20220630 Culture 7

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• 20220630_Culture_1 papers 1-10: 1: 英语笔译 卞王倩 Bian Wangqian 202170081563 Europeanized Chinese and Cultural Factors Behind it, 2: 英语笔译 曹姣 Cao Jiao 202170081564 Research on court culture in the Tang Dynasty from the perspective of poem -- take Changhenge for example, 3 英语笔译 陈路瑶 Chen Luyao 202170081565, 4 英语笔译 崔晓凡 Cui Xiaofan 202170081566, 5 英语笔译 邓阳林 Deng Yanglin 202170081567, 6 英语笔译 高智慧 Gao Zhihui 202170081568, 7 英语笔译 何丽娜 He Lina 202170081569, 8 英语笔译 胡良明 Hu Liangming 202170081570, 9 英语笔译 黄琼 Huang Qiong 202170081571, 10 英语笔译 邝雨琪 Kuang Yuqi 202170081572
• 20220630_Culture_2 papers 11-20: 11 英语笔译 黎溢佳 Li Yijia 202170081573, 12 英语笔译 李思敏 Li Simin 202170081574, 13 英语笔译 李思源 Li Siyuan 202170081575, 14 英语笔译 李婷 Li Ting 202170081576, 15 英语笔译 李欣 Li Xin 202170081577, 16 英语笔译 李颖 Li Ying 202170081578, 17 英语笔译 李媛 Li Yuan 202170081579, 18 英语笔译 李梓婕 Li Zijie 202170081580, 19 英语笔译 梁思婷 Liang Siting 202170081581, 20 英语笔译 廖诗韵 Liao Shiyun 202170081582
• 20220630_Culture_3 papers 21-30: 21 英语笔译 刘唱 Liu Chang 202170081583, 22 英语笔译 刘乐乐 Liu Lele 202170081584, 23 英语笔译 刘双英 Liu Shuangying 202170081585, 24 英语笔译 刘婷 Liu Ting 202170081586, 25 英语笔译 刘瑶 Liu Yao 202170081587, 26 英语笔译 刘珍 Liu Zhen 202170081588, 27 英语笔译 龙翰良 Long Hanliang 202170081589, 28 英语笔译 罗姚林 Luo Yaolin 202170081590, 29 英语笔译 马艳焕 Ma Yanhuan 202170081591, 30 英语笔译 聂薇 Nie Wei 202170081592
• 20220630_Culture_4 papers 31-40: 31 英语笔译 孙丽君 Sun Lijun 202170081593, 32 英语笔译 仝雨梦 Tong Yumeng 202170081594, 33 英语笔译 童略雅 Tong Lueya 202170081595, 34 英语笔译 庹树梅 Tuo Shumei 202170081596, 35 英语笔译 王思琪 Wang Siqi 202170081597, 36 英语笔译 王亚娟 Wang Yajuan 202170081598, 37 英语笔译 肖冬晴 Xiao Dongqing 202170081599, 38 英语笔译 肖佳莉 Xiao Jiali 202170081600, 39 英语笔译 谢晓莹 Xie Xiaoying 202170081601, 40 英语笔译 熊嘉玲 Xiong Jialing 202170081602
• 20220630_Culture_5 papers 41-50: 41 英语笔译 颜媛 Yan Yuan 202170081603, 42 英语笔译 杨心怡 Yang Xinyi 202170081604, 43 英语笔译 杨紫微 Yang Ziwei 202170081605, 44 英语笔译 张国浩 Zhang Guohao 202170081606, 45 英语笔译 张姣玲 Zhang Jiaoling 202170081607, 46 英语笔译 张瑞 Zhang Rui 202170081608, 47 英语笔译 赵宇翔 Zhao Yuxiang 202170081609, 48 英语笔译 郑冬琴 Zheng Dongqin 202170081610, 49 英语笔译 钟青 Zhong Qing 202170081611, 50 英语笔译 周皓熙 Zhou Haoxi 202170081612
• 20220630_Culture_6 papers 51-60: 51 英语笔译 周哲 Zhou Zhe 202170081613, 52 英语笔译 朱丽娟 Zhu Lijuan 202170081614, 53 英语口译 段小蝶 Duan Xiaodie 202170081615, 54 英语口译 方楚晗 Fang Chuhan 202170081616, 55 英语口译 胡雯雯 Hu Wenwen 202170081617, 56 英语口译 黄天琪 Huang Tianqi 202170081618, 57 英语口译 兰绮 Lan Qi 202170081619, 58 英语口译 李丹 Li Dan 202170081620, 59 英语口译 李立飞 Li Lifei 202170081621, 60 英语口译 莫雨婷 Mo Yuting 202170081622
• 20220630_Culture_7 papers 61-70: 61 英语口译 彭慧璇 Peng Huixuan 202170081623, 62 英语口译 时友洁 Shi Youjie 202170081624, 63 英语口译 伍佳惠 Wu Jiahui 202170081625, 64 英语口译 夏晶 Xia Jing 202170081626, 65 英语口译 向师琦 Xiang Shiqi 202170081627, 66 英语口译 向望 Xiang Wang 202170081628, 67 英语口译 徐舞 Xu Wu 202170081629, 68 英语口译 张静芝 Zhang Jingzhi 202170081630, 69 英语口译 张旻丰 Zhang Minfeng 202170081631, 70 日语笔译 曹梦然 Cao Mengran 202170081632
• 20220630_Culture_8 papers 71-80: 71 日语笔译 胡梦琪 Hu Mengqi 202170081633, 72 日语笔译 张白鹭 Zhang Bailu 202170081634, 73 朝鲜语笔译 刘安莉 Liu Anli 202170081635, 74 朝鲜语笔译 王思佳 Wang Sijia 202170081636, 75 朝朝鲜语笔译 徐盖 Xu Gai 202170081638, 76 朝鲜语笔译 徐文慧 Xu Wenhui 202170081639, 77 外国语言文学 Akira Jantarat 202121080009, 78 比较文学与跨文化研究 Mahzad 202021080004, 79 英语语言文学 Mimi 2020GBJ002301

