lexicology --“Learning English idioms”-- 词汇学 小论文.doc

Learning English idiomsThe genius, wit, and spirit of a nation are discovered in its proverbs. -Francis Bacon Looking through the literature, idioms take a great part of the forming of a culture. As a Chinese student learning English as a second language, I found that among the sea of English words and phrases, there are some English idioms of great interest and far-reaching. The idioms, whatever Chinese or English, origin from literature, ancient fable, myths and legend, and daily life, influenced by nationality, geography, and mon in English idioms and Chinese thoughts The east and the west are combined somehow because of the same ideas we share from the experience of human life and history. The hard-working people make the life nearer by forming so many interesting idioms. People like saying “strike while the iron is hot” both in England and China. “More haste, less speed” is also often used. These are the productions of life experiences. In the same cases are expressions such as, “the higher up, the greater the fall” and “constant dropping wears the stone”. Money, seen as the most significant substance in modern material world, makes comic connection between distinguished cultures. “Windfall” describes the property that falls with the wind out of expectations. This seems like the Chinese saying “meat pie falls”. In a traditional Chinese family, which is extremely rich, if only a little boy was born, we call him “Shaoye”. He is born with a silver spoon in his mouth. Jack, an ordinary person, has money to burn. This does mean jack is dull boy but he is so wealthy that he can even make fire with paper money. On the other hand, the west and the east have been communicating all along the history through trade and culture. “Sour grapes” shows the person who can not have the grapes say the grapes are sour. This comes from the famous Aesops Fables. Now the state of mind is formed the stable mentality of envy. differences between English interpretation and Chinese thoughts Though human live in the same globe, we find differences between English and Chinese expressions, idioms included. When going into the English idioms I will mention to some degrees below, we may have a clearer mind. Geography. The Great Britain consists of England, Scotland, Welch and Ireland. Surrounded by sea, the Great Britain makes its idioms with its descriptions of navigation and fishing. “Hearing the news, I was all at sea.” If you think that in this way-when I heard the news, I went to the sea, it can be a big fault. In fact, here I mean I was at a loss, and dont know what to do on hearing the shocking news. The similar idioms like “between devil and blue sea”, “in low water”, “to keep ones head over water” are all relevant to the sea. Cultural psychology. Besides the basic geography, this seems to be the most influential point of view to the differences of English idioms and Chinese thought. Westerners put their individual benefit first, they believe that their own value are the highest and can not be invaded. For instance, one day, Jack ate my cookies without asking me. I shouted, “Hey, Jack. You are dead meat.” You can have an imagination when Jack eats my cookies again, I will beat him to dead meat. And it must be mentioned for different ethnics have different preferences and taboos. We Chinese consider the color red as a most auspicious color. We use “hong de fa zi” to describe a person or a thing that is extremely popular, “zou hong yun” to say one is to have a good luck. On contrast, in English, “red alert” means there will be something dangerous happens, “red ruin” is a fire that will ruin all the things. When it comes to the animals, more views can be revealed. “Let sleeping dogs lie.” Dog seems to be a rude animal in this idiom. While the dog is sleeping, do remember not to wake it up, or you will be bitten at once. The deep in the idiom is that we should not care about the things not related to ourselves, or we may invite troubles. Another animal dragon has a confusing meaning between England and China. In China, dragon is a wonderful totem that stands for power and honor. The emperor is said to be the son of dragon called “zhen long tian zi”. We are proud of dragon. While westerners account the dragon as a cruel animal which has evil wings and makes a lot of troubles. “Sow dragons teeth” is the meaning used to describe people creates the source of disaster. Social custom. Because we developed our culture in different ways and different periods, we have a great difference in social custom. In the west, it is forbidden to “get up from the wrong side”. Getting up from the left is held to be ominous, it is same when we get to put on our shoes and step into the hotel with our left side first. Sometimes in the front of the hotel, there is a porter who is specialized to remind the customers of this custom. This sounds a little amazing. never comprehend the English idioms on surface In English idioms, there are a great many rhetoric features, such as metaphor, simile, personalize and so on. Quite a lot of time we try to translate these idioms at the first sight, it seems that we are likely to be misled by the very special ways of expressing. To set up an example, Jack is talented for music, and he can easily play any opern immediately after he looks at it. Someday I asked him to play Schuberts Serenade for me, he said, “Oh, it is just childs play”. I was very glad because the talent agreed to play for me. Here “childs play” is an idiom which has an idea of a small case. The same as “pull ones leg” which means play a trick and “in the same boat” which means in the same period of hardship. The questions emerge that what a certain idiom and its characteristic is Fitting, many Chinese characters are likewise idiomatic constructs, as their meanings are more often not traceable to a literal meaning of their assembled parts, or radicals. Because all characters are composed from a relatively small base of about 214 radicals, their assembled meanings follow several different modes of interpretation -from the pictographic to the metaphorical to those whose original meaning has been lost in history. It may be a feature that helps everyday life.Generally speaking, an idiom is a colloquial metaphor a term which requires some foundational knowledge, information, or experience, to use only within a culture where parties must have c