文化差异即是指因地区异同,各地区人们所特有的文化异同而产生的差异。霍夫斯坦特认为:文化是在一个环境中的人们共同的心理程序,不是一种个体特征,而是具有相同的教育和生活经验的许多人所共有的心理程序。下面就由小编给大家带来关于中美文化的不同英语作文,希望能够对大家有所帮助!
关于中美文化的不同英语作文篇一
文化差异何其大 美国为何难以理解中国
Do the events that led to the outbreak of the first world war carry lessons for the Sino-American relationship? A century ago it was the ascent of Germany under Kaiser Wilhelm I thatunsettled the world; today a rising China is roiling east Asia. Then, as now, domestic politicson both sides played a role; one that is too easily neglected.
导致一战爆发的事件对中美关系有什么启发意义吗?一个世纪以前,德国在威廉一世(Kaiser Wilhelm I)领导下的崛起让世界感到不安;如今,中国的崛起让东亚感到不安。当时和现在一样,对立双方的国内政治都发挥了作用——这是一个太容易被人们忽视的因素。
Why did Britain and Germany – linked by trade, dynastic ties, culture and religion – findthemselves at war in August 1914? In part, as historian Paul Kennedy has argued, it wasbecause London’s liberal ideology contributed to its perception of a growing German threat.
1914年8月,存在贸易、王朝纽带、文化和宗教联系的英国和德国为何开战?从某种程度上来说,正如历史学家保罗肯尼迪(Paul Kennedy)所指出的,那是因为伦敦的自由主义意识形态强化了其关于德国威胁日益加剧的认识。
Filtered through liberalism’s lens, Germany looked militarist, autocratic, mercantilist and statist– and contempt for the country’s political culture added to London’s disquiet. When the warbegan, it quickly came to be seen as a liberal crusade against “Prussianism”.
透过自由主义“棱镜”,德国给人看到的是军国主义、独裁、重商主义和计划经济——而对该国政治文化的鄙视也增加了伦敦的不安。当战争爆发时,人们立刻将之视为一场讨伐“普鲁士主义”的自由主义战争。
In this respect, today’s Sino-American rivalry resembles the pre-1914 Anglo-Germanantagonism. The speed of China’s growth worries US policy makers, as do the geopoliticalimplications of its economic transformation.
从这个方面来说,当今的中美对抗类似于1914年以前的英德对抗。中国的发展速度让美国政策制定者感到担忧,其经济改革对地缘政治的影响同样让美国不安。
Across the American political spectrum, China’s success is attributed to its failure to play bythe rules of free trade – for instance, its habit of manipulating the value of its currency andengaging in industrial espionage. Market-oriented liberalism is the dominant ideology in theUS and, as in pre-1914 Britain, it shapes policy makers’ image of their supposed adversary.
在美国政界上下看来,中国的成功得益于其没有遵守自由贸易规则,例如惯于操纵汇率,以及从事工业间谍活动。以市场为导向的'自由主义是美国的主要意识形态,而正如1914年前的英国一样,它决定了政策制定者对他们所以为的对手的印象。
American leaders view China as a nation whose undemocratic political system raises doubtsabout both the scope of its foreign policy ambitions and its trustworthiness as a diplomaticpartner. Moreover, China’s combination of political authoritarianism and state-directedcapitalism causes unease because it challenges the supposed universality of the Americanmodel of liberal democracy and free-market capitalism.
在美国领导人的眼里,中国不民主的政治体制令人怀疑其外交政策雄心的范围,以及其作为外交合作伙伴的可信赖性。此外,中国政治威权主义与国家资本主义的结合令人不安,原因是它挑战了美国模式的自由主义民主和自由市场资本主义的所谓普适性。
Aaron Friedberg, a Princeton University professor, says that for Americans, “the success of amainland [Chinese] regime that blends authoritarian rule with market-driven economics is anaffront.” For members of the US foreign-policy elite, the Chinese threat is not so muchgeopolitical as ideological.
普林斯顿大学(Princeton University)的阿龙弗里德伯格(Aaron Friedberg)教授表示,在美国人看来,“中国大陆政权将威权统治和市场导向的经济学结合在一起所取得的成功是一种侮辱”。对美国上层外交政策制定者来说,中国威胁更多是意识形态层面的,而不是地缘政治上的。
Powerful external and domestic forces are putting the US and China on the road toconfrontation. China aspires to be the regional hegemon in east (and southeast) Asia. The US– the incumbent hegemon, having dominated the region since 1945 – is blocking its path.