英语口译 彭慧璇 Peng Huixuan 202170081623

Foot Binding in China Peng Huixuan

Introduction

Foot binding, a custom of breaking and tightly binding the feet of young girls in order to change their shape and size, persisted in China for a millennium. Feet altered by foot binding were known as lotus feet, and the shoes made for these feet were known as lotus shoes. The different sizes of feet are different levels of "lotus", feet longer than four inches are called “iron lotus”, those about four inches are called “silver lotus”, and those shorter than three inches are “gold lotus”. In late imperial China, bound feet were considered a status symbol and a mark of feminine beauty.

There are various views on when foot binding began, including the Xia dynasty, Shang Dynasty, Spring and Autumn period, Sui dynasty, Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, and Song Dynasty. According to the scholar Gao Hongxing’s book “The History of Footbinding”, foot binding began in the late Northern Song Dynasty and entered its heyday in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. (Gao 1995, 1) Later, the popularity of foot-binding spread to women of all social ranks. After the overthrow of the Qing Dynasty, Sun Yat-sen officially banned foot-binding. During the May Fourth Movement, foot-binding became the target of the revolutionary movement, with many denouncing the destruction and oppression of women by foot-binding. After the founding of New China, foot binding was completely abolished, and Chinese women were completely liberated from that.

In this article, the author provides further details on the history and specific process of foot binding. At the same time, the reasons for foot binding will be further discussed in detail, including cultural and social factors. In addition, the paper will describe the impact of foot binding on Chinese women, China, and on the world in general. Finally, the views on foot-binding will be mentioned, as well as traditions similar to foot-binding in other countries, such as the Victorian corset and their impacts.

Origin and History of Foot Binding

Sui Dynasty

The saying that foot-binding began in the Sui Dynasty originates from folklore. It is said that when Emperor Yang of Sui traveled east to Jiangdu to select beautiful women as his concubine, a woman named Wu Yueniang (the Moon Lady) was chosen. However, she hated Emperor Yang of Sui’s tyranny, so she asked her father, who was a blacksmith, to make a three-inches knife with a lotus petal, and wrapped the knife under her foot with a long cloth, and also wrapped her foot as small as possible. Then she carved a lotus flower on the sole of the shoe. In this regard, when she was walking, there will be beautiful lotus flowers printed on the floor. Emperor Yang of Sui was very happy to see her and asked her to come close to him, eager to play with her small feet. Wu slowly untied her foot wrapping and suddenly drew out her knife and stabbed Emperor Yang of Sui. He dodged in a hurry, but his arm was stabbed. Seeing that the assassination attempt failed, Wu plunged a suicide. To commemorate Wu Yueniang, many women started to wrap or bind their feet.

The Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period

The general view is that the practice is likely to have originated in the time of the 10th-century Emperor Li Yu of the Southern Tang, just before the Song dynasty. Li Yu created a 1.8-meter-tall (6 ft) golden lotus decorated with precious stones and pearls, and asked his concubine, Yao Niang, to bind her feet in white silk into the shape of the crescent moon and perform a dance on the points of her feet on the lotus. (Ko 2002, 42) Yao Niang's dance was said to be so graceful that others sought to imitate her. (Taylor 2008, 203) In addition to altering the shape of the foot, the practice also produced a particular sort of gait that relied on the thigh and buttock muscles for support. From the start, foot-binding was imbued with erotic overtones. Gradually, other court ladies—with money, time, and a void to fill—took up foot-binding, making it a status symbol among the elite. And then, the practice became popular.

Song Dynasty

According to Gao Hongxing’s “History of Footbinding”, numerous historical sources prove that foot-binding originated in the late Northern Song Dynasty, and became trendy in the Southern Song Dynasty. (Gao 1995, 16)

There are many literary verses from the historical period of that time that confirm this point. For example, In the 13th century, scholar Che Ruoshui wrote the first known criticism of the practice: “Little girls not yet four or five years old, who have done nothing wrong, nevertheless are made to suffer unlimited pain to bind their feet small. I do not know what use this is.” Besides, in the earliest extant discourse on the practice of foot-binding, scholar Zhang Bangji wrote that a bound foot should be arch-shaped and small (Ko 2008, 111). He observed that “women’s foot-binding began in recent times; it was not mentioned in any books from previous eras.” (Ian 2011, 424)

The imperial family and the upper class of the Song Dynasty were among the first to start foot-binding. The promotion of Song rulers played a great role in the creation and development of foot binding. In the Song Dynasty, it was common for princesses to have their feet wrapped. At that time, someone claimed to be Princess Roufu, the 10th daughter of Emperor Huizong of Song, but was suspected of impersonation because of her large feet. In a poem by Su Shi, a famous literary scholar of the Song Dynasty, he regarded women's small feet as “palace-like”, and another poet, Cao Yuanchong, also called small feet “official-like” in a lyric, which shows that foot-binding started from the upper class of the Song Dynasty, such as the bureaucratic aristocracy. (Gao 1995, 18) Foot binding was also very popular with the literati of the Song Dynasty, and even Su Shi and Xin Qiji, two famous poets, wrote poems admiring foot binding.

Women in the early Northern Song Dynasty had not yet begun to wrap their feet. The phenomenon of foot-binding began to appear in the middle of the Northern Song Dynasty. According to historical records, the custom of foot-binding was already in place during the Xining period (1068-1077) and Yuanfeng period (1078-1085), but there were still few who did it, so it can also be inferred that the custom of foot-binding did not last long at that time, and the custom of foot-binding roughly emerged in the eleventh century of the Song Dynasty. In the Xuanhe period (1119-1125) of Emperor Huizong of the Song Dynasty (late Northern Song Dynasty), the custom of foot-binding witnessed rapid development. The Fengchuang Xiaodu, which records the manners, customs, political affairs and arts of the late Northern and early Southern Song Dynasty, records that after the Xuanhe period, there were “embroidered bow shoes” everywhere at boudoirs in Bianjing, a city in east-central Henan province, and there were shoes specially designed for foot-binding at that time. Archaeological discoveries have also led to the frequent discovery of foot-binding shoes for women in the Southern Song Dynasty. For example, six pairs of women’s shoes, 13.3-14 cm long and 4.5-5 cm wide, were unearthed from a Southern Song tomb in Fuzhou, Fujian province. By the end of the Southern Song Dynasty, small feet had become a characteristic of women.

Yuan Dynasty

In the Yuan Dynasty, foot-binding is not popular among the Mongolian noble class, but also they did not oppose it, instead, they held an attitude of appreciation. Thus, the style of foot-binding in the Yuan Dynasty continued to develop. At the end of the Yuan Dynasty, the concept of “not wrapping the feet was a disgrace” emerged. Then, in order to meet the aesthetic and social trends of the time, Yuan Dynasty women bound their feet smaller and smaller.

