科罗拉多州立大学语言文学及文化专业thesis

 

1. Introduction 引言

 

Language is closely connected with culture. As we know, every nation has its own culture and the cultures of nations in the world are different from each other. Owing to the discrepancies in culture, a word used to express good intention may surprise or offend people; a common sentence can sometimes amuse one person greatly and cause laughter, but it can be dull in the eyes of another person with a different cultural background.

 

No matter in the field of foreign language teaching or translating, we are well trained for listening, speaking, reading, writing and translating in the kingdom of the target language. But if we are careful enough, we may notice that in schools and on some cross-cultural communicative occasions, some students and young interpreters may speak English in an inappropriate way, although their pronunciation is good and the grammar is correct. That is because for a long time the traditional English learning has been in the leading position. We have laid too much emphasis on language itself, i.e., pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar. And to some extent, we have neglected the cultivation of cross-cultural communicative competence and cultural awareness. Thus, after years of English study, we still find ourselves as losers when we communicate directly with the native English speakers.

 

2. Literature Review文献综述

 

2.1 some basic concept about “culture”

 

The definitions of culture vary from people to people, and they hold to their own idea hardly. The concept of culture was first defined in print in 1871, as Edward Burnett Tylor’s book Primitive Culture was published. He wrote,“Culture or civilization , taken in its wide ethnographic sense, is that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society.”[1] This definition emphasize more on spirit, and it represents most anthropologists, and for most people, culture has long meant the way of life of a people, the sum of its learned behavior patterns, attitudes, and material things. The term “culture” may be understood in a broad or narrow sense. Ji Xianlin, the master of Chinese culture, defined culture as“culture is life, include both material and mind, the basic necessities which are produced by the social relations of production is the material culture; The social ideology which is revealed by the social relations of production is called the spiritual culture, such as law, politics, art and philosophy. 1 This is culture in its broad sense. Often referred to as culture with “C”; On the other hand, culture may also refer to whatever a person must know in order to function in a particular society. According to W. H. Goodenough, “A society’s culture consists of whatever it is one has to know or believe in order to operate in a manner acceptable to its members...culture is not a material phenomenon, it does not consist of things, people, behavior or emotions...it is the forms of things that people have in their mind, their models for perceiving, relating and otherwise interpreting them”[2]. Goodenough’s definition is culture in its narrow sense, often referred to as culture with “c”.#p#分页标题#e#

 

William A. Haviland summarized four universal characteristics of culture:1

 

1) Culture is shared. Culture is a set of shared ideals, values and standards of behavior. It is the common denominator that makes the actions of individuals intelligible to the group. Because they share a common culture, people of the same community can predict each other’s action in a given circumstance and react accordingly.

 

2) Culture is learned. All culture is learned rather than biologically inherited. One learns one’s culture by growing up in it. The process whereby culture is transmitted from one generation to the next is called enculturation.

 

3) Culture is symbolized. All human behavior originates in the use of symbols. Art, religion and money involve the use of symbols. Symbolic language is the foundation upon which human cultures are built.

 

4) Culture is integrated. For the purpose of comparison and analysis, anthropologists customarily break a culture down into many discrete elements. But all aspects of a culture function as an inter-related whole. This tendency is called integration.

 

According to Edward Hall, the essence of culture lies in the fact that it is a mold in which we are all cast2. Culture controls our life in many unsuspected ways; also it is the man’s behavior we taken for granted. Though the concepts of culture are abstract, they turned out to be have the deepest relevant with human concerns. Hall concludes that full acceptance of the reality of culture would have revolutionary consequences.

 

2.2 the relationship between culture and language

 

From the definitions about culture above, we know that language and culture are inextricably linked and they can’t be divided from each other, we can get the idea from the following three aspects: first, language is the carrier of culture, it is the material forms of culture, the formation and the expression of culture cannot leave language. Second, as to language, it is a part of culture and plays a very important role in it, language is influenced and shaped by culture, and it reflects culture. Last but not least, the expression of language is the symbolic representation of a nation, and it comprises heir approach to life and their ways of living and thinking as well as their historical and cultural background.

