从英汉委婉语中透析中西文化差异

本 科 毕 业 论 文 第 1 页 共 15 页1 IntroductionEuphemism, an appropriate language form created for perfect communicative effect and an important way to coordinate interpersonal relationship, is a common linguistic phenomenon existing in people s use of language.Euphemism appears first in ShiJing , so it has a long history. Chinese scholar Chen Wangdao defines “ euphemism ” and studies it from the perspective of rhetoric in The Origin of Rhetoric. In the 1970s and 1980s, affected by the foreign social linguistic theory, scholars who work on the study of social linguistics become interested in the special social function of euphemism. In Sociolinguistics , Chen Yuan discusses the profound historical and psycho-social background of euphemism, revealing its social essence of avoiding mentioning those unpleasant things or phenomena. In The Euphemism in Modern Chinese Language published in Chinese Language Learning, Shu Dingfang attempts to describe and discuss the structure and research scope of euphemism in modern Chinese language from the angle of modern linguistics for the first time.The study of euphemism at abroad also has a long history. In the 1580s, the English writer George Blunt created the word “ euphemism ” and presented the following definition: a good or favorable interpretation of a bad word. Referring to the historical cultural background of American society, American linguist Menken probes into the reason why several hundred euphemisms appear and become popular in The American Language published in 1936. The book A Dictionary of Euphemism and Other Doubletalk written by English linguist Hugh Rawson manifests the research achievements about euphemism of English and American linguists. The book not only reviews the study history of euphemism, but also makes an extensive discussion of the characteristics, definition and classification of it.Euphemism, as one form of language which contains affluent cultural connotations, must be the reflection of a specific culture. Euphemisms created in different cultural backgrounds reflect different cultural connotations and embodies the attitude towards life and life-style of people living in this specific language group. This thesis aims to contribute to a successful cross-cultural communication by helping people understand the appropriate interpretation of euphemisms.2 Euphemism and Culture2.1 Language and CultureCulture owns diverse kinds of carriers, such as art, language, literature and so on. Language, as the most important carrier, is intimately related to culture. The come into being and inheritance of culture are due to the appearance and development of language. There is no culture without language and no language without culture. At the same time, culture affects language all the time, making language become more accurate to adapt to the development and change of culture. The creation of culture cannot exist without the function of language, and the accumulation of culture is also conserved through language. As a result, language and culture are supplementary to each other and dependent on each other for existence.Language itself, as the carrier and a significant composition of culture, bears the special imprint of culture. Although language is the outcome of the development of social culture, language plays an essential role in the formation and development of culture. The language people use reflects their real thoughts towards what they talk about. Language, from a broad sense, symbolically stands for a people and makes up their historical and cultural backgrounds. Like a mirror, language reflects the culture of a people and reveals their ways of living.Culture is the keystone of language. Any kind of language cannot survive and developwithout the social culture environment, which language relies on. To a certain degree, social culture restricts language s evolution as well as perfection. Language itself has an influence on people s ways of thinking and consequently impacts the culture. However, affected by culture greatly, language changes with culture undergoing in development and change. Just in the contemporary world, millions of the new words in various fields prove that rich and colorful cultures make all sorts of languages come into being.2.2 Euphemism and CultureThe word “ euphemism ” originated from the Greek. In Greek, the prefix “ eu ” means “ good ” with the root “ pheme ” meaning “ speech ” . As a result, the literal meaning of euphemism is “ to speak with good words or in a pleasant manner”(Neaman and Silver 1. Euphemism is a frequently used figure of speech, and there are other definitions of it. Allan and Burridge presents the following: “ a euphemism is used as an alternative to a dispreferred expression, in order to avoid possible loss of face: either one s own face or, through giving offence, that of the audience, or of some third party” ( Allan and Burridge 18.For the reason that the formation of English and Chinese euphemisms has various ways, euphemisms can be divided differently in accordance with different standards. The classification employed in this thesis is from Hugh Rawson, who, in 1981, classified euphemisms into negative euphemisms and positive euphemisms in his book A Dictionary of Euphemisms and Other Doubletalk from the aspect of semantics.The negative euphemisms, which are closely related to tabooed words, also can be called traditional euphemisms. What the negative euphemisms and tabooed words express are the same. If languages, like sex, disease, physical and psychological defects, are expressed in a direct way, they are called tabooed words, giving people asense of vulgarity and rudeness. But if the languages presented above are delivered in an indirect way, they are called euphemisms, granting people a feeling of connotation, elegance and politeness. For example, people in western countries substitute “ sex ” with “ sleep with” or “ go to bed with” and