Ming Dynasty

In the Ming Dynasty, foot-binding entered a period of prevalence. During the Ming Dynasty, men were not allowed to study and women were not allowed to bind their feet in the common people of eastern Zhejiang. Foot-binding became a symbol of social status, which shows that the society at that time respected and admired foot-binding. During the Ming Dynasty, foot binding developed rapidly throughout the country, this development can be seen in the following example: At that time, Datong, Shanxi province and Xuande Residence the northwestern part of Hebei Province became the country's famous foot binding areas, which attracted numerous small-feet freaks, and Zhengde Emperor, the 11th Emperor of the Ming dynasty, often go there to choose concubines. Because foot-binding was popular at this time, Hu Shi, a Chinese literary scholar, listed it as one of the three major diseases of the Ming Dynasty, along with the eight-legged essay and opium.

Qing Dynasty

Foot-binding reached its peak in the Qing Dynasty. At that time, women from all walks of life, rich or poor, had their feet wrapped. By the 19th century, it was estimated that 40–50% of Chinese women had bound feet, and, among upper-class Han Chinese women, the figure was almost 100%. Bound feet became a mark of beauty and were also a prerequisite for finding a husband. They also became an avenue for poorer women to marry up in some areas, such as Sichuan.

In the Qing Dynasty, the ruler initially strongly opposed foot-binding and repeatedly ordered to prohibit it, but at this time the culture of foot-binding is difficult to stop. By the seventh year of the Kangxi period (1668), the ban had to be removed. In the frenzy of the worship of foot-binding, some insightful people in the Qing Dynasty soberly recognized the harm of foot-binding, and they forcefully opposed the harmful effects of foot-binding from different angles. They were the pioneers of the anti-footbinding movement in the late Qing Dynasty.

Opposition to foot-binding had been raised by some Chinese writers in the 18th century. In the mid-19th century, many of the rebel leaders of the Taiping Rebellion were of Hakka background whose women did not bind their feet, and foot-binding was outlawed. (Shi 1968, 27) However, the rebellion failed, and Christian missionaries, who had provided education for girls and actively discouraged what they considered a barbaric practice, then played a part in changing elite opinion on foot-binding through education, pamphleteering, and lobbying of the Qing court, placing emphasis on the fact that no other culture in the world practiced the custom of foot-binding. (Gerry 1996, 999)

The earliest-known Western anti-footbinding society was formed in Amoy (Xiamen) in 1874. Around 60-70 Christian women in Xiamen attended a meeting presided over by a missionary John MacGowan formed the Natural Foot Society (Tianzu Hui, literally Heavenly Foot Society). [11.12] (Dorothy 2007, 14) (Brent 2008, 203) Reform-minded Chinese intellectuals began to consider foot-binding to be an aspect of their culture that needed to be eliminated. In 1883, Kang Youwei, a prominent political thinker and reformer in China, founded the Anti-Footbinding Society near Canton to combat the practice, and anti-footbinding societies sprang up across the country, with membership for the movement claimed to reach 300,000. (Gail 2019, 67) Reformers such as Liang Qichao, influenced by Social Darwinism, also argued that it weakened the nation. In 1906, Zhao Zhiqian wrote in Beijing Women's News to blame women with bound feet for being a national weakness in the eyes of other nations. (Gail 2019, 67) In 1902, Empress Dowager Cixi issued an anti-footbinding edict, but it was soon rescinded.

After 1912

In 1912, the new Republic of China government banned foot-binding, though the ban was not actively implemented, and leading intellectuals of the May Fourth Movement saw foot-binding as a major symbol of China's backwardness. Many provinces engaged in their own sustained campaign against foot-binding or enforced the ban against foot-binding. The campaign against foot-binding was successful in some regions; in one province, a 1929 survey showed that, whereas only 2.3% of girls born before 1910 had unbound feet, 95% of those born after were not bound. (Stewart 2014, 423) In most parts of China, however, the foot-binding practice had virtually disappeared by 1949. (Stewart 2014, 423) The practice was also stigmatized in Communist China, and the last vestiges of foot-binding were stamped out, with the last new case of foot-binding reported in 1957. By the 21st century, only a few elderly women in China still had bound feet. In 1999, the last shoe factory making lotus shoes, the Zhiqiang Shoe Factory in Harbin, closed. (Dorothy 2008,9)

Practice of Foot Binding

Binding Method and Process

The process was started before the arch of the foot had a chance to develop fully, usually between the ages of four and nine. Binding usually started during the winter months since the feet were more likely to be numb, and therefore the pain would not be as extreme.

