中、日、英亲属词汇体现的文化差异

根据“语言相对论”,不同的语言体现不同的思维模式。对两种语言的词汇进行比较并分析文化差异的研究较多,而将三种语言进行比较能够得到新的发现。通过比较可以看到,中、日、英三种语言的直系亲属词汇基本上是一一对应的,而旁系亲属词汇的差别较大。中文的旁系亲属词汇丰富繁杂、指代清晰,而英文和日文的亲属词汇则比较笼统。亲属词汇是否相似与地理位置远近没有关系,其中体现的是不同文化中人们的不同思维方式,这与该文化的生活方式、家庭观念、长幼关系、继承习俗、主导思想有密切关系。这值得引起语言学习者和翻译工作者注意。

Cultural Differences Embodied in the Kinship Terms in Chinese,Japanese and English Languages

According to linguistic relativism, all languages reflect their unique thinking patterns. Many researches have been conducted on the comparisons between words of two languages. The comparison of three languages can reveal something new. As it can be seen from the comparison and contrast of the kinship terms in the three languages, Chinese, Japanese and English, immediate kinship terms are mostly on a one-to-one basis, while collateral kinship terms are quite different, with Chinese rich in collateral kinship terms and English and Japanese quite ambiguous. Whether kinship terms are similar or not is not related to geographical distance, but embodies the different thinking patterns of people in different cultures, involving the life style, family idea, relations between the young and the old, heritage norms, guiding theory in those cultures, which should be noted by language learners and translators.