 

2.2.1 The cultural influence on animal words

 

In the language system of human beings, animal words play a very important part, and it is with great charm. We should not only pay attention to its conceptual meaning but also should pay more attention to their connotative meaning. Through the analysis of the meaning of the same animal in English and Chinese, we can analysis how the culture affect vocabulary, which can help us in language learning and cross-cultural communication. Both English and Chinese background can cause different image for the same animal word, thus the same animal word have the same conceptual meaning but different in the connotative meaning, even absolutely the opposite.#p#分页标题#e#

 

1, Fish

 

English contains a lot of phrases and idioms about fish, and it gives fish a rich but different from Chinese cultural significance. For example, in English, fish represents “special people” or “guy”. “a big fish” refers to the “ big man, tycoon”; “a dull fish” refers to somebody who is slow in thinking or action; “a poor fish” is the “unlucky man”; “ a cool fish” for“ unscrupulous person”, “ a cold fish” for the person who is indifferent for others; As for “a loose fish”, it means dissolute man. But I should point out that, in these examples, all the parables of fish are derogatory terms. The idioms formed by fish are very lively and interesting. Such as “fish in the air”, the original intension of this idiom is “air fishing”, it refers to “the method or the direction is wrong, so can’t reach the purpose”, which is equivalent to the Chinese idioms “缘木求鱼”. And as “like a fish out of water” means“such as fish from water, feel unfamiliar”; “Feel the fishes” refers to the “in Davy Jones’s locker or get seasick”; in Chinese, the cultural meaning of “fish” is flourishing. “Fish” is the homophonic of “余”, so Chinese believe that when they dream about“fish”, they maybe get rich. Besides, fish is the homophonic of “多余的”, therefore, the lucky term “年年有鱼(余)” comes into being. From this point of view, fish is the symbol of wealth is occasional and it is because it’s pronunciation accidentally the same with rich in Chinese. But this is not the only reason, in the ancient China and some other nationalities, fish, in the eyes of people, can say foe wealth. Maybe it’s because to the primitive man, catch fish means get wealth. In addition, “fish” can also refers to bad guys, such as “鱼龙混杂” means the bad and the good man mix together; to express “人为刀俎我为鱼肉”, we say the others have the knife, but I am just a fish in the table; to express the relationship is very intimate, the analogy is “如鱼得水.”

 

2, Bat

 

In British and American culture, “bat” is an ugly, evil vampire animal, so in English, we have the phrases as “as blind as a bat”, “have bats in the belfry (whimsical)”. In the European folklore, bat is an evil animal, and it always related with the dark and evil, especially “vampire bat”, when mention it, we get feared. If we say someone is “batty”, it means she (he) is abnormal. But in Chinese, the connotative meaning of bat is absolutely different. Due to the pronunciation of “蝠” and “福” is the same, bat became the symbol of auspicious and healthy. The image composed of bat and peach contains the meaning“福寿延年”; The bats and deer composition means“福禄双全”. Put bats and fish together, we take its “rich” meaning for they are homophonic, delivering our expectation of a bright future. According to the folk tale, bats live to one thousand years will become white, and they hang themselves in the trunk, if ate the bats’ meat, we were expected to longevity. What’s more, red bats are the symbol of good luck, because red bats are the harmonics of “洪福”.#p#分页标题#e#

 

2.2.2 The cultural meaning contained by animal words

 

Some animal words not only have the same conceptual meaning but also have the same connotative meaning in both Chinese and English. This is a kind of cultural superposition phenomenon. Different nations sometimes have the same attitude towards the same animals, thus to some certain animals, although nations vary, they have the similar associative meaning.

 

1, Fox

 

Take “fox” as an example, when refer to fox, both Chinese and English remind their memory of cunning, sly, brimful of mischief. We say “he is as sly as a fox. You’ve got to watch him” in English, and in Chinese also have “像狐狸一样狡猾”. For another instance, we called a girl with being a sugar daddy "狐狸精", and in English, foxy refers to the women beautiful but harmful.

 

2, Parrot

 

The parrot is a bird can mimic human being’s pronunciation. Both English and Chinese use parrot to describe the people who have no independent opinions. Such as“he doesn’t have an idea on his own. He just parrots what other people say or he didn’t own point of view, only a parrot.” Moreover, we Chinese describe people as ass, pig and busy bees, also in English, we have the similar way: You ass! Your stupid ass! How could you do a thing like that?! The children were as busy as bees, making preparations for the festival.

 

2.3 the cultural difference between Chinese and English from the perspective of animal words.

