英语名字与中国名字的差异

The difference between Chinese name and English name
Human names contain abundant cultural information. Chinese and English names contain different cultural information because of their different cultural backgrounds. Now, we will have a simple analyze of the cultural differences by making a comparative study of Chinese, English names in aspects of its construction, meaning and taboos in choosing a name.
So I will talk about the difference of Chinese name between English name with you.
First of all, let’s see the different construction of the name. As we all know, a integrated name is made of family name and second name. this is same for the Chinese name and English name, but their sequence is different. For example, for a English name, the family name is behind the second name. But for a Chinese name, the family name is before the second name. what’s the reasons for this phenomenon. I have learn some information, for westerner, the people emphasize the individual values relatively, the personal interests is the most important. But in china, the people emphasize more values of family or group than individual. This is the difference of culture, and this is reflected on the name.
Furthermore, let’s see the difference of their source and meaning. As we all know, there are five thousand years for china’s history, and before five thousand years, the family name has appeared in china. The people
usually use something as their family name, such as the place where they live, the sequence of brothers, the colour, the number, the profession, the government post. Now, In china, the most of children will have the same family name with their father. Of course, they can follow mother’s family name, but this is very seldom. It’s also a possible that the child will use a family name which is made of father’s and mother’s. In our class, I think all the students are belong to the first situation except her. Because she is belong to the third situation. But for English family name , they have so many sources, such as the profession(cook, barber), the name of animals and plants(lamb ,rose), the birthplace, and the direction(north),the relation of the family, the material noun(stone), the currency(pound), the building, the season, month, data, weather, colour, the colour of skin, and the feature. Judging from what have been argued above, we can see that there are so many family name for westerner. A famous linguist named wang li have said that in western, somebody has the family name such as big, small, fat, young. That’s so interesting. From this, we can see that the westerners emphasize free, and the Chinese are influenced by tradition culture seriously.
At last, let’s see the difference of their taboo in choosing a name. In china, it’s a taboo that younger generation has the same name with eldership, even their names have the homophone. Because the people think that the same name means younger generation doesn’t respect
eldership. In general, we won’t have the same name with a historical person, because we think the one won’t have good fortune and thus have a short life. But for the westerner, there are not taboos. They can have the same name with father for meaning that they have good relationship. They can have the same name with died relative for missing. They can have the same name with a king or a famous person for loving. They are so free that they don’t have some taboos.
Ok, what I have talked above is the difference between Chinese name and English name, and that reflect the difference of their culture. That’s all. Thanks.。