Abstract
There is close relation between language and culture. Language is not only one part of culture, but also a mirror of it. The language of a nation reflects abundant cultural modality of the nation, thus there are great cultural differences between Chinese and English with different cultural backgrounds. As one part of the cultural phrases, the color words have rich cultural connotation. And a great many of words indicating various color or colors both in Chinese and English have great differences in their usages and associative meanings, because of different cultural and historical backgrounds and customs of each nation. From the point of cultural analysis, this paper have compared and analyzed the associative meanings and usages of the color words between Chinese and English through a large number of specific examples, in the hope of helping people to eliminate the barriers in cross-cultural communicating and cultivating the intercultural communication awareness and ability of English learners.
Keywords Cultural differences, color words, English, Chinese
Contents
Abstract I
Contents I
Introduction 1
1.Color and Color Words 3
1.1 BasicColor Words 3
1.2 Defintion of Basic color words 3
1.3 English Basic Color Words ……………………………………………… 3
1.4 Chinese Basic Color Words………………………………………………..4
2. Difference of Basic Color Words in Meaning and Usages in Chinese and English ………………………………………………………………5
2.1 Difference in Associative Meanings 5
2.2 Difference in Language usages 8
2.2.1 Color Inclination 8
2.2.1 Ill-matched Situation of the Usages of Color Words 9
3 Factors Affecting the Differences of Color Words in Chinese and English 11
3.1 Cultural Tradition and Customs 11
3.2 Historical Background 11
3.3 Religious Belief…………………………………………………………… 12
4 .Conclusion 13
References 14。
