Abstract and Key Words

Abstract: Color displays the splendid and gorgeous nature and words of color manifest great impressive power．However, because of different cultural backgrounds，words of color  are bound to take the brand of national characteristics. This paper discusses the differences of color words between English and Chinese by means of comparison and contrast, indicates that due to different natural environment, traditional and religion, there are many differences in the use of colors and color words as well as in the understanding and meaning of the same color, and therefore, concludes that it is practically useful to know and study the differences between Chinese and English, thus promoting the cultural communication and translation practice.

Key Words: color words; cultural difference; meaning
   
摘要：颜色是大自然绚丽多姿的表象，颜色词是最富有表现力的语言，然而因为文化背景不同，颜色词必然也会留下民族特色的迹象。本文将通过对比法探讨英汉两种语言中颜色词的差异，说明由于内在环境，传统因素，宗教因素等方面的差异，表示颜色的方法和用词有很多不同，对同一颜色的理解也有很大差异，并由此得出结论：了解并掌握英汉颜色词及所构成词汇的差异，对中外文化交流及实践翻译研究有一定的实际意义。

关键词：颜色词；文化差异；意义

1. Introduction
People live in a colorful world and color plays a vitally important role in our lives. As a powerful form of communication, color is irreplaceable. For example, traffic lights send the universal message, that is, red means “stop”, yellow means “wait” and green means “go”. Color is an impersonal existence of nature. Thus in essence, it is the same to all the nations in the world. There are various words in the world to describe colors, which take up a great part in language. Every language has phrases and sentences that cannot be understood literally. Even if one knows the meanings of all the words in a phrase or sentence and understands the grammar of the sentence completely, the meaning of the phrase or sentence may still be confusing, and color words are just the case. There exist a great number of color terms in both Chinese and English. In some sense, they express the same meaning in Chinese and English, however, there are also many differences. Some color words differ greatly in meanings due to their different historic backgrounds, conventional customs, ways of thinking, ways of living and their different habits of language expressions in these two languages. Ignorance of these dissimilarities would lead to inconvenience in communication. Thus, to have a good master of the differences and similarities of the meanings of color words and their cultural connotations is a prerequisite for a better understanding of Chinese and English cultures, which will promote the cultural communication.