[英语学习]A Comparison of Chinese and Western Priacy Concepts.docVIP

Abstract Knowing the different views on privacy between Chinese and Western cultures is important to improve the ability to communicate in cross-cultural environment. This paper is to make a comparison of the views on privacy between Chinese and Westerns and analyze the reasons of the differences. Key words: privacy views in China and West; comparison; reasons 1. Introduction Social being is the nature of human being but the close connection between human beings and their personal affairs is also the inherent nature of human beings. The psychology to protect privacy evolved with the development of people’s wisdom. The origin is the sense of shame recorded in Bible. In Genesis of Bible, the first thing that Adam and Eve did after eating fruit of wisdom was that they knew shame and picked fig leaves to cover their bodies. The scholar, ZHANG Xing-bao thinks that the sense of knowing shame and covering body is the proof of the beginning that people became aware of privacy (WANG Xiu-zhe, 2005: 137). 1.1 Background of the Research In the current social environment, people are placing more emphasis on privacy, and going to greater lengths to have their privacy protected and respected. In cross-cultural communication, we cling to our respective cultural backgrounds, so realizing differences on both sides is the premise of successful communication. Privacy, as a psychological concept, it is very easy to be misunderstood. Due to the differences between Chinese and western cultural background, and different concept of values, the meaning and category of privacy are different; the privacy of consciousness is also different in international intercourse unavoidably. But the concept of privacy is not constant, and it will change with different times and places. Privacy is a kind of common phenomenon; it exists in every culture, just different in how it’s expressed. The conventional view is that Chinese culture is absolutely collectivism, there is no privacy in the Chinese collect