 

2.3.1 Current situation of the research at home and abroad

 

The researches which foreigners do on the animal words are less than we do. The early linguist mainly classified and explained the language based on its source and expressive function. The British linguist Smith (1925) is the representative among, and in the classification of the language he made the animal words as an essential part. What’s more, he classified the communicative function of animal words, and divided into the expression of emotion, attitude, desire, determination, curse and angry, etc.

 

The foreign linguist’s interpretations on the sources of animal words are varied. Firstly, from the historical point of view, the Great Britain once was the mistress of the seas and the suzerain of the Commonwealth. Besides Europe, it had its colonies all over the other continents. Therefore, the British could meet much more animals more frequently. Secondly, Christianity is the national spiritual totem in western countries, and “the Bible”, which is the essential book in every family, have a profound effect on the animal words as it has several sermons about animals. Moreover, due to the differences of religious culture, the different cultural groups have different flavors of the same animals. Moreover, the myths of Greece and Rome had a great influence on the culture and spiritual areas of western countries. A lot of cultural connotations of animal words are derived from there, and passed down from generation to generation.#p#分页标题#e#

 

According to Mr. Liao Guangrong's statistical analysis, there are culture-loaded animal words in a total of 258 in English, accounting for 39.75% of all common animal words. While in Chinese, the total number is 105, accounting for 16.16% of all. (Liao Guangrong, 2000). The ratio of culturally-loaded animal words in English is much higher than that in Chinese. Therefore in china we are mainly focus on the comparative study and analyze between English and Chinese animal words.

 

There is book called “On the Solidified Religious Meanings of English and Chinese Animal Words”. Started the visual angle from language research and made the animal words as its field, the authors Zhang Fuyong and Du Jiali discussed the religious meanings of the English and Chinese animal words which are under the influence of religious culture and their solidification, conflicts and gradual interpenetration on different religious cultures.

 

In Li Meng’s book “The Source of Cultural connotations of the English and Chinese Animal Words”, he concluded that the source of cultural connotations of the English and Chinese animal words is mainly from four aspects: history, religion belief, human’s interests and the myths or legends. Jia Xiaohui, Quan Yuping in their book “On Animals and Chinese Culture” gave us several examples of the culture function of animals: Sacred totem, the symbol of ethics and the roles of folk culture.

 

2.4 Several summaries of “the source of animal words”

 

2.4.1 The reasons caused by the differences of historical geography

 

There is no doubt that history and geography have great influence on modern life, especially language. Both English and Chinese have some words which are reflecting historical events, the difference is some are used in a certain time while the other are still used today. Take “buffalo” as an example. It has no special extended meaning in Chinese but in English there is a certain usage “to buffalo”. At the very beginning, it means “confusing” or “helpless”, gradually it changes into “kidding” or “threatening”. These meanings are related to the history of West America. Once upon a time, the West Americans killed lots of buffaloes for economic interest. As the number of the buffaloes declined, meanwhile they are hard to tame, people found it became more and more difficult to catch buffaloes. So they complained like that, “We are buffaloed” which meant “we feel helpless as the resource coming to the end”, or “the exhausting of resource has threatened our life”. In China, we have long history of farming and lots of animal words are related to agricultural activities. At the very beginning, the yellow cattle are used to farm, so until now we call diligent workers “old yellow cattle”.#p#分页标题#e#

 

2.4.2 The reasons caused by the differences of religious culture

 

In English, the Bible is the major religious source of cultural connotations of animal words. The stories in the Bible contain politics, law, art and psychology. Whatever idioms, proverbs, metonymy or metaphor, animal words mostly reflects the religious spirit in the Bible. For example, the word “dove” according to the Bible is from the story of Noah and Noah's Ark. The dove brought an olive branch which now is the symbol of peace.

 

Totem worship is the early form of religious behavior. In ancient times, some animals were artificially endowed with supernatural abilities such as summoning wind and calling for rain, even more it was regarded as a symbol of a nation or a race. For example, Chinese dragon is considered as a powerful and ferocious animal, and it is a symbol of strength and destiny. No wonder that the Chinese until now call themselves “the descendants of the dragon”. There are a lot of Idioms related to dragon, such as vigorous spirit of the aged, lively and vigorous flourishes in calligraphy, dragons and Phoenix, a dragon and a tiger in combat, roaring dragons and tigers and so on. Even the feudal emperor made no efforts to link himself to the dragon, like wearing dragon robes, sleeping dragon couch, claiming himself to be the “son of the heaven”. So we can see that the cultural connotation on the animal “Dragon” has been handed down for thousands of years and had gained total support from the people.

