A Comparative Study of Metaphors about Death in English and Chinese Children’s Picture Books_英语论文

摘要

“死亡”是一个人必须面对的结局，但也是社会中被普遍认为“禁忌”的话题。近年来，死亡主题也逐渐的进入到了儿童文学创作领域。但是儿童文学的语言需要区别于成人文学，作者需对死亡的情节描写和内容的设置上进行模糊化的处理。在诸多创作中，“隐喻”是较为常见的表现手法。但在不同的文化背景中，“死亡”的隐喻有着不同的表达形式。本文将概念隐喻作为理论框架归纳分析中英儿童绘本中“死亡”的英语的表达，并探讨其深层的文化原因和教育意义。研究发现：一、由于人类对死亡认知的普遍性，中英儿童绘本中死亡的隐喻表现出了相似的表达，也展示了一定程度的文化一致性，诸如中英文都有用“离开”,“去远方”，“睡着了”类似的隐喻。 二、在死亡隐喻的源域的选择中由于文化背景的不同，展现了一定的区别性，诸如因东西方宗教的差异而表现的来源域的不同。基于这些发现，笔者建议我们应该根据自己的文化做一些调整，引导孩子理解死亡的客观事实，并在阅读图画书时安抚他们的负面情绪。

关键词：概念隐喻  儿童绘本  死亡  文化认知

Abstract

“Death” is the destination that a person must face, but it has been generally considered as “taboo” in society. Recently, this theme has gradually entered the field of children’s literature. However, children’s literature is different from adult literature in language features. It needs to be artistic and fuzzified in both the plot of death and the language of writing. In many creations, “metaphor” is one of the common ways to express death taboo. But in different cultural contexts, the metaphors of “death” have different forms of expression. This paper uses conceptual metaphor as a theoretical framework to analyze the expression of “death” in Chinese and English children’s picture books, and to explore its deep cultural background and educational significance. The study found that: First, since the universality of human cognition of death, the metaphor of death in Chinese and English children’s picture books shows a certain degree of cultural consistency. For example, both Chinese and English use metaphors like “Leave”, “Go to afar” and “Sleep” to represent death. Second, in the choice of the source domain of death metaphor, due to the different cultural backgrounds, it shows a certain difference. For example, due to the religious difference, western and eastern countries have differences in the source domain of Death. Based on these findings, the author suggests that we should make some adjustments base on our own culture to lead children to understand the objective facts of Death and appease their emotions when introducing the picture book.

Key words: metaphor  death  children’s picture book  cultural cognition 

Contents

Chapter One  Introduction 1

1.1  Motivation of the Research 1

1.2  The Objective and Significance of the Research 2

1.3  Layout of the Thesis 2

Chapter Two  Literature Review 4

2.1  Previous Studies on Metaphor 4

2.2  Researches on Children’s Picture Book Related to Death 5

2.3  Our Comment 6

Chapter Three  Theoretical Framework 8

3.1  Conceptual Metaphor Theory 8

3.1.1 Features of Conceptual Metaphor 8

3.1.2 Working Mechanism of Conceptual Metaphor 9

3.2  Death Metaphors 10

3.3  Florence Kluckhohn’s Five Orientations 11

Chapter Four  Comparative Analysis of Death Metaphor 13

4.1  Death Metaphor in English Children’s Picture Books 13

4.1.1 Sleep 14

4.1.2 Leave/ Departure 14

4.1.3 Buried/ In the Ground 15

4.1.4 Religions 15

4.1.5 Stop Doing Something 16

4.1.6 Go to Another Place 17

4.2  Death Metaphor in Chinese Children’s Picture Books 17

4.2.1 Sleep 18

4.2.2 Back to Nature 18

4.2.3 Religions 19

4.2.4 Journey 19

4.2.5 Never Come Back/ Disappear 20

4.2.6 Meet the People Already Dead 20

4.3  A Comparison of English and Chinese Death Metaphors 20

Chapter Five  Cultural Comparative Analysis of Death Metaphors 22

5.1  Cultural Universality in Death Metaphor 22

5.2  Cultural Diversity in Death Metaphor 22

5.2.1 Human Nature 23

5.2.2 Relationship Between Man and Nature 23

5.2.3 Time Sense 24

5.3  Functions of Death Metaphor to Children 25

5.3.1 Beautify Death and Blur Its Sense of Horror 25

5.3.2 Back to Nature 26

5.3.3 Supernatural Power 26

5.3.4 Borrowing the Characteristics of Death 27

5.4  Reference and Suggestions to the Domestic Creation 27

Chapter Six  Conclusion 30

6.1  Major Findings of the Research 30

6.2  Limitations of the Study and Suggestions for Further Research 30

Bibliography

Acknowledgments