Items to be prepared before foot binding:

1. Six blue cotton bandages. It should be about eight to ten feet or more.

2. Five pairs of flat-soled shoes. Shoes are shaped pointed, and have to be flexible, so that they can be sewed smaller.

3. Two or three pairs of sleeping shoes. Wear when one is sleeping, which can prevent the bandages from loosening.

4. Needle and thread, which will be used to sew up the bandages.

5. Cotton. Wearing shoes with cotton so as to cushion protruding parts of foot bones.

6. Feet-washing basin and hot water. Wash the feet with warm water before wrapping.

7. A small pair of scissors, which will be used to cut the toenails and corns.

First, each foot would be soaked in a warm mixture of herbs and animal blood; this was intended to soften the foot and aid the binding. Then, the toenails were cut back as far as possible to prevent in-growth and subsequent infections, since the toes were to be pressed tightly into the sole of the foot. Cotton bandages were prepared by soaking them in the blood and herb mixture. To enable the size of the feet to be reduced, the toes on each foot were curled under, then pressed with great force downwards and squeezed into the sole of the foot. (Gerry 1996, 999)

Shi Jin

This process is to continue tightening the bandage. When wrapping, people will first wrap the second and fifth toes, wrapped to curl them under the foot, and the third and fourth toes will follow to curl under the foot. This process will also last a few days to about two months. During this time, the bandages will become stiff and the wrinkles of the bandage are punched out by a small hammer so that the foot can get used to the stiffness and tightness of those bandages, and then the bandages can be tightened to a new level.

Guo Jian

In this process, the bandages are wrapped as tightly as possible, until the little toe is pressed under the feet and the second toe is pressed under the big toe joint. During the Guo Jian, it is often necessary to twist the toe to the bottom of the foot until it can no longer be bent, and then tighten the bandages. During this process, several sprained joints will suffer a lot of damage, which is very painful. After wrapping, the bandages are sewn up tightly with a needle and thread, and then the foot is squeezed hard into a small and pointed shoe, and the girl is asked to walk around in the small shoe. When walking, the weight of the person will be pressed on the eight toes bent inward, spraining the joints even more. The next morning, the young girl woke up and had to unwind the bandages again and wrap her feet even tighter. Finally, the third, fourth and fifth toe joints had to be severely sprained or even dislocated. When the feet and toes are dislocated, the foot will be very swollen, and the skin turns purple, and it is extremely painful. However, the bandages are tighter and tighter day by day, until the swelling subsides, the all the toes are wrapped to the bottom of the feet, which is considered to have completed the work of Guo Jian, and then one can proceed to Guo Shou.

Guo Shou

After the Guo Jian, the four toes have been rolled under the palm of the foot, but may not be neatly attached to the bottom of the foot. Until the tips of the third, fourth and fifth toes can touch the inner edge of the palm of the foot, the work of Guo Shou is complete. During this process, the little toe bone should be pushed downward, and the four toes should be pushed along to the inner edge of the palm of the foot. After a few days, when the bandages are unwrapped, there are often many places on the foot where the ulcerated part and the bandages are tightly stuck, which is like a bloody mess. This process will take almost six months, and the young girl will have to endure the pain until the toes are rolled to the inside edge of the foot, and the toes can be touched by the inside edge of the foot, so that the process is complete.

Guo Wan

Guo Wan is to wrap the foot until the palm is folded into two sections, so that the front section of the foot is tightly pressed against the heel, the second half of the foot. Besides, the foot should be wrapped until the sole of the foot palm has a deep gap, which sometimes reaches four or five centimeters. Generally speaking, the pain is slightly less during the Guo Wan. However, if the foot is not wrapped hard during the process of Guo Shou, the Guo Wan start in the teenage years, and the length of the foot is required to be particularly short after this process, then it will be very painful at this time. After the Guo Wan, the length of the foot will be significantly shortened.

