Abstract:

Festival is not only a cultural phenomenon, but also a powerful tool by which we conduct study of culture and it plays a very important role both in Chinese and Western cultures. However there are some aspects of differences between Chinese and Western cultures. Traditional festivals reflect some of the most important differences, such as origin, decoration, food and celebration. They also reflect two nations’ different economic patterns, religious beliefs and ways of thinking. Chinese and Western traditional festivals have different origin and historic background, so their cultural connotations and forms of expression have very huge differences. Knowing these differences is very important for us students of English, because it can help us communicate better with western countries and rationally absorb the essence of the western culture, and it also can help us to understand and better handle the fact that some western traditional festivals are becoming more and more popular in China.

Keywords: Traditional Festival；Chinese and Western culture；Difference

摘  要：

节日是一种文化现象，也是我们学习文化的强有力工具。它在中西文化中扮演着十分重要的角色。中国和西方国家的文化存在着各个方面的差异，传统节日反映了一些重要的差异,比如起源，装饰，食物和庆祝方式。它也反映了两个国家不同的经济模式，宗教信和思维模式。由于中西方传统节日有着不同的起源和历史背景，所以无论是文化内涵还是表现形式上都有着很大的差别。认识这些差别对我们学习英语的学生来说非常重要，因为它可以有助于我们和西方国家更好的交流并能够理性地吸收西方文化的精华，也能帮助我们更好的理解和看待一些西方传统节日在中国流行的事实。

关键词：传统节日；中西文化；差异