Language and Culture

Chapter 1

Does language shape culture or does culture shape language? In my view, language is a mirror, in front of which culture is reflected. As a student majoring in Chinese as a foreign language, I’d like to take this advantage to discuss the cultural differences between Chinese and English. In the following passage, I am going to elaborate on the cultural differences reflecting in colors.

There are many color words in our language, such as red, white, black, yellow, purple and so forth, which are used frequently. In the first place, I’d like to introduce the common usages of the color words.

1.adj.+color word

(1)"deep/dark+color words": indicating the strong color

e.g., deep blue; deep green; dark brown; dark red.

(2)"light/pale+color words": indicating the light color

e.g., light yellow; light blue; pale grey; pale white.

(3) "bright/rich/vivid+color words": indicating the bright color

e.g., bright/rich/vivid red; bright/rich/vivid yellow.

(4) "dull/dirty+color words":indicating the dark color

e.g., dull yellow; dull gold; dirty grey; dirty white.

2. "color words+-ish"

This group indicates the different shades of the color. An adjective followed by -ish means "slightly…"

e.g., whitish sky, yellowish book leaves; reddish face…

3. "color words+color words"

This pattern indicates the mi

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