Regional Differences

The method, age, requirements, and order of foot binding vary from place to place, thus creating different shapes of the feet.

Northern China

Generally speaking, northerners are taller and their feet are longer than those of southerners, so their feet will still be longer than southerners' after foot-binding. However, because of the cold weather in the north, feet that are wrapped for a long time are not easy to ulcerate and do not require frequent washing, so it is easier to wrap harder and tighter. Because the bandages are more tightly wrapped, so the northern feet are more pointed, thinner, and softer.

Southern China

In Southern China, the weather is hot, due to the wrapping and thick shoes, the feet will feel unbearably hot. Foot-binding in Southern China mainly focuses on the process of Guo Wan. In Taiwan or Shunde and Dongguan, Guangdong province, there are often feet that are wrapped to about two inches, which is far from what the northerners can reach. In order to seek smaller feet, some people even bend the back of the foot into a ball shape, which is generally known as the goose head-shaped feet.

Variation of Foot Binding

Manchu women, as well as Mongol and Chinese women in the Eight Banners, did not bind their feet. The most a Manchu woman might do was to wrap the feet tightly to give them a slender appearance. (Mark 2001, 246) The Manchus, wanting to emulate the particular gait that bound feet necessitated, adapted their own form of platform shoes to cause them to walk in a similar swaying manner. These Manchu platform shoes were known as “flower bowl” shoes or “horse-hoof” shoes; they have a platform generally made of wood 5–20 cm (2–6 in) in height and fitted to the middle of the sole, or they have a small central tapered pedestal. Many Han Chinese in the Inner City of Beijing also did not bind their feet, and it was reported in the mid-1800s that around 50–60% of non-banner women had unbound feet. Bound feet nevertheless became a significant differentiating marker between Han women and Manchu or other banner women. (Mark 2001, 246)

Reasons of Foot Binding

There are many interpretations of the practice of foot-binding, mainly divided into the following major aspects:

Aesthetic and Erotic Factors

In the ancient Chinese aesthetic concept, the so-called female beauty is to reflect their “feminine” side, that is, small, soft, quiet, and curvy. Before foot-binding was practiced in China, admiration for small feet already existed.

Speaking of “small”, cherry-like small mouths, small and heart-shaped faces, and willow-like slender waist are the qualities of female beauty, and foot is no exception. Before the Song Dynasty, although the custom of foot binding did not appear and there was no frenzy for small feet, there was a concept of beauty in the form of small feet. In the Han Dynasty, there is a line in “The Peacock Flies Southeast” that reads, “The fine step is the fine step, and the exquisite world is no two” which praises the slenderness of the female foot. (Gao 1995, 86)

For more than a thousand years, bound feet were associated with exquisite beauty, therefore enhancing women’s attraction. For women, a pair of perfectly bound feet were considered to be a mark of gentility and refinement. For men, the tiny and fragile appearance of the bound feet had a profound erotic appeal. Numerous studies have given proof of the male attraction to women with bound feet. It is obvious that bound feet aroused in the male a feeling of lust and sexual desire.

The theory that foot-binding was inherently erotic or aesthetic comes from the fact that up until recently, much of the historical information we can glean about the practice of foot-binding comes from texts written by men. Images and accounts of foot-binding are captured in the art and writings of mostly male elites over the centuries and portray women with bound feet as beautiful and sexually appealing.

Even while not much was written on the subject of foot-binding prior to the latter half of the 19th century, the writings which were done on this topic, particularly by educated men, frequently alluded to the erotic nature and appeal of bound feet in their poetry. (Gail 2019, 45)

Economic Factors

Foot-binding persisted for so long because it had a clear economic rationale: It was a way to make sure young girls sat still and helped make goods like yarn, cloth, mats, shoes and fishing nets that families depended upon for income – even if the girls themselves were told it would make them more marriageable.

Some research found that foot-binding endured longest in areas where it still made economic sense to produce goods like cloth at home and began to decline only when cheaper factory-made alternatives became available in these regions. Girls began hand spinning yarn as young as 6 or 7 – roughly the same ages as when their feet were bound.

Foot binding was an instrumental means to reserve women to handwork, and can be seen as a way by mothers to tie their daughters down, train them in handwork, and keep them close at hand.

