摘  要

在现代社会，广告扮演了越来越重要的角色，它已是人们生活中不可或缺的一部分；它存在于人类社会的每一个角落，影响着现代社会的每一个人。总的来说，广告既是商品信息的载体，也是一种文化形式。作为文化中最有活力的一个因素，广告蕴含并反映着社会文化，同时也受到了社会文化的影响和制约。中英文广告语言就是反映中西方文化的一面镜子。二者在价值观念、社会习俗、思维模式等方面存在着文化差异。本论文将探讨影响中英广告语言的文化因素，目的在于通过对比研究，挖掘出中英广告语中的文化内涵并希望以此来加强人们在汉英广告翻译过程中的跨文化意识。

关键词：中英文广告；文化差异；广告翻译

Abstract

In modern society, advertising has become more and more important and indispensable. It exists everywhere and influences everyone. Generally speaking, advertising is a carrier of both commercial information and culture. And as the most active factor of culture, advertising not only contains and reflects social culture, but also is influenced and restricted by it. Chinese and English advertising language is a mirror to reflect Chinese and the western culture. This paper clarifies the Chinese and western cultural differences from values, social customs and thinking modes by conducting a contrastive analysis of Chinese and English advertising languages. In this thesis, the author will focus on cultural factors which influence Chinese and English advertising languages. The purpose is to reveal the cultural implications in advertising languages by contrastive study and to help strengthen the intercultural awareness in the process of Chinese-English advertising translation.

Key words: Chinese and English advertisements；cultural differences；advertising translation

1.    Introduction
In modern age, we find ourselves surrounded by various advertisements each day. An American writer writes: “we find advertisements all kinds everywhere, for example, glittering neon signs on top of high buildings along main streets, colorful pictures painted between TV programs, various advertisements glutting newspaper and radio that broadcast, etc.” Advertisement has a very long history. It is said that commercial advertisement started to appear on British newspaper in 17th century, however, people living in modern societies may see or hear advertisement everywhere, and it has already become an industry. “Advertise” deriving from the Latin “advertere” is “a means of catching people’s attention and leading to a certain way”. Encyclopedia explains it as follows: the techniques used to bring products, services, opinions or cause to public for the purpose of persuading the public to a certain way towards what is advertised.
The language of advertisement is a kind of cross-communication, the differences of historical conditions geographic locations, natural circumstances and social reality formed cultures of unique characteristics and styles. Language, as the carrier of culture, represents the thoughts, cultural characteristics and national emotions of the people who use it. Different languages are restricted by different cultures; on the other hand, they reflect their own cultures. Therefore, in order to smoothly communicate, we must combine the language knowledge and culture knowledge. In international communication, the most widely used advertising language is English.