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their teaching skills,turning the mechanical and boring classroom into a lively classroom atmosphere. For students,it may help to provide an effective approach that increases their vocabularies. Under theguidance of teachers, the students can realize that memorizing words is not difficult so as tocultivate the interest of learning vocabulary. And the author hopes that the students can beable to expand their vocabulary by themselves after they have mastered the new method ofmetonymy. Hopefully, this study may provide enlightenment to the future research.
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Chapter 2 Literature Review

The study will be based on Idealized Cognitive Models and Spreading Activation Model,which will serve as theoretical foundations of metonymy. First of all, the basic principles ofthese two theories are described briefly. The relationships between these two models andmetonymy are also included. Moreover, the second part of this chapter is designed to explainthe previous studies relevant to lexical fossilization and metonymy.

2.1 Theoretical Foundations of Metonymy
In the aspect of the connection between the metonymy and Idealized Cognitive Models,metonymy is a cognitive process in which one conceptual entity provides mental access toanother conceptual entity within the same idealized cognitive model. One example will beshown in the following, which will not only show the thinking process of metonymy, but alsorely on the knowledge representation of the world in people’s own minds and the culturalenvironment they live in, which is the theoretical principle of Idealized Cognitive Models.Therefore, the understanding and production of applying metonymy to dispel lexicalfossilization is based on the operation principles of the Idealized Cognitive Models.In the aspect of the connection between the metonymy and Spreading Activation Model,the activation exists not only in the speech act, but also in words because language is a hugenetwork system. According to the Spreading Activation Model, once a concept starts, it leadsto the activation of the associated concepts. To apply this theory in the experiment of applyingmetonymy, teachers only need to select the active points as the starting point in the conceptualsystem, which can activate the network of students' conceptual system.
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2.2 Previous Relevant Studies
The definition of fossilization proposed by Larry Selinker (1972) has been widelyaccepted by other scholars. Fossilization refers to the failure of the usage of a language formto achieve the target language standards, and maintain the level of stagnation in foreignlanguage acquisition.In the aspects of the causes of fossilization, scholars have done a lot of researches fromdifferent perspectives. Selinker (1972) summarized five causes of fossilization: nativelanguage transfer, transfer of training, inappropriate learning strategies, strategies ofcommunication and overgeneralization. Ellis (1994) analyzed the causes of fossilization fromthe angle of internal and external. Long (2003) divided the causes of the fossilization into twocategories. One is the cause that probably influences all the scholars and the whole system ofinterlanguage. Another is the cause that influences individuals, which provides a newperspective for the study. Han (2004) put forward about 50 reasons based on Ellis’ viewpoint,such as low cultural adaptability and lack of classroom inst