Abstract:

This paper puts an emphasis on the color white, analyzes the similar as well as different connotations in Chinese and English cultures, discusses various reasons for these differences, and touches upon their influences on the cross-cultural communication. Along with the development of human culture, the vocabulary that expresses color have accordingly been enriched, and these color words have been given many other new significances other than its original express of color. However, due to the various natural environments, historical backgrounds, political backgrounds, religious belief, living habits, and other factors, same color may carry different connotative meanings in different cultures. And therefore an analysis of the same color in different cultures is of great importance in cross-cultural communication.

Key words: White; Connotation; Contrastive; Chinese and English

摘要：

本文旨在研究白色在中西方不同文化里的内涵，浅究其根源和对跨文化交际的影响。随着人类文化的发展，颜色词不仅在数量上明显增加，其内涵也在不断丰富。由于历史背景、社会习俗等原因，同一颜色词在不同的文化里的内涵不同，对同一颜色不同文化内涵的分析有助于跨文化交际。

关键词：白色；内涵；差异；中英文

1. Introduction
This paper mainly deals with a contrastive analysis of the color white in Chinese and English. First, the author talks about the classification and function of color terms. Second, the writer discusses the similarities of connotation of the color white in Chinese and English. Then comes the differences of the connotation of the color white in Chinese and English. At last, the author introduces the factors causing different cultural connotations of the color white in Chinese and English culture.