappeared from the landscape. The faecal filth of salmon farming has driven wild salmon from many of the sea lochs and rivers of Scotland. Natural soil fertility is dropping in many areas because of （ 因果关系）continuous industrial fertiliser and pesticide use, while the growth of algae is increasing in lakes because of （ 因果关系） the fertiliser run-off.

C  Put it all together and it looks like a battlefield, （20）but（转折关系）consumers rarely make the connection at the dinner table. That is mainly because（因果关系）the costs of all this damage are what economists refer to as externalities: they are outside the main transaction, which is lot example producing and selling a field of wheat, and are borne directly by neither producers nor consumers. To many, the costs may not even appear to be financial at all, but（转折关系）merely aesthetic - a terrible shame, but（转折关系）nothing to do with money. And anyway they as consumers of food, certainly aren’t paying for it, are they?

Question 18- 21

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 2.

      YES                     if the statement agrees with the writer’s claims

      NO                      if the statement contradicts the writer’s claims

      NOT GIVEN              if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this

18 Several species of wildlife in the British countryside are declining.

考生先在该题干中划出核心词，British countryside， 回到原文中定位即发现，出题处为刚刚在速读时所划出的举例逻辑关系所在，B 段第三句，for example ， 通过原文同题干的对应来看，这道题很容易将答案写出来，为 YES。

19 The taste of food has deteriorated in recent years.

此题出题处同上一道题，原文并为提及食物的味道是否有所恶化。即此题答案为NOT GIVEN

20 The financial costs of environmental damage are widely recognized.

划出此题核心词，financial costs，及widely recognized，在文中C 段首句but 处。上文B段因果关系处作者写到由于杀虫剂及化肥的使用，土壤已经变得很贫瘠，并且湖中蓝藻的增多也是由于化肥的使用。这些都暗示了对环境造成的损害及破坏。因此在C 段首句中作者用转折关系写到消费者们很少将这些成本消耗同自己的生活联系起来，似乎这些离自己很远。而题目中写到由于使用杀虫剂和化肥所造成的环境危害的成本是人们众所周知的，因此该题为NO。

文中红笔标记处为逻辑关系所在，即考生可以在1--2分钟的skim （速读） 内完成， 然后做文章后面的考题。因此学习和掌握逻辑关系词在阅读中的功能和作用，将对提高答题的速度起关键性的作用。逻辑关系词在原文中的位置还常常是命题考点最集中的地方。通过以上几道题的举例详解， 我们可以看出在雅思阅读文章中逻辑关系的重要性，所以笔者认为考生若掌握了阅读中的逻辑关系，对阅读中的问题即可迎刃而解。同时，能够熟练运用逻辑关系词对于写出条理清楚，层次分明的雅思作文也起到至关重要的作用。

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