 

2.4.3 The reason caused by social psychological differences

 

Due to the difference of natural environment, ideology and economic development level, different cultural groups have different feelings towards the same animals. British people usually treat the dog as their partner or a member of the family, even their own children. Dogs in the British and American families are enjoying the special treatment, such as listening to some famous piano music or door-to-door medical caring. So the animal words related to dogs often contain the commendatory meaning. “Love me, love my dog” equals to “爱屋及乌”; “a lucky dog” means “a lucky person”; “old dog” refers to the upper class or experienced person.

 

Similarly, the animal also affects the Chinese way of thinking and their language. Chinese animal words often contain strong feelings, so that their cultural connotations come out. The mandarin duck usually appear in pairs, so Chinese like to refer it to the couples. We can find the animals from the pillows the newly married couple used which to express the good wishes of a harmonious union of the two people.

 

2.4.4 The reason caused by different myths and legends

 

The myths of Greece and Rome had a great influence on the culture and spiritual areas of western countries. A lot of cultural connotations of animal words are derived from there, and passed down from generation to generation. For example, the owl in the English-speaking world means wisdom, calm, dignified and stable, etc. There is evidence in the phrase “as wise as an owl”. In Greek mythology, the goddess of wisdom Athena use owl as her symbol, it is said that when the birds and beasts are in a conflict, she will send an owl to mediate. If you describe a person" owlish", you mean he’s smart or dignified. In China, myths and legends are passed down from generation to generation, and some of which are the source of cultural connotations of animal words. Most Chinese think that the owl is a bad omen, put it with bad luck or death together. This proverb “night owl goes to the house, nothing good will come”, “night owl goes to the house, everyone should cry”. However, the Phoenix is considered as the king of birds, “all the birds are kneed to the king”. It symbolizes the good things, peace and quietness, which can bring people good luck. What’s more, due to its rarity, it also refers to virtue and wisdom, “the phoenix’s feather” refers to outstanding genius or precious thing.

 

3. The equivalence of animal words

 

3.1 The meaning of the equivalence of animal words

 

Equivalence of animal words refers to when we express a certain meaning, the vocabulary that are involved in the language are coherence or the same; what’s more, the animal words used in the language represent and reflect the same or similar figurative meaning or associative meaning. Different countries and people, although life style and cultural background are different, but due to the common shape or the unique habits, people pretend to use the same animal words to express the same meaning. The animal words have the same conceptual meaning and the same connotative meaning in English and Chinese do exist, they have the same metaphor, symbol and meaning.

 

3.2 The performance of the equivalence of animal words

 

1) The semantic equivalence caused by the shape of the animal. For example, according to the snake’s body shape and the movement characteristic, the English and Chinese language both use “snakes” to indicate a route or a travel mode. We have the phrases “snakes its way through/across” to mean a winding road travel along the twists and turns in English, and in Chinese, we say “蛇行” or “swift movement of calligraphy” or “self-created suspicion”.

 

2) The semantic equivalence caused by translating, words borrowing and cultural exchange. For example, Chairman Mao once used “纸老虎” to describe the enemy, as with the cultural exchange, “paper tiger” also popular in the western culture. In English, “a bird view” is used to convey the meaning “look from the up to down”, later, Chinese also used “a bird view” to express the same meaning. Such kind of examples consist of “a dark horse”, “an ugly duck”, “horsepower”, “bull market”, “bear market”, and so on.#p#分页标题#e#

 

3) The semantic equivalence caused by the living habits and behaviors of the animals. For “monkey, shakes, fox, wolf” both Chinese and English hold the same attitude, so these two kind of language express roughly the same meaning about these animals.

 

1，Monkey

 

For example, in the eye of both Chinese and English, “monkey” means naughty and clever. In English, “monkey” is “naughty and playful”, so “he is a little monkey” means “he is very mischievous playfulness”. “Monkey business” means deceive people or a mischief. A typical example of monkey in Chinese is the portrait of “孙悟空”.

 

2，Horse

 

We can use “horse” to describe a variety of people. We say “a dark horse (黑马)”, “a willing horse (吃苦耐劳的人)”, and “a Trojan horse (特洛伊木马)” in both Chinese and English.

