《新编跨文化交际英语教程》复习资料U4.docxVIP

v1.0可编辑可修改 v1.0可编辑可修改 10 10 PAGE # / 10 Unit 4 Lan guage and Culture Some Ideas Related to Ian guage and culture In terrelati on ship betwee n culture and Ian guage Each culture has its own peculiarities and throws special in flue nee on the Ianguage system. For example, referring to the same com mon domestic ani mal, En glish chooses the word “ dog” , while Chin ese has its own character “狗” ；Chinese has the phrase “走狗” while English has the expression “running dog ” , but the meanings attributed to the two expressi ons are completely differe nt accord ing to Chin ese culture and Western culture respectively. To Westerners, “running dog” has a positive meaning since the word “dog” , in most cases, is associated with an image of an ani mal pet — the favorite frie nd, thus they have the phrases “lucky dog ” （幸运儿）, “top dog ” （胜禾U者）, “old dog ” （老 手）, “gay dog” （快乐的人）,and it is usually used to describe everyday life and behavior, as in “Love me, love my dog” （爱屋及乌），“Every dog has its day” （凡人皆有得意日）.But in Chinese “走狗” refers to a lackey, an obsequious person. Since Chinese associates derogatory meaning to the character “狗” depe nding on the cultural differe nee, Chin ese has such expressions as “狗东西”，“狗腿子”，“狗仗人势”，“狗胆包天”，“狗 嘴里吐不出象牙”， “狼心狗肺” ，“痛打落水狗”，“狗急跳墙” We can obviously see that the meaning attributed to Ian guage is cultural-specific. A great deal of cross-cultural misun dersta nding occurs whe n the a ? ” mea nings of words in two Ian guages are assumed to be the same, but actually reflect differe nt cultural patter ns. Some are humorous as whena Turkish visitor to the . refused to eat a hot dog because it was aga inst his beliefs to eat dog meat. Someare muchmore serious as when a French couple on a trip to China took their pet poodle into a restaura nt and requested some dog food. The dog was cooked and returned to their table on a platter! We can summarize the relati on ship betwee n culture and Ian guage as the following: Ianguage is a key component of cult