各种强有力的内外因素正把美中推上对抗之路。中国渴望成为东亚(以及东南亚)地区的霸主,而自1945年以来主导该地区的现任霸主美国则拦在路上。
Yet America’s predominance in east Asia contributes little to the security of a nation whosegeography and unsurpassed military capabilities would anyway make it close to invulnerable.The US is the most secure great power in history – even more so if you factor in thedeterrent effect of nuclear weapons. The true cause of American insecurity is not animminent encroachment on its territory but the risk that US alliances – especially with Japan –will draw it into a regional conflict.
然而,在东亚地区的主导地位并不会让美国更安全——不管怎样,美国所处的地理位置和拥有的无可匹敌的军事能力让其处于一种近乎无懈可击的状态。美国是历史上最安全的大国——如果你考虑到核武器的威慑作用,就会更肯定这一点。美国真正的不安全因素不是其疆域会遭到入侵,而是同盟关系——尤其是美日同盟——将其拖入地区冲突的风险。
The US wants to maintain its east Asian dominance to keep the region’s markets open toAmerican goods and its people open to liberal ideas. China threatens this openness, on whichAmerica’s security is wrongly believed to depend.
美国希望保持在东亚地区的主导地位,以让该地区的市场继续向美国商品开放,其民众继续接受自由主义思想的熏陶。中国威胁到了这种开放,而美国的安全被错误地以为依赖于这种开放。
The liberal assumptions embedded in American foreign policy put the US at odds with China,and also heighten Beijing’s mistrust of Washington’s intentions and ambitions. The spiral ofanimosity that threatens to culminate in a confrontation between the two countries is inlarge part a creation of American policy.
美国外交政策中蕴含的自由主义思想导致美国与中国立场不一致,也加深了北京方面对华盛顿意图和抱负的不信任感。这种不断增长的、有可能在两国对抗中达到顶峰的敌意,在很大程度上是美国政策导致的。
As China’s rises, Washington has a last clear chance to avoid the looming Sino-Americanconflict.
在中国的崛起过程中,美国有最后的避让机会,可以避免不断迫近眼前的中美冲突真正爆发。
This would entail making real concessions on Taiwan and on China’s territorial claims in the Eastand South China Seas. It would also involve a commitment that Washington would notinterfere in China’s internal affairs.
这需要美国在台湾xx以及中国涉及东中国海和南中国海的领土主张上做出真正的妥协。此外美国也需承诺不干预中国内部事务。
America’s political culture – based on exceptionalism, liberal ideology, and openness – is a bigobstacle to coming to terms with a resurgent China. So is the fact that the foreign-policy eliteremains wedded to American primacy, and refuses to accept that this will inevitably slip awaybecause of the relative decline of US power.
美国建立在例外主义、自由主义思想和开放观念等基础之上的政治文化,是影响美国接受复兴的中国的一大障碍。另一个障碍是,美国外交政策圈子中的精英们依然痴迷于“美国主导地位”,并拒绝接受这种地位随着美国实力相对衰落必将丧失的观点。
History is also a problem.
历史也是一个问题
US policy makers are quick to invoke what they take to be the lessons of the 1930s whileoverlooking the causes of the first world war. David Calleo, a professor at Johns Hopkins, hasobserved that what we should learn from the earlier conflict “is not so much the need forvigilance against aggressors, but the ruinous consequences of refusing reasonableaccommodation to upstarts”.
美国政策制定者迅速摆出他们从上世纪30年代事件中归纳的教训,却无视一战的起因。约翰斯-霍普金斯大学(Johns Hopkins University)的戴维卡莱奥(David Calleo)教授指出,我们应该从更早那场冲突中学到的主要教训,“不是必须警惕侵略者,而是拒绝合理包容新崛起者将带来破坏性后果”。
If the US wants to avoid a future conflict with China, it cannot allow liberal ideology toobstruct a reconciliation with an ever more powerful China. That is the real lesson of 1914.
如果美国想要避免未来与中国发生冲突,就不能让自由主义意识形态妨碍它与越来越强大的中国修好。这是1914年带给我们的真正教训。
关于中美文化的不同英语作文篇二
The difference between chinese and western culture
With the rapidly challging word, people throughout the world have found it increasingly necessary to minimize the rate of misunderstanding due to miscommunication in their contacts with another. In the oast most human beings were born, lived, and died within a limited geoographical area, never encountering people of other cultural backgrounds. It might be said that technological advances have been most effective in creating the borderless word, the global community. As our world shrinks and its inhabitants become interdependent, people from remot cultures increasingly come into contact on a daily basis. It is no longer hard to find situations in which membes of ince isolared groups of people. Now these people may live thousands of miles away or right next door to each other. So all the people are faced with the challenge of understand this world. So when the east meet west, there are many problems. Some problems are listed as follows.