 

3，Snake

 

“A snake in the grass” in English means a person who pretends to be your friend but actually are the enemies. We have the fable “The Farmer and the Snake” in Chinese, this story tells us that a farmer saved a poor snake, but when the snake is alive, it ate the farmer. So in our mind, the snake means malicious.

 

4，Wolf

 

The English idiom “A wolf in a sheep’ clothing” is originated from the Bible. When Jesus was in Galiee, preaching the area to believe in the god, one day he said to his disciples: “beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves.” In Chinese language, “wolf in sheep’ clothing” is actually borrowed from English.

 

5，Pig

 

In addition, “pig” consists the characteristic of “lazy, stupid and greedy”, thus it gives people the impression of “awkward, messy, lazy” in both Chinese and English, also, it represents ugly. “A pig” means “a greedy, dirtier bad-mannered person”, moreover, if we say someone is “pig-headed”, it means a person refused to change his view about something even if there was an obvious mistake.

 

Such kind of examples reflects that these two kinds of languages have the exact equivalent meaning in the way of using animal words to express their meaning. These words not only have the same conceptual meaning, but also have the same equivalent emotional color, this kind of words do not lead to the misunderstanding in the intercultural communication.

 

4. The inequivalence of animal words#p#分页标题#e#

 

4.1 The meaning of the inequivalence of animal words

 

The inequivalence of animal words means different countries and districts have different life style, customs, cultural tradition as well as the experience of the people, as the language reflects the culture, so the people have different metaphor, symbol and connotative meaning towards the same animals. So in this case, when to express the same meaning, different culture may have different animal words. We may use this kind of animal words in Chinese and that kind of animal words in English to express the same meaning. And also, the animal words used in this language may be completely disappearing in other language.

 

4.2 The performance of the inequivalence of animal words

 

According to the degree of the difference, the semantic inequivalence can divide into segmental inequivalence and completely inequivalence.

 

First, the segmental inequivalence

 

1) We use this kind of animal to form a idiom or phrase to express a certain meaning, but in other language, we will use another animal. Through the two language use different animals, the both use animals, thus in the form of expression, they are segmental inequivalence or segmental equivalence.

 

1，Owl

 

In English, “owl” is the symbol of wisdom, solemn, so we have “as wise as an owl” in English, but we don’t have the associative meaning about “owl” in Chinese, on the contrary, it is an unlucky bird in Chinese, when refers to the owl, we think of bad luck; in Chinese, we use “monkey” to indicate “wise”.

 

2，Bat

 

“Bat” have negative meaning in English, it reminds people of blind, ugly, sin and vampires, such as “as blind as a bat”, but in Chinese, bat is commendatory, it is a symbol of happiness, good fortune and rich, because it is the phonogram of “blessing”.

 

3, Tiger and lion

 

In English culture, the lion is the king of beasts, but in Chinese, the king is the tiger, so we have the idiom“when the cat is away, the mice will play” and “老虎不在家，猴子称霸王” in Chinese. As long as we use “tiger” in Chinese, the phrases will contain “lion” in English. These kind of words include “lion-hearted”, “as majestic as a lion”, “as brave/bold as a line”, “lion in the way”,“make a lion meal of”,“twist the lion’s tail”.

 

4, Horse and cow

 

The same example lies in “horse” in English and “cow” in Chinese, this is because, in the eyes of western people, the horse is hard-working and willing to do everything, but in China, “cow” is to bear hardships and stand hard work and it is the symbol of great strength. To the west, the people who is hard-working and willing to do everything, they call them“a willing horse”, actually, it is the corresponding to “cow” in Chinese. “As strong as a horse” will be translate as “像牛一样强壮” in Chinese.#p#分页标题#e#

 

This kind of phrases and idioms is too numerous to mention, like “lead a dog of life(过着牛马不如的生活)”, “love me, love my dog(爱屋及乌)”, “have/hold a wolf by the ears(tiger in Chinese)”, “chicken-heated(胆小如鼠)”，“like a cat on hot bricks(热锅上的蚂蚁团团转)”, “like a drowned cat( 落汤鸡)”, “beat the dog before the lion(杀鸡儆猴)”, “rat in the hole”, and so on

 

2) To the same animal words, they have the same denotative meaning and their connotative meaning is similar but not exactly the same.

 

1, Dove

 

“Dove” is a symbol of peace in both Chinese and English, so we have “dove of peace”, but besides peace, dove also means “a gentle, innocent person” in English, but in Chinese, “dove” doesn’t have this meaning.