Foot-binding was common when women could do light industry, but where women were required to do heavy farm work they often did not bind their feet because it hindered physical work. These scholars argued that the coming of the mechanized industry at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, such as the introduction of industrial textile processes, resulted in a loss of light handwork for women, removing a reason to maintain the practice. Mechanization resulted in women who worked at home facing a crisis. (Laurel 2011, 347) Coupled with changes in politics and people's consciousness, the practice of foot binding disappeared in China forever after two generations. (Hill 2001, 130)

Social Factors

Those high and mighty princes and generals were not only afraid of outsiders taking away their power, but also afraid of the people around them seizing power. Therefore, most of the princesses and concubines of the Southern Song Dynasty have wrapped their feet. This is a constant suppression of women, it is the men to let women know that they are born below men and to prevent the idea of seizing power and usurping the throne.

People have taken the foot binding of women in their families as something to show off. The women in the brothels had their feet wrapped and that was a “job requirement”, while the women in the royal palaces and noble families had their feet wrapped purely to satisfy men’s desire for a sense of control. This is a way to suppress the female mind and a manifestation of men’s pathological desire to control. For upholding this tradition for so long, the motive was for men to be able to dominate women.

Impacts of Foot Binding

Harms on Women

The most direct danger to women from foot-binding is the physical damage it causes. The most common problem with bound feet was infection. Despite the amount of care taken in regularly trimming the toenails, they would often in-grow, becoming infected and causing injuries to the toes. Sometimes, for this reason, the girl's toenails would be peeled back and removed altogether. The tightness of the binding meant that the circulation in the feet was faulty, and the circulation to the toes was almost cut off, so any injuries to the toes were unlikely to heal and were likely to gradually worsen and lead to infected toes and rotting flesh. The necrosis of the flesh would also initially give off a foul odor, and, later, the smell may have come from various microorganisms that colonized the folds. (Fraser 2005, 1) Most of the women receiving treatment did not go out often and were disabled. (Gerry 1996, 999)

At the beginning of the binding, many of the foot bones would remain broken, often for years. However, as the girl grew older, the bones would begin to heal. Even after the foot bones had healed, they were prone to rebreaking repeatedly, especially when the girl was in her teenage years and her feet were still soft. Bones in the girls' feet would often be deliberately broken again in order to further change the size or shape of the feet. This was especially the case with the toes, as small toes were especially desirable. (Cummings 1997, 1677) Older women were more likely to break hips and other bones in falls, since they could not balance securely on their feet, and were less able to rise to their feet from a sitting position. (Cummings 1997, 1678) Other issues that may have arisen from foot binding included paralysis and muscular atrophy. (DeMello 2007, 116)

Foot binding is often seen by feminists as an oppressive practice against women who were victims of a sexist culture. It is also widely seen as a form of violence against women. Foot binding causes women to suffer torture and pain for no reason. It prevents women from participating in social work and interferes with their social activities.

Social Impact

Foot binding not only seriously affects the normal development of women's feet and makes people form a deformed aesthetic mentality. Foot binding also reinforced the concept of male superiority and inferiority of women, which contributed to the stability of the patriarchal feudal system and increased the confinement and bondage of women.

In addition, foot-binding has reduced women's motivation to engage in dance and sports. For example, Korea and Japan have continued to develop their dances after the introduction of the art of dance in China. In contrast, the development of dance in China has become more and more stagnant with the development of foot binding.

Similar Practice in Other Countries

Brass Coils in Kayan People (Myanmar)

Women of the Kayan tribes identify themselves by their forms of dress. Women of the Kayan Lahwi tribe are well known for wearing neck rings, brass coils that are placed around the neck, appearing to lengthen it. These women who wear the coils have only three chances to take it off in their lifetime: marriage, childbirth, and death. Girls first start to wear rings when they are around 5 years old. Over the years, the coil is replaced by a longer one and more turns are added. The weight of the brass pushes the collar bone down and compresses the rib cage. The neck itself is not lengthened; the appearance of a stretched neck is created by the deformation of the clavicle. (Keshishian 1979, 798) Many ideas regarding why the coils are worn have been suggested. Anthropologists have hypothesized that the rings protected women from becoming slaves, making them less attractive to other tribes. It has also been theorized that the coils originate from the desire to look more attractive by exaggerating sexual dimorphism, as women have more slender necks than men. The coil, once on, is seldom removed, as the coiling and uncoiling is a lengthy procedure. It is usually only removed to be replaced by a new or longer coil. The muscles covered by the coil become weakened. Many women have removed the rings for medical examinations. Most women prefer to wear the rings once their clavicle has been lowered, as the area of the neck and collarbone often becomes bruised and discolored. Additionally, the collar feels like an integral part of the body after ten or more years of continuous wear.