First of all, the way of eating. All huaman beings have certain basic needs. Our fundamental needs for things that keep us alive. This is the physioligical need. All individuals must eat in order to survive. But what people eat, when they eat, and the manners in which they eat are all patterned by culture. No society views everything in its environment that is edible and might provide nurishment as food. Americans eat oysters but not snail. The French eat snails but not locusts. The Jews eat fish but not pork. The Hindus eat pork but not beef. The Russiand eat beef but not snake. We all have ideas about what kinds of food are good to eat. We also have ideas about what kinds of food are bad to eat. As a result, people from one culture often think the food that people from another culture eat are disgusting or nauseating. Dislike is not the only reason why some culture will not eat a certain food. In some clture, certain foods are taboo. Sometimes the food taboos may be so strong thrat just the thought of eating forbidden foods can cause an indivdual to feel ill. We can also find culture difference in way of bring up children treating the early, greeting each other, saying and spending money before other people do in everyday, but in some English-speaking countries, people do not agree with us. We chinese may enjoy something that is not usually consider as edible by the English-speaking people. Generally we perfer to have thing hot and much emphasis on the taste. We eat from one plate when we are eating with others, and we like to seat one by one, and in the shape of a round. On the opposite, some English-speaking contries, most of the people like to seat in two rows, two people face to face. They have their own plate. On the aspect of table manners, there are many differences between chinese and English-speaking people. For example, in some Englishi-speaking countries, Bread plates are to the left of the main plate, beverage glasses are to the right. Salad fork, knife and soup spoon are further from the
main plate than the main course knife, fork and spoon. When eating bread rolls, break off a piece before buttering. Use the knife only to butter the bread, not to cut it. They should not start eating before your host does or instructs to do so. At larger meals, it is considered okay to start eating once others have been served. When finished, place the knife and fork together at five o’clock with the fork on the left. It is considered rude to answer the telephone at the table. If need to take an urgent call, excuse self and go outside. Try to eat all the food you are served. But in China, the table manners are different. Chinese traditionally eat rice from a small bowl held in the left hand. The rice bowl is raised to the mouth and the rice pushed into the mouth using the chopsticks. Some Chinese find it offensive to scoop rice from the bowl using a spoon. If rice is served on a plate, as is more common in the West, it is acceptable and more practical to eat it with a fork or spoon. The thumb must always be above the edge of the bowl. The host should always make sure the guests drinks are sufficiently full. One should not pour for ones self, but should offer to pour for a neighbor. When your drink is being poured, you should say "thank you" and tap fingers on the table to show appreciation. When people wish to clink drinks together in the form of a cheer, it is important to observe that younger members should clink the edge of their drink below the edge of an elder to show respect.
Secondly, the way of communication. Form birth to death, communication plays an integral part in our life. There are some language problems, including the different styles of using language such as direct, indirect; expansive, succinct; argumentative, conciliatory; instrumental, harmonnizing; and so on. These different styles can lead to wrong interpretations of intent and evaluation of insincerity, aggreeiveness, deviousness, or arrogance, among other. The misinterpretation nonverbal signs and symbols such as gestures, postures, and other body movements. It is a definite communication barrier. But it is possible to learn the meanings of these observable message,usually in informal rather ways. It is more difficult to understand the less obvious unspoken codes of the other cultures. Language, as the carrier of culture, is created during the process of human beings’ productive labor and serves as the tool of communication to convey the message between people. However, it has been endowed with magic and power in particular language acts. As the old saying goes, troubles come out of the tongue. Superstitious people think that the language itself can bring about fortune or misfortune so that taboos to restrict the use of language are created. Anyone who violates them will get punishment, whereas those who faithfully obey the restrictions of language taboo will get protection. Furthermore, linguistic taboos change with the development of society .The paper firstly analyzes the evolution of linguistic taboo. It is indicated in the paper that linguistic taboo exists in almost every aspect of people’s life and is a universal social phenomenon in China and Britain. Both Chinese and
English cultures are in agreement about linguistic taboos such as pronunciation taboo, and vocabulary taboo. However, influenced by different cultural backgrounds, ideologies and the concepts of value, Chinese and English linguistic taboos also have differences, as is discussed in the paper from the aspects of taboo subjects, taboo numbers and names. At last, this paper puts forward two effective ways of avoiding taboo, that is, using euphemism and having a good knowledge of the taboo culture. And this discussion would help English learners improve their ability of cross-cultural communication and achieve better communicational effects. For example, During the feudal times, people were not equal to the rulers and were suppressed by their superiors. The distinction between the upper and the lower classes was also reflected in the evaluation of the language used by them respectively. The words of upper class used were considered good and elegant while those used by the lower class were regarded as vulgar and indecent and should be avoided in the speech of ladies and gentlemen. In modern society, as a result of the development of science and technology, many natural phenomena are no longer mysterious. Human beings not only constantly improve their abilities to exploit the world where they are living through their great wisdom and knowledge, but also make efforts to explore the extraterrestrial world. Science has much more say in today’s society. Thereby, the superstitious elements in linguistic taboos decrease while those reflecting spiritual civilization increase.