 

2, Bee

 

As to “bee”, its connotative meaning in Chinese and English is almost the same. We use “as busy as a bee” or “a busy bee” to indicate the person who is busy. What’s more, “bee” also means “whim notion” in English, so we say“ have a head full of bees” to indicate someone has a maggot in his head.

 

3, Fox

 

Besides, in both Chinese and English, “fox” means “cunning, sly”, so we have “he is as cunning as a fox” and “he was a sly old fox” ( 1995), but in English, “she is such a fox” means “she is a sexually attractive young person”, it is commendatory or neutral, but “foxy” has derogatory sense in Chinese.

 

Second, the fully inequivalence

 

It refers to an animal word used in the idioms or phrases to express a certain meaning in a language, but in another language, the animal word is completely disappeared. It reflects that the two language choose different vocabulary to express the same meaning, that is the fully inequivalence. Because of different cultural background, some animal words in this language can’t be found in another language, so when translate or communicate with others, these words can’t be applied.

 

1, Dragon

 

For example, in China, we imposed ourselves as the “descendants of the dragon”, but it is hard to accept by the English, even lead to misunderstanding. We imposed ourselves as the descendants of the dragon is because in our country, the “dragon” has been a totem image from the ancient, it is a kind of auspicious animal, but the animal does not actually exist. Dating back to the ancient China, the “dragon” has been full of commendatory emotions; we think “the dragon” is the emblem of the emperor, containing “luck, rich, honor and authority”. We respect “dragon” very much, regard it as a symbol of the nation, and we are proud of “descendents of the dragon”. However, in the eyes of the western people, “dragon” is thought to be a monster, it has four legs, wings, tail scales and in can spray smoke and spit fire, people think it is the symbol of evil. This is because, in the , Satan fought with the god, and Satan is called “the great dragon”, from then on, “dragon” is assigned to evil.#p#分页标题#e#

 

2, Dog

 

The conceptual meaning of “dog” is the same, that is, the animal with four legs, domesticated and can help guard home, but its connotative meaning varies. “dog” is commendatory in most English culture, it represents “loyalty”, also it means the person who is trustworthy and sympathy, such as“a lucky dog”, “love me love my dog”, “every dog has his day”, “better be the head of a dog than the tail of a lion”, “help a lame dog over a stile”. These statements show that in English, people regard dog as their lovely partner. But in our culture, dogs are spurned, so the phrases about dogs are usually with derogatory sense. Like “走狗”, “狗眼看人低” and so on.

 

3, White elephant

 

In Chinese, a kind of electronic products called “white elephant”, but when the products export to the western countries, the sales volume isn’t so good, it is because in the western culture, “white animal” means something is “expensive but useless.”

 

4, Cat

 

In the western, “cat” is the “devil incarnate”, especially the black cat, it is the symbol of evil, and people hate it like poison. When we say “a fat cat”, “she is a cat”, “an ally cat”, we contain detest and disdain. But in Chinese, “cat” can’t remind us of these image, when we say “she is like a cat”, we just mean she is docile and lovely.

 

5, Goat

 

In English, “goat” is always connected with evil and devil. The devil created “the goat”, so “the goat” is the representative of the devil. In ancient Greek mythology, Satyr is the deity of the forest; he is a lecher, for he has the face of human beings and the body of a goat, so goat has the connotative meaning of “immoral people”. Besides, in the “all the people will be gather in the front of him, and he will distinguish them one from one, just like the shepherd separate the sheep from the goat”. So the goat has the meaning of “inferior goods or subhuman”. “Make him the goat”, “old goat”,“separate the sheep from the goat” are born at the right moment. But we Chinese have no idea about it. To Chinese, “the goat” is just a kind of animals and it doesn’t have such connotative meanings.

