摘　 要

在人类历史发展的漫长进程中,动物一直与人类保持着密切联系，并对人类的生存与发展产生深刻的影响。人们也常常借动物来寄托和表达情感，所以在英汉两种文化中都有许许多多与动物相关的词汇。但是由于两种语言起源于不同的文化背景，传统习俗，宗教信仰和地理环境，因而在习语中出现的动物词汇在各自的语言系统中就可能会有不同的文化内涵。本文从比较两种语言中一些有代表性的动物词汇的联想意义入手，通过喻体相同，比喻意义相同；喻体相同，比喻意义不同；喻体不同，比喻意义相同三方面，来探讨其在中西文化中所体现出的不同的文化意蕴，意在减少跨文化交际中的语言障碍，从而帮助人们顺利、恰当地进行跨文化交流。

关键词：动物词汇；文化内涵；象征意义；跨文化交际

Abstract

In the long course of the development of human history, animals usually keep a close relation with human beings and influence human existence and development deeply. People often use animals to express their feelings. There are so many vocabularies with relation to animals in both English and Chinese culture. But because these two different languages are originating in different culture backgrounds, traditional customs, religious beliefs and geographical environment, thus different animal words in different language systems have their own cultural connotations. This paper start from some representative animal words which have rich associative meaning to study the different cultural connotation of the animal words between Chinese and western culture. Animal idioms of both English and Chinese can be compared in the following three aspects: Same referent, same metaphorical meaning; same referent, different metaphorical meaning; different referent, same metaphorical meaning. It intends to reduce language barriers between these countries and help people do well in the cross – cultural communication.

Key words: animal words; cultural connotation; symbol meaning cross-cultural communication

1  Introduction
“Like a mirror, idioms may clearly reflect a nation’s cultural characteristics.”Because of the changes and development of a nation’s culture can be found from idioms, so they form very important parts of a language’s vocabulary. Smith has pointed that “among all the animals, horses and dogs play the most important roles.”   According to the Bible Revolution, Jesus and all of his guards ride white horses. Horses are also our tools when we are farming and our companions when we are fighting against enemies. So, there are not less horse idioms in each language. Among those idioms, dark horse has been familiar to Chinese people along with the interaction and fusion of Chinese and western culture, which often appears in media coverage. A nation’s idioms usually contain lots of information about its culture. “A language can not be learned without some knowledge of the culture behind it.” “Language is the principal means whereby we conduct our social lives. When it is used in communication, it is bound up with culture in multiple and complex ways.” That is “language expresses cultural reality; language embodies cultural reality; language symbolizes culture reality.