隐喻在英语商务信函中的应用研究
The Application of Metaphor in Business English Letters
摘要
随着全球化的不断深入，各国之间的商务联系越来越紧密，英语商务信函又是商务贸易中不可或缺的重要组成部分，而隐喻在英语商务信函中占据着重要的地位。本文作者在韩礼德的系统功能语言学的相关理论基础上，对英语商务信函中的隐喻现象进行了分析，从语法和语气两个方面分别探讨了隐喻在英语商务信函中的应用研究。语法隐喻是人类认识世界的一种重要手段，而名词化隐喻又是语法隐喻的重要组成部分。英语商务信函中运用了大量的名词化隐喻，在信函语篇中起着重要的作用，同时，这也是商务英语最显著的文体特征之一。本文也探讨了英语商务信函中的语气隐喻现象的语用功能，指出语气隐喻在商务信函中能起到礼貌性、商讨性以及语篇衔接的作用。合理运用隐喻，利用其在英语商务信函中的作用，能有效地促进双方之间的情感交流，有助于建立长期的合作关系。
关键词：英语商务信函；语法隐喻；名词化隐喻；语气隐喻；语言特征
Abstract
With the deepening of Globalization, the tie between different countries has become closer. Business English letter is an indispensable component of business trade, and metaphor also occupies an important position in business English letters. Based on Halliday’s Systemic Functional Linguistics, this paper discusses the application of metaphor in Business English letters in grammar and mood. Grammatical metaphor is an important means for human beings to know the world, and nominalization is an important part of grammatical metaphor. Nominalization means that some words like verbs, adjectives, articles, prepositions and other words can be used as a noun in different ways. There exist a great quantity of nominalizations, which play an important role in Business English letters. Moreover, this is also one of the most notable stylistic features of Business English. In the meantime, this paper also discusses the pragmatic functions of mood metaphor in Business English letters, pointing out that they could achieve the pragmatic functions of courtesy，consultation and the coherence of discourse. We can make practical and effective use of metaphor, which plays an important role in Business English letters. By using it reasonably, we can effectively promote the emotional communication between the two parties of trade, close the distance between the two sides of trade and establish a long-term relation of cooperation.
Key words: Business English letter; grammatical metaphor; nominalization; metaphor of mood; language features