Cross-linguistic Awareness of Cultural Keywords: A Study of Chinese and English Speakers  

Oleh:

Cortazzi, Martin ; Wei, Wei Shen

Jenis: Article from Journal - ilmiah internasional
Dalam koleksi: Language Awareness (Full Text) vol. 10 no. 2&3 (2001), page 125-142.
Fulltext: 10.2&3.125-142.pdf (267.49KB)

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In this paperwe examine six Chinese terms which are among a handful of identifiable culturalkeywords which have played an important role in Confucian heritage cultures. On the basis of an examination of common translations and explanations of the keywords in English, we show that their meanings are interrelated and overlapping. Using a questionnaire,we use ‘definitional elements’ from translations to investigate how native speakers of Chinese understand these keywords, compared with English-speaking learners of Chinese, and how English speakers who do not know Chinese understand the translations. Using a statistical approach we show in detail how the three groups have a measurably differentunderstanding,which is asymmetrical. Visual representations, closely derived frommean scores, display the participants’ awareness of the interrelatedmeanings, which is different for the three groups. The article is relevant to translators and teachers of Chinese, and in general to teachers and learners of vocabulary.

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