A Dissertation by GRACE HUI-CHIN LIN Submitted to the Office of ...

deconstructed Chinese characters and words and transformed them into new English
words through the skill of “word coinage” in the interlanguage strategy. He was
familiar with how the Chinese words were originally invented. Therefore, he easily
demonstrated his ability in using interlanguage. Cheng Chih talked about how he
implemented interlanguage through Tsang-Chieh’s methods of “creating through
pronunciation,” and “creating through deconstruction.”
Likewise, Pei Pei displayed how she borrowed the word-creating method of
Tsang Chieh, the ancient Chinese word creator, in order to generate her speeches
through interlanguage strategy. Another student, Ling Mei also stated that whenever
she translated a Chinese idiom into English, the people from Chinese backgrounds
would comprehend it more quickly and correctly. Since most people from Chinese
backgrounds have been educated with Ancient Chinese literatures, or philosophical
stories developing the Chinese idioms, they could understand the profound meaning
of the translated idioms. In contrast, the native English speakers might not catch it
easily because of their lack of background knowledge of idiom origins.
Apparently, Cheng Chih, Pei Pei, and Ling Mei felt that the ability to create
words and the ability to comprehend the speech productions created through
interlanguage were controlled greatly by their proficiency in their native language,
Chinese. At the same time, these abilities also were affected by the literal knowledge
of the speakers’ native language.
As to the theme of “intentionality” as well as the systematic reaction to the
usages in communication strategies, Cheng Chih’s perceptions toward the systematic
translation from Chinese to English did explain why interlanguage has been activated
in Asian societies. Non-native speakers from the same speech community tend to
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