use “ plain looking” or “ ordinary looking” to replace “ ugly ” .The positive euphemisms, also named as stylistic euphemisms, have no relationship with tabooed words. In fact, positive euphemisms are analogous to the words with a meaning of compliment. “I t tends to inflate and magnify the word meaning, making the euphemized seem altogether grander and more important than they really are ” (Hugh Rawson 1. In order to show politeness, respect or strive for cooperation, people apply beautiful words to express things which are unpleasant but not tabooed. In the past decades, positive euphemisms have been applied in such areas as education, occupation and unemployment. There are many euphemisms for some occupations with lower social status. A gardener who shaves trees and flowers can be called “ a landscape architect” . A garbage collector is often said to be “ a sanitation engineer” and a file clerk would be very happy to know that she is “ a research consultant” .The concept of culture is so broad that defining the word “ culture ” seems to be a very difficult matter for us. Different people often see the same object in different lights. Many scholars have defined it. Linell Davis defines culture as “ the total accumulation of beliefs, customs, values, behaviors, institutions and communication patterns that are shared, learned and passed down through the generations in an identifiable group of people”(24. According to Goodenough, culture is “whatever it is one has to know and believe in order to operate in a manner acceptable to its members. Culture, being what people have to learn as distinct from their biological heritage, must consist of “ the end product of learning: knowledge” (167. The culture covers a broad spectrum and contains all the phenomena of the universe. All the things created by people and related to experience, knowledge, science and technology as well as education and language, can be called culture.Euphemism is a language used pervasively in our daily life. It is not only a language phenomenon in both English and Chinese culture, but also is a kind of social culture. Language and culture are closely related to each other. Euphemism, as one form of language, is also greatly affected and shaped by culture in terms of the origin, growth and usage. Simultaneously, euphemism is a reflection of culture. Euphemism bears the weight of abundant cultural connotation for the reason that it deeply roots in the soil of a people s social culture. It is hard for people to make sense of the euphemisms if people do not have a notion of a country s culture. Shao Zhihong points out that he Patrick Hartwell considers euphemisms as “ a natural part of the social world of words ” and believes they tell us “ a good deal about the values of a culture” (305.3 Different Cultural Implications Reflected in English and Chinese EuphemismsLanguage is the carrier of culture and a mirror reflecting social culture. For this reason, euphemism, as a special form of language, must be the reflection of a specific culture. Language decides a nation s cultural features, which gives rise to the phenomenon that English and Chinese euphemisms without exception will reflect the cultural differences of two nations as well.3.1 Different Concepts of ValueIn term of concept of value, western people live for their self-satisfaction. Once they cannot get the material insurance, they immediately think that their life will fall apart and that they cannot be mentioned in the same breath with their friends because they believe they are inferior to them. While, deeply affected by Confucianism, Chinese contend that the value of life lies in the contribution they do in their lives rather than the material abundance. Euphemisms for “poverty” in English and Chinese reflect their different concepts of value.The word “ poverty ” in English is a terrible word which means “ there is neither powernor social status ” . In the western commercial societies, people hold the belief that money talks and admit poverty directly incurs disdain. Although the society thinks highly of the view that everyone is equal and has his own civil right, the phenomenon that the gap between the poor and the rich keeps widening still exists. However, there is no person who would like to acknowledge that they do not have enough money to afford them a normal life. Therefore, people in West spare no effort to refrain from mentioning “ poverty ” for the sake of the poor themselves. The following example will show us how western people avoid “ poverty ” :“ I used to think I was poor.” She wrote. “ Then they told me I was not poor, I was needy. Then they said it was self-defeating to think of myself as needy, that I was culturally deprived. Then they told me deprived was a bad thing, that I was underprivileged. Then they told me underprivileged was overused, that I was disadvantaged. I still do not have a dime but I have a great vocabulary.” (William and Mary 229In the short section of speech above, there are four euphemisms “ needy ” , “ culturally deprived ”, “ underprivileged ” and “ disadvantaged ” , which have the similar meaning as “ poor ” . All these words are just some indirect ways western people use to avoid saying the word “ poor ” because most people regard the possession of material wealth as the symbol to measure people s ability of survival.There are also many other euphemisms for “ poverty ” : “ hard up for money” , “ less well off ” , “ down on one s luck ” , “ in a awkward financial situation ” , “ in reduced circumstances ” , “ badly off ” , “ the have-nots ” , “ man of modest means ” , “ negative saver ” and so on.By contrast, being poor does not seem to be a horrible thing in China. Chinese people embrace the perspective that though one is poor, he has lofty aspirations and believe that poverty can exercise people s perseverance and character. Nevertheless, beingpoor is not a thing to be proud of, so there are