 

5.Conclusions

 

From the research above, we can see that the English and Chinese animal idioms exist differences, the reasons are that English and Chinese have different history, geography, religion, social psychology, myths and legends. Therefore, the translation of animal idioms on one hand should consider the figure of the animal, on the other hand also need to consider the two kinds of culture.#p#分页标题#e#

 

Base on the study of the equivalence and the inequivalence of animal words above, we have some corresponding translation strategy as following:

 

1.Word-for-word translation

 

When the animal words or idioms have equivalence, namely they have the some meaning or style when express the same thing in both English and Chinese, we can translate according to the literal meaning, for example:

 

(1)Not for nothing does a weasel pay a new year visit to a chick.(黄鼠狼给你拜年，不安好心)

 

(2)Barking dogs do not bite(会叫的狗不咬人)

 

(3)one swallow does not make a summer(一燕不成夏)

 

(4)The great fish eat small fish (大鱼吃小鱼)

 

(5)A rat crossing street is chased by all(过街老鼠人人喊打)

 

Besides, we also have "as busy as a bee"(像蜜蜂一样忙), "as sly as a fox" (像狐狸一样狡猾)and "as proud as a peacock"(像孔雀一样骄傲).

 

2.Substitution method

 

When animal words with partial inequivalence, which means in English and Chinese idioms, the animal words have the same meaning but different rhetoric method and cultural image or different occasions or context, what's more, they have the literal meaning but the connotative meaning and the emotional color is different, the cultural characteristics are just overlap, when translation, we can change the different animal words, for example, we use "cow" to describe strong force "力大如牛" but in English we have "as strong as a horse", here we use "cow" to replace " horse" to express the same meaning. We also have the same example like: "a cat on the hot bricks" to describe anxious and worried in English, we use "ant" to replace "cat" in Chinese "热锅上的蚂蚁团团转'. "like a duck to water" but “如鱼得水”to describe the environment is good. "It had been raining all day and I came home like a drowned rat." but “落汤鸡”in Chinese."You will never persuade him，he is as stubborn as a mule." but “犟得像牛”“Cutting down fruit trees for fire wood is an obvious cake of killing the goose that lays the golden egg.” but "杀鸡取卵”in Chinese."Don 't believe him, he often talks horse."equal with "吹牛' . "He is as timid as a horse, you can 't count on him to AD copy whenever you are attacked by robbers." but “胆小如鼠” in Chinese.

 

3.Liberal translation

 

When animal words have completely inequivalence, that is to say a part of english idioms is neither "form agreed" chinese animal words, nor can be found "different form but meaning close" substitute, the reason is that the cultural origin and cultural connotation of these idioms are strange to chinese people. Because of its metaphors in minds of the chinese people and their idioms as the transfer of the culture can't contact together, for this part of idioms, when translation, we can adopt only significance and ignore the image.#p#分页标题#e#

 

This kind of examples are common,such as "to rain the cats and dogs" equals to 倾盆大雨，“a bear garden" means "非常热闹且充满敌意的地方", a rogue elephant( 不诚实不合群的人) ;a mare' s nest( 骗局), there are also many similar situation:Last night, I heard him driving his pigs to market (昨晚我听见他睡觉打鼾声音很大);John can be relied on he eat no fish(约翰为人忠诚可靠);All right I blame myself, But it's the last time we were cat's-paw，that's all.(一整晚我都在责怪自己，但是这是我们最后一次被人利用)He is as poor as a church mouse(他很穷困);

 

Through the comparison of animal words in English and Chinese language, we can see the similarities and differences of animal words come from the similarities and differences between Chinese culture and English culture. So when translate animal words, in order to achieve better effects in the cultural exchange between China and English,we should according to the specific situation and take an appropriate translation strategy.

 

In the process of cross-cultural communication, different ethnic groups and different cultural background have different perception and usage towards the same animal words. This kind of perception makes the animal vocabulary richer and more interesting. Besides conceptual meaning, the animal words have a richer denotative meaning and connotative meaning. The difference of the animal words come from the differences in history, religion, people’s preferences, myth legend and other differences. The formation and the development of the animal words in English and Chinese have a deep relationship with the different ethnic groups, customs, habits, cultural traditions, values, religious belief and the ecological environment. It reflects the differences belongs to the two culture system, and it is also reflects that language and culture are closed linked. Language is the integral part of the culture as well as the carrier of culture. The learning and the use of language can’t transcend culture and exist independent, language reflects, spreads and restricts the culture. The research on the equivalence and inequivalence about the animal words in both Chinese and English can help us improve our competence about language, thus can have a better significance in the cross-cultural communication.

 

1 William A. Haviland, cultural Anthropology 10th ed. (Fort Worth: Harcourt College Publishers, 2002) 34-42

 

2 E,霍尔，《无声的语言》，侯勇译著(北京：中国对外翻译出版公司， 1995)，5