英语论文A_contrastive_study_of_color_words_in_Chinese_and_western_country.doc

A contrastive study of color words in Chinese and western country A contrastive study of color words in Chinese and English Abstract: There are different kinds of colors. Color is closely related to people’s life. In human language, the color words are frequently used, and endowed with plentiful emotion and cultural connotation. In both Chinese and English, the words of different colors are abundant. We should pay attention to not only their own basic meaning but also their deeper symbolic meaning. Due to the respective cultural background and tradition, peoples feeling and expression to the color are not the same, so the symbolic meaning of color can produce great difference between Chinese and Western culture. This paper is to make a contrastive study of some major difference in color words. Key words: color words , culture , western , Chinese 摘要：在我们生活中有许多种颜色。颜色与人们的生活紧紧联系在一起。在人类语言里颜色词经常用到，并且被赋予不同的情感和文化象征。在中文和英文中不同的颜色词很丰富。我们不仅要注意他们的基本含义还要注意他们深层含义。由于各自的文化背景和传统，人们对颜色的感觉是不相同的，所以颜色词的象征意义可以产生中国与西方文化的巨大差异。这篇论文对比研究颜色词的主要差异。 关键词：颜色词 , 文化 , 西方 , 中国 1 The definition of color From the scientific definition, color is a visual phenomenon launched, reflected or caused through certain light wave by the object; it is one kind of visual essential features of human eye. 2 Basic color words in the Chinese and English culture Color words in each nation’s language differ from one anther in the world. On the basic color words, there is not so much difference in English and in Chinese. In Chinese, there are 赤、橙、黄、绿、青、蓝、紫，while in English there are red, white, black, green, yellow, blue and purple. Owing to the different historic cultural background of the two cultures, the same color words have different symbolic meanings. 2.1Red Red in the Chinese culture is a basic esteem color. In the Chineses mind, it signifies excitement and succeeding, lucky, loyal and flourishing. In Chinese traditional wedding, people put up the character 喜, the bride is dressed in red, the bridegroom w