only a few euphemisms for the word “ poverty ” in Chinese. The words used most frequently in Chinese are “ 揭不开锅 ” , “ 手头不便 ” , “ 拮据 ” and “ 囊中羞涩 ” . The small quantity of euphemisms for “ poverty ” may be relevant to the reason that the word in Chinese is not tabooed as that in English. Specific culture creates special language. China today is a country brimming with rich cultural elements, which makes the new euphemisms for “ poverty ” emerge. With the implementation of reform and opening-up and the rapid growth of economy, millionaires and even billionaires appear in China. The word “ 富 翁 ” sounds good, but the meaning of the word “ 负翁 ” has an entirely opposite meaning. Some people of the salariat are called “ 月光族 ” because they never have surplus salaries at the end of the month.3.2 Different Concepts of RankChina is a nation of courtesy with a cultural heritage running several thousand years and a nation which attaches importance to Confucian culture and feudal patriarch system. However, democracy, referring to freedom, equality and human right, is the main idea of western people. Euphemisms for “ address forms ” reflect the different social values of rank in English-speaking countries and China and also show the relationship among people.People in West have every confidence in the belief that all men are equal. This view stresses that citizens are equal both in laws and mentality, which means there is no rule to judge people whether they are noble or poor. Consequently, western people lay more emphasis on individuality, and they are not so conscious of the concept of family hierarchy as Chinese to show their respect for seniority. No matter what people s social status are, they can get along with each other like friends and call their names on a first-name basis. In western families, children usually call their parents names instead of “ father ” and “ mother ” when they grow up. However, the parents do not blame them for the change of titles; on the contrary, they feel that the relationshipbetween them and their children is cozy. Furthermore, the concept of address forms in West is relatively general and ambiguous. Men who are of the same generation of childrens parents are called “ uncle ” , women on the generation base are called “ aunt ” and their children are called “ cousin ” no matter what gender they are. The phenomenon that family members address each other directly regardless of the family hierarchy is a common occurrence in western families while it is not accepted in an old-fashioned Chinese family. The reason lies in that the address forms in English do not belong to the scope of language taboos.On the contrary, Chinese people pay much attention to the arrangement of rank, etiquette and the order of seniority and inferiority, which directly reflected in the “ address forms” . In ancient times, ordinary people were forbidden to address directly the names of emperors and government officials. They had to use other words to replace the name; otherwise, they would be punished because of showing no respect. For instance, in Tang Dynasty, the name of emperor is called “ 李世民 ” . In order to avoid the word “ 世 ” , people use “ 代 ” to take the place of “ 世 ” , substitute “ 世 ” with “ 人 ” and shorten the word “ 观世音 ” to “ 观音 ” when they write or communicate. Title taboos derive from the concept of the ancient patriarchal clan system. With the changes of times, this phenomenon has been no longer in existence, but some title taboos continue to be used even today. Nowadays, people always address other people in a way of adding the title of a post to show respect between the superior and the subordinate, the young and the old and even peers, such as “ 张局长 ” , “ 刘书记 ” and “ 赵老师 ” . When it comes to the relationship between friends, people usually address friends by adding “ 小 ” or “ 老 ” for the sake of intimacy, such as “ 小王 ” and “ 老李 ” . In a Chinese family, parents always educate their kids that they are not allowed to address the elders directly. The younger generation is obliged to call the older generation in terms of kinship to express their esteem, such as “ 爷爷 ” , “ 奶奶 ” , “ 爸 爸 ” , “ 妈妈 ” , “ 叔叔 ” , “ 阿姨 ” , “ 舅舅 ” , “ 舅妈 ” . If people address other people s names directly, they will be considered as uneducated and impolite.本 科 毕 业 论 文 第 9 页 共 15 页 3.3 Different Concepts of ReligionChristianity, a very prevailing religion in West, has a long-term and profound effect on the society, deeming that everybody is guilty and laying stress on a person s imperfection and inherent evil tendency. In China, people mainly believe in Buddhism and Taoism, which guide people to establish perfect personality and even be Buddha and immoral by means of enhancing their self-cultivation. Each language has its own religious faith, which leads to the different uses of euphemisms for “ death ” .In West, people, from heads of state to the common people, almost all of them believe in Christianity which is dominant among the diverse religions. Christians deem that the value of human body is inferior to the soul for the reason that the fresh will die eventually, but the soul is immortal. They stick to the faith that their souls will enter into the heaven rather than hell after death if they make great efforts to do spiritual practice. Affected by this faith, they are confronted with death calmly. As a consequence, a large amount of English euphemisms for “ death ” come from the Bible and give expression to the basic Christian doctrine that people s lives given by God are destined to go through sin, indulgence and expiation, and people can only get saved in the other world after expiating the sins. For example, the “ death ” is called “ to return to dust/earth” because God creates people with clay; “to pay the debt of nature” is a statement of “ death ” for the reason that people are born with sins and their death is to atone for sins. God is the master of the earth, so peop