高中英语阅读课堂中融入隐性中国文化元素的教学实践
王笑伊（江苏省南京市南京外国语学校）
附教学材料：
译林版《英语》 选择性必修一第一单元Reading
Comfort Food
Whenever I feel lonely, I have a secret recipe that never fails: rice, milk and sugar, cooked low and slow. No matter how bad my mood is, that perfect combination is always enough to lift my spirits. Sometimes the smell alone can do the trick, not to mention the lovely creamy flavour, which works like a time machine immediately transporting me back to my sunny childhood. With pleasure, I remember the lazy Sunday afternoons I used to spend in the warmth of my grandma's flat, listening to her wonderful stories and greedily eating bowl after bowl of her delicious rice pudding. I take my time over every spoonful, gently rolling the silky dessert around my mouth and enjoying the perfect marriage of rice and milk. Before I know it, I'm happy again.
My experience with rice pudding illustrates the unique power of “comfort food”. In its broadest sense, comfort food refers to any food that makes us feel better. In this article, we will talk about a particular type of comfort food whose power mainly lies in the associations it calls to mind. It often makes up for bad feelings by helping us recall happy memories of the people, things or places we love.
Our comfort foods are highly individual. They vary from person to person, depending on our own unique experiences that have shaped our lives. If we grow up eating certain foods in our family, then those foods tend to be linked with positive emotions. For example, we often connect chicken soup with a happy childhood and its flavor becomes tied up with the feeling of being taken care of. When we eat it again, we unlock memories of a time when we were loved and looked after, and this cheers us up.
The feeling of happiness and sense of belonging can become particularly important for people who move away from their home country. According to some food experts, there are some aspects of culture that people will lose right away, but with food, there are more opportunities to connect to memory, family and place. It is hardest to give up the food that you grow up with. Of course, each person's comfort food largely depends on where they come from－for a Chinese it might be a plate of dumplings with a saucer of vinegar, and for a native of the UK it might be the classic fish and chips, served hot, salty and sour. One mouthful of comfort food takes us back to our cultural roots, giving us the “taste of home” that we cry out for and relieving feelings of homesickness.
That's certainly true for me. Comfort food tastes good and by building an emotional bond with our happy memories, always makes us feel good. It isn't just a bowl of noodles or chicken soup. It's food for the soul.
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