Conclusion

In general, foot binding is a custom that has been passed down in China for many years. Although it may seem far away from us, such a small custom can give us contemporary people an insight into the history of previous times. Although the history of foot-binding is a thing of the past, today it is even more important to learn a lesson from such important history, such as the need to protect women’s rights and maintain a healthy social climate. History brings us experience and lessons, and we need to learn from it, face up to it, reflect on our lives today and make efforts for a better society, or even a better world.

Terms and expressions

Iron lotus铁莲

Silver lotus银莲

Gold lotus金莲

Emperor Yang of Sui 隋炀帝

Wu Yueniang (the Moon Lady) 吴月娘

The Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period 五代十国

Yao Niang 窅娘

Emperor Li Yu of the Southern Tang 南唐后主李煜

Che Ruoshui 车若水

Zhang Bangji 张邦基

Princess Roufu 柔福帝姬（柔福公主）

Emperor Huizong of Song 宋徽宗

Cao Yuanchong 曹元宠

Xining period (1068-1077) 熙宁年间

Yuanfeng period (1078-1085) 元丰年间

Xuanhe period (1119-1125) 宣和年间

Fengchuang Xiaodu 《枫窗小牍》

Xuande Residence 宣德府

Zhengde Emperor 明武宗

Eight-legged essay八股文

Kangxi period 康熙年间

The anti-footbinding movement 天足运动

Natural Foot Society (Tianzu Hui, literally Heavenly Foot Society) 天足会

Empress Dowager Cixi 慈禧太后

Zhiqiang Shoe Factory 志强鞋厂

Lotus shoes 缠足鞋

Shi Jin 试紧

Shi Chan 试缠

Guo Jian 裹尖

Guo Shou 裹瘦

Guo Wan 裹弯

“Flower bowl” shoes 花盆鞋

“Horse-hoof” shoes 马蹄鞋

Non-banner women 非八旗女子

cherry-like small mouths 樱桃小嘴

small and heart-shaped face 瓜子脸

willow-like slender waist 杨柳细腰

The Peacock Flies Southeast 孔雀东南飞

Kayan people巴东族

Brass Coils 铜圈

Questions

(1)According to the size of the foot, how many types of foot binding can be classified?

(2)When was the heyday of foot binding?

(3)How many major steps are there in foot wrapping?

(4)What are the effects of foot binding?

(5)What is the similar practice as foot-binding in other countries?

Answers

(1)Three. The different sizes of feet are different levels of “lotus”. There are iron lotus (longer than four inches), silver lotus (about four inches), and silver lotus (shorter than three inches).

(2)In the Qing Dynasty.

(3)Five. They are Shi Chan, Shi Jin, Guo Jian, Guo Shou, and Guo Wan.

(4)Foot-binding brings great physical and social harm to women, and also gives rise to aberrant aesthetics in society.

(5)Brass Coils in Kayan people (Myanmar)

References

[1] 高洪兴．缠足史：上海文艺出版社，1995:1-2

[2] Dorothy Ko (2002). Every Step a Lotus: Shoes for Bound Feet. University of California Press. p. 42. ISBN 978-0-520-23284-6.

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[4] 高洪兴．缠足史：上海文艺出版社，1995:16

[5] Dorothy Ko (2008). Cinderella's Sisters: A Revisionist History of Footbinding. University of California Press. pp. 111–115. ISBN 978-0-520-25390-2.

[6] Morris, Ian (2011). Why the West Rules - For Now: The Patterns of History, and What They Reveal About the Future. McClelland & Stewart. p. 424. ISBN 978-1-55199-581-6.

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[8] Vincent Yu-Chung Shih; Yu-chung Shi (1968). The Taiping Ideology: Its Sources, Interpretations, and Influences. University of Washington Press. pp. 27–29.

[9] Mackie, Gerry (1996). “Ending Footbinