跨文化交际实用教程
INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION: A PRACTICAL COURSEBOOK
王凌燕制作 王凌燕制作
Unit 4 Verbal Communication
“Careful with fire,” is good advice, we know; “Careful with words,” is ten times doubly so. Will Carleton, The First Settler’s Story
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Warm-up Cases Culturally Loaded Words Cultural Reflections on Proverbs Taboos Differences in Cultural Thought Patterns Exercises
Unit 4 Verbal Communication
01 Warm-up Cases Cases 02 03 04 05 06 Culturally Loaded Words Cultural Reflections on Proverbs Taboos Differences in Cultural Thought Patterns Exercises
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Warm-up Cases
Case 1 Shoes for Street Walking (P67)
It is said that in Rome, in front of a shoe store, there was such a sign to attract English-speaking customers: Shoes for street walking. Come in and have a fit. The sign caught the attention of many English-speaking tourists, but not to look at the shoes displayed in the windows, but to read the sign and then break out into laughter.
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Warm-up Cases
a street walker ------ a prostitute to have a fit ------ to become suddenly and violently angry or upset (勃然大怒)
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Warm-up Cases
Case 2 A Misunderstanding Caused by a Joke (P67)
Roger was the Personnel Executive of a large American multinational firm. In 1996, Roger was working in Brazil to help promote their business. One evening, there was a party, attended by both his employees from the United States and many Brazilian business people. At the party, Roger bumped into Rosalita, a Brazilian woman he had known for some time. Roger generally had a very good impression of Rosalita and always felt at ease with her, so that he felt free to tell jokes and share personal thoughts, and talk about Brazil and Brazilian life without having the jitters of offending Rosalita. During the party, Rosalita said to Roger, “I’d like to introduce you to one of my good friends. She is a very capable woman and is presently thinking of working in a joint venture so she can provide a better living for her large family. She is very much interested in your company.” Hearing that, Roger smiled and replied, “OK, but I just hope I don’t get hustled.” Unfortunately, Roger’s reply made Rosalita quite upset. Very soon she excused herself as politely as she could, and did not speak with Roger for the rest of the evening.
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Warm-up Cases
to force sb. to make a decision before they are ready or sure
to work as a prostitute; romance or sex is hinted
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Warm-up Cases
Case 3 Look Out (P69)
A foreign student in the U.S. was sitting by a window reading a book. She heard someone yelling “Look out!”, so she stuck her head out of the window. Just then a board hurtled down from above, narrowly missing her. She looked up, half in anger and half in fright. There was a man on the roof doing repairs. “Didn’t you hear me call ‘Look out’?” he demanded. “Yes, and that’s what I did,” she replied.
to be careful, especially when there is danger
to stick your head outside of sth.(window/door) to take a look
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Unit 4 Verbal Communication
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Warm-up Cases
02 Culturally Loaded Words Cultural Reflections on Proverbs Taboos Differences in Cultural Thought Patterns Exercises
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Culturally Loaded Words
A beautiful woman
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Culturally Loaded Words
Does “dragon” mean the same to a Westerner as “龙” to a Chinese?
In Chinese culture, “龙” is a totem['t??t?m] with many royal association, such as “龙颜”, “龙床”, “龙袍”, “龙心大喜”. Unit 4 Verbal Communication
The associations of “dragon” to Westerners are horrible, disgusting monsters.
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Culturally Loaded Words
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Culturally Loaded Words
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Culturally Loaded Words
Does “知识分子” have the same meaning as “intellectual”?
? In CC, it refers to people including college teachers, college students, middle school teachers, and such people as medical doctors, engineers, interpreters who have had a college education. ? In EC, it includes only people of high academic status such as college professors, not ordinary college students. (Cover a much smaller range of people.) (Not always a complimentary term, sometimes used in derogatory[d?'r?g?t(?)r?] sense.)
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Culturally Loaded Words
干部
cadre
? In EC, “cadre” is not a common word, and many Englishspeaking people do not know what it means. ? Some other substitutes: official, functionary, administrator, etc. But none of these gets exact same meaning as Chinese word “干部”.
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Culturally Loaded Words
社会科学
Social Sciences
? “社会科学” covers all the fields except the ones in the natural sciences and applied sciences. It would be the same to “the humanities” in English: language, literature, philosophy, etc. ? The English term “social sciences” covers a smaller area of learning. It includes political science, economics, history (which is often classified under the humanities), and sociology ----the branches of learning that study human society, especially its organization and relationship of individual members to it.
