跨文化交际背景下的中英文禁忌语对比研究---毕业论文 精品

【标题】跨文化交际背景下的中英文禁忌语对比研究

【作者】谢玲铃

【关键词】比较；英国禁忌语；中国禁忌语；跨文化交际

【指导老师】王露

【专业】英语

【正文】

I. Introduction

In China, “入境而问禁；入国而问俗；入门而问讳” 1 have been a norm of behavior for thousands of years．Similarly, in west，“when in Rome，do as the Romans do．”is also the norm of western．For the purpose of successful intercultural communication, both east and west people all emphasize on the studying the knowledge of taboos. And linguistic taboo exists universally in almost all of the languages and cultures．The violation of linguistic taboo is regarded impolite and offensive，but people from different cultures do not all agree on what are linguistic taboos and what should be tabooed．Even taboo in the same thing may have different implications，since people from different cultures have established different social customs and cultural orientations．In intercultural communication，they may interpret each other’s speech and behavior in accordance with their own beliefs and values and adopt different politeness strategies to achieve their goals．

At the same time，with the development of transportation, information technology and the globalization of economy, communication between people from different cultures are increasingly frequent and extensive．In this process，people are increasingly conscious of the existence of cultural diversity, and they gradually notice that differences produce great barriers to social or intercultural communication.

Human tolerance and desire for communication do help to reduce these differences and enhance mutual understanding but there are still some aspects such as some taboos that are beyond people’s acceptability because of its sensitiveness，misunderstanding ,unhappiness，conflict or even disastrous consequences may occur due to the violation of certain taboos．Considering what have been mentioned above, when intercultural communication occurs more frequently and more extensively, a systematic study of linguistic taboos in intercultural communication becomes an imperative．Mastering taboos knowledge in Chinese and English helps to cultivate intercultural competence．It is particular conducive to the management of interpersonal and intercultural conflicts，and enables people

to produce harmonious relationships．As James Thurber has said in The East and The West, “Precision of communication is important, more than ever, in an era of hair-trigger balances when a false or misunderstood word may create as much a disaster as a sudden thoughtless act．”2

II. Literature Review

A. The Definitions and Features of Taboo

Oxford English Dictionary defines taboo as：words likely to be considered offensive, shocking or indecent by certain people(though not necessarily by everyone)．In Chinese taboo is regarded as the indelicate or dirty word．Taboo is explained by the Modern Chinese Dictionary as the prohibited words or actions. According to modern linguists Robinett，taboo is a principle or criterion erected by society, which can prevent people from bad action．As Wardhaugh states：“taboo is one way in which a society expresses its disapproval of certain kinds of behavior believed to be harmful to its members，either for supernatural reasons or because such behavior is held to violate a moral code”. Generally speaking, taboo has about it a sense of something unapproachable，and it is principally expressed in prohibitions and restrictions．

Linguistic taboo，as a common social cultural phenomenon in both east and west, exists objectively．It has three features as below．

1. Temporality

With the development of the society, some linguistic taboos changed and some disappeared or lost their original meaning．In the Qing dynasty the poet Xu Jun(徐骏)was killed because his poem had“Qing清”in his poem“清风不识字，何事乱翻书”．B ut he wouldn’t be killed in other dynasties．The poem“清明时节雨纷纷”is widely loved before Qing dynasty．In English, the word“women” was once a taboo in Victorian Age，It meant mistress and adultery wife．But now, it lost its original meaning and became a common word．

2. Ethnocentricity

Every ethnic group has its own cultural pattern．Linguistic taboo，as an ethnic phenomenon, is influenced by the economy, social structure and belief of the whole group．Take age as an example．Chinese people don’t care about old age．Sometimes, we especially call someone “Zhang Lao张老”,“Wang Lao王老”，for respect．But this is totally unacceptable in English-speaking countries．In their opinion, “old老”means useless，and people will feel offended if they are described to be old．So women keep their age secret in the English-speaking countries and seldom talk about age．

3. Context-reliability

The usage of taboos is limited by the social conditions and the psychological factors．The context confines the usage of the taboos．In formal situations like social gatherings and banquets，people will pay more attention to taboos，which can be used in private situations．A lot of Chinese taboos are confined by the special contexts .For example, “帆(Fan, has the same