In short, by comparison, we can find that both Chinese and English communication reflect people’s psychology for good will, for safety and fortune and pleasantness. The Chinese and English people restrict their words and deeds through taboos, trying to keep a harmonious relationship between human and nature, or between people and society. They are a reflection of people’s pursuit of freedom and equality.
The most important, the different way of family structure, family values and family education. Family structure is the big difference between east and west, traditional chinese, amony many other Asians, repect their elders and feel a deep sense of duty toward them. Children repay their parents` sacrifices by being successful and supporting them in old age. This is accepted as a natural part of life in China. In contrast, taking care of aged parents is often viewed as a tremendous burden in the English-speaking countries, where aging and family support are not honored highly. In some English-speaking countries are still extrmely family-oriented. They are dedicated to helping their children and will sacrifice greatly for their children to get an edcuation. In turn, the children are devoted to their parents, who often live nearby. Grown children who go away and leave the country for the economic reasons typically send large parts of their salary home to their parents and the rest of the family. Or in some Asia, any decisions or actions are done from family consideration, not individual desires. Peope`s behavior is judged on whether it
brings shame or pride to the family. The children are trained to rely on their families, to honor elderly people, and to fear foreigners. And many of them think that their actions in this life will influence their status in the next life.
The way of family edcation is also the different. We all know the family education is the elementary education for children. Many serious problems have appeared in our education system in recent years. Almost everyone has realized the importance of solving these problems and many people have presented a lot of valuable suggestions. There are many types of family education in the world and each of them shows distinctive features and is closely responsive to its culture. And American family education is the most famous one among them. There are great differences in the concepts of education, methods of education and results of education between East family education and West family education. In some English-speaking countries, parents’ aims are to train their children to have the ability of adapting to environmental variety and the ability of living independently. Based on this concept, most American parents emphasize more to train their children’s ability of independence once they are born. They generally believe that children’s growth must rely on their own experiences, because they think that children should form a self-supporting will and the capacity to live independently since their childhood. And the capacity comes from the training in the early age. The so-called training contains many aspects, such as work, temper will, patience, the spirit of hard work, etc. However, the most fundamental training is the ability of adapting to hard conditions. Through the process of work, children will form the labor sense, learn some work skills and form a habit of labor. Besides, children can learn how to overcome difficulties, temper their willpower, develop their talents and skills, rich their knowledge, and form a habit of hard work and thrifty by working in hard conditions. It is just in the unconsciously process that children will obtain the independent survivability and take the responsibilities for the society. Compared with some English-speaking countries, Chinese parents have a very different concept of children’s education. Some parents in China only care about whether the children have a promising future, a good job, a good life or not. Based on these expectations, the majority of parents feel that their responsibility for their children is to create as good conditions as possible they can so that the children will not worry about anything in the future. Chinese parents would like to provide everything what they can for their children in the process of children’s growth. In short, they would like to sacrifice anything if their children can live better with their help. Therefore, in the process of children’s growth, the most important thing the parents concerning is to developing their children’s intellect, except for caring children’s daily life. In order to make their children have a good performance in study, become outstanding, or even become a famous person in the future, they would not let children do anything except studying. As for the children’s independence, civic awareness and their ability adapting to the
society in the future, they consider little or not at all. From these aspects we can find the obvious differences of family education between America and China.
When we faced with those difference between West and East, we should give some advice to solve these problems. According to the three big difference that pointed, we should find some way to deal with these problems.