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Culturally Loaded Words Generic term
chicken duck goose horse cattle/cow pig dog sheep deer
Name for male
cock, rooster drake gander stallion bull boar dog ram stag
Name for female
hen duck goose mare cow sow bitch ewe doe
Name for the chick young
duckling gosling foal calf shoat puppy lamb fawn
?With certain less common animals and birds, “bull” or “cow” and “cock” or “hen” are frequently used to distinguish sex, e.g. bull seal, cow seal; bull elephant, cow elephant; cock pheasant, hen pheasant; cock sparrow, hen sparrow. Also, using the term “male” or “female”, or sometimes “she” with the generic name, is acceptable, as in “male leopard”, “female panda”, “she wolf”, etc. Unit 4 Verbal Communication
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Culturally Loaded Words
Chinese Terms in English viceassociate assistant 副 deputy lieutenant [lu't?n?nt] under
Examples in English vice-chairman, vice-president associate professor, associate director assistant manager, assistant secretary deputy director, deputy chief-of-staff lieutenant governor, lieutenant general undersecretary (of, U.S.)
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Culturally Loaded Words
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Culturally Loaded Words
The major semantic differences between English and Chinese terms might be grouped as follows:
? A term in one language does not necessarily have a counterpart in the other language;（干部） ? Words or terms in both languages appear to refer to the same object or concept only on the surface, but actually refer to quite different things;（龙） ? Things or concepts are represented by one or perhaps two terms in one language, but by many more terms in the other language, i.e. finer distinctions exist in the other language;（副） ? Terms have more or less the same primary meaning, but have secondary or additional meanings that may differ considerably from each other. （hustle）
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Unit 4 Verbal Communication
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Warm-up Cases Culturally Loaded Words
03 Cultural Reflections on Proverbs Taboos Differences in Cultural Thought Patterns Exercises
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Cultural Reflections on Proverbs
? Proverbs may provide interesting glimpses or clues to a people’s geography, history, social organization, social views, etc. People who live along coasts and whose livelihood is dependent on the sea will definitely have proverbs about sailing, about braving the weather, and about fish and fishing. Nomadic people will have sayings about the desert or pasture, about sheep and horses or camels, and about wolves and jackals. In cultures where old age is revered, there will be proverbs about the wisdom of the elders, and in societies where women’s status is low, there will be a number of demeaning sayings about woman.
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Cultural Reflections on Proverbs
The proverbs show the similarities of human experiences and observations 新官上任三把火。 人多好办事。 今日事，今日毕。 一箭双雕。 欲速则不达。 无风不起浪。 这山望着那山高。 美貌是肤浅的。 玉不琢不成器。 以其人之道还治其人之身。 A new broom sweeps clean. Many hands make light work. Don’t put off until tomorrow what you can do today. Kill two birds with one stone. Haste makes waste. Where there’s smoke there’s fire. The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. Beauty is only skin deep. Spare the rod and spoil the child. Give a person a dose of his own medicine.
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Cultural Reflections on Proverbs
Chinese proverbs do not have exact English equivalents
良药苦口利于病，忠言逆耳利于行: Frank’s advice is like good herbal medicine: hard to take, but ultimately beneficial. Here the bitterness of herbal medicine could only be imagined for some Westerners who have never taken herbal medicine. 瓜田不纳履，李下不整冠: Neither adjust your shoe in a melon patch, nor your hat under a plum tree. If we translate the latter half literally into: nor straighten your hat ’neath an apple tree, it is sure to cause English-speaking people to chuckle, although they might catch the implication immediately.
一人得道，鸡犬升天: Even the dog swaggers when its master wins favor.
Leaving out chickens in English version in no way detracts from the meaning. It only makes the English more concise.
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Cultural Reflections on Proverbs
English proverbs do not have exact Chinese equivalents
Absence makes the heart grow fonder. An apple a day keeps the doctor away. Let sleeping dogs lie. You can’t teach an old dog new tricks. You can’t have your cake and eat it too.
越是不见越想念。 一天一苹果，医生远离我。 莫惹是非。 年逾花甲不堪教。 鱼与熊掌不可兼得。
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Cultural Reflections on Proverbs
Surface similarities, but differences It takes two to make a quarrel. 一个巴掌拍不响。
English: both people may be at fault. Chinese: both people may be at fault. It often takes more than one person to achieve anything significant.
A miss is as good as a mile.
差之毫厘，谬以千里。
Chinese: it’s a warning: a small fault or deviation, if not corrected, will end up in a major error or catastrophe[k?‘t?str?f?]（大祸）. English: merely states a fact, or a philosophic attitude that to miss one’s mark even very slightly is as bad as missing it by a mile.
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Cultural Reflections on Proverbs
Surface similarities, but differences Gilding the lily. 锦上添花。
English: implies spoiling something already fine, good or beautiful by attempting to make it better. (disapproval) Chinese: adding flowers to the brocade, i.e. adding something to make a good thing even better or turning excellence into perfection.
Life begins at forty.
人到四十五，正如出山虎。—— roughly the same meaning, but the age shows a five-year difference. 潮怕二十，人怕四十。—— mentions the same age, but takes a dim view about reaching that stage of life: tides ebb after the twentieth of each month (in lunar calendar), people decline after forty.
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Unit 4 Verbal Communication
01 02 03 05 06
Warm-up Cases Culturally Loaded Words Cultural Reflections on Proverbs
04 Taboos Differences in Cultural Thought Patterns Exercises
04 Taboos
Excreta and acts of human excretion 委婉型： I want to go somewhere. I have to powder my nose. I would like to go to the powder room. I need to wash my hand. I want to go to the restroom/washroom. I need to use the bathroom. I gonna to pick some flowers. I would like to go and see my aunt. I have to use the John. I need to answer the call of nature. I must spend a penny. 直接型： I need to go pee. I need to take a leak. I need to take a dump/shit. 男厕/女厕： Men / Women Gentlemen / Ladies Princes / Princesses
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04 Taboos
Sexual intercourse and certain part of the body
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
four-letter words (fuck, tits, etc.) to make love to have sex with I slept with her. penis['pi?n?s] (cock) vagina[v?'d?a?n?] (crack) anus['e?n?s] (dirt road) breast[brest] (milk bottles) urine['ju?rin] (hot water)
pregnant:
She is “expecting”. (待产) She is “in a delicate condition”. (怀孕中) She is “well-along”. (心满意足) She is about to have a “blessed event”. (福事) She is about to be “in a family way”.(家庭之路)
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04 Taboos
Swear words
? some words are more offensive, some are less
More: Jesus Christ! / Holy Mary! / Son of a bitch! Less: Damn! / Damn it! / Hell!
? age, sex and occupation
a child / a woman / a teacher
? setting or environment
Stricter: in public speaking, in classroom, or at gatherings of people with certain social status.
* For nonnative speakers, it is better to be cautious when using profanities.
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Unit 4 Verbal Communication
01 02 03 04 06
Warm-up Cases Culturally Loaded Words Cultural Reflections on Proverbs Taboos
05 Differences in Cultural Thought Patterns Exercises
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Differences in Cultural Thought Patterns
Case in P78
? Tal (African): the associative uniting style Expressing ideas with a series of details by association ? Tony (British): abstract Expressing thoughts with facts concerning the main topic
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Differences in Cultural Thought Patterns
English-speakers: linear and direct Semitic: a combination of tangential[t?n'd?en??l] and semidirect Asian: circular Romance: more consistently circuitous Russian: a combination of direct and circuitous
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Differences in Cultural Thought Patterns
American: factual-inductive 事实归纳 (ascertain facts, find similarities, and formulate conclusions) Russian: axiomatic-deductive 公理演绎 (move from general principle to particulars which can be easily deduced) Arab: intuitive-affective 直观情感 (facts are secondary to emotions)
*Taking one step back from one’s values and cherished beliefs, which is far from easy. Nevertheless, understanding and appreciation of differences among cultures in cognitive processing and problem solving is a major step toward successful intercultural communication.
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Unit 4 Verbal Communication
01 02 03 04 05
Warm-up Cases Culturally Loaded Words Cultural Reflections on Proverbs Taboos Differences in Cultural Thought Patterns
06 Exercises
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Exercises
Give the Chinese equivalents of the following expressions.
1. Justice has long arms. 2. Diamond cut diamond. 3. golden saying 4. fat office 5. You will cross the bridge when you get to it. 6. Better be the head of a dog than the tail of a lion. 7. drink like a fish 8. tread upon eggs 天网恢恢，疏而不漏。 棋逢对手。 金玉良言 肥缺 船到桥头自然直。 宁为鸡头，勿为牛后。 牛饮 如履薄冰
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Exercises
Read the following situation and choose the appropriate answer(s). What would you do if a stranger pronounced your name incorrectly? First, think about what you would do in your own language and culture, and then what you would do if you were talking in English with an American. a) You wouldn’t say anything.
No. Sometimes it is better not to correct the person right away, especially if he or she is very busy. Also, if other people are present, the person may be embarrassed to find out he or she pronounced your name incorrectly. However, if the person pronounces your name incorrectly more than once, you should tell him or her.
b) You would say, “Excuse me, but my name is…”
Yes. If you want to be polite and formal, it is best to apologize first, and then say your name correctly.
c) You would not say, “Excuse me.” You would just say, “It’s…”
Yes. If the situation is informal, you can just say your name correctly without apologizing.
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