We can study other languages and learn to expect in nonvwebal forms and other cultural aspects. We can train ourselves to meet intercultural encounters with more attention to situation details. We can use an investigative approach rather than stereotypes and preconceptions. We can gradually expose ourselves to differences so that they become less threatening. We can even learn to lower our tension level when needed to advoid triggering defensive reactions. The overall goal should be to achieve intercultural communication competence.
So the ideal solution to reduce the problems are to share knowledge with others in communication. This is why it is easiest to communicate with other members of the same group. This is why people so often gather together socially with others who are very much like them. Since intercultural communication is communication with members of different cultual groups, and therefore, because we do not share knowledge, assumptions, values, and forms of discourse with them, we must expect there to be problems of interpretation. We must look for these problems, anticipate where they will arise out of our differences, and then plan our aommunications to be as effective as possible.
However, we have to remember that, most of the time, the different ways that are the customs of dfferent cultures are neither right nor wrong. It is simply that different people do the same tings in different manners, even though we can not understand ,we should show the respect. I believe this is the best way to make our life become more comfortable and make the world more harmonious.
关于中美文化的不同英语作文篇三
中美文化差异
国人见面打招呼时,喜欢问“你吃了吗?”“你去哪呀?”
而西方人对此都感到很怪异。
An American studying in China had an appointment at noon. As he was getting on his bicycle a Chinese friend passed by. "吃了吗?”The young Chinese asked. This, of course, is a common Chinese greeting around meal time and the American merely nodded with a smile, waved goodbye and went off. He realized that his friend’s remark was nothing more than a Chinese way of saying hello or Hi. If the greeting had been put literally into English "Have you eaten yet?" Or “Have you had your lunch? " It would have sounded rather unusual. To Americans, this greeting might mean this: "I haven't either. Come on, let’s go together and get something to eat." or "If you haven’t, I was just going to invite you to my place." In other words, it could indicate an invitation to a meal.
Actually , another foreign student who had not been long in China once complained in broken Chinese 你们为什么老问我吃了饭没有?我有钱。To his way of thinking, people were concerned that he was not getting his meals properly because of lack of money. Clearly, he was offended. There is a similar Chinese greeting, such as "上哪儿去啊?""到哪儿去啦?" Which if translated literally, would be "Where are yon going?" Or "Where have you been?" The natural reaction of most English-speaking people to this greeting would most likely be "It’s none of your business!"
Fortunately, not all greetings sound strange or arouse displeasure. Many are similar, some are merely different. While greetings in many languages often indicate the time of day, there may be inconsistencies within a language. English has Good morning, Good afternoon and Good evening but not Good noon. And Good night is not a greeting at all, but an expression of farewell.
greeting 打招呼
一天中午,一个在中国学习的美国留学生有个约会。他刚要骑上自行车,一位中国朋友从旁边走过,问他:“吃了吗?”这是中国人在吃饭前后打招呼的常用语。美国留学生笑着点点头,挥挥手表示告别,就走了。
他知道,中国朋友的话等于英语中的Hello或Hi,但如果照字面译成Have you eaten yet?或Have you had your lunch?外国人听起来就很怪。美国人会以为,这种打招呼似乎是说:“我也没有吃。走吧,我们一起去吃点东西吧。”或者说:“如果没有吃的话,我正要请你到我家去呢。”;总之,这样打招呼有时意味着邀请对方去吃饭 。
发生过这样的事。有一次,一个刚到中国不久的外国留学生结结巴巴地用汉语说:“你们为什么老问我吃了饭没有?我有钱。”他以为人们总问他“吃饭了吗”是因为怕他没钱吃饭。他显然对这种问法感到生气。
再如,汉语中的“上哪儿去啊?”和“到哪儿去啦?”这样打招呼的话直译成英语就是Where are you going?和Where have you been?用这两句英语来打招呼,大部分讲英语的'人听了会不高兴,他们的反应很可能是:It' s none of your business! 你管得着吗!
幸而,打招呼的话并不都令人感到奇怪或者引起对方反感。有许多打招呼的话是相似的,有些只是说法不同。在许多语言里,打招呼的话往往是相似的,有些只是说法不同。
在许多语言里,打招呼的话往往与时间有关,但即使在一种语言中也有不一致的地方。英语中有Good morning, Good afternoon, Good evening 都相当于汉语中的“您好”,只是说的时间不同而已,但不说Good noon。而 Good night (晚安;明天见;再会)根本不是打招呼的话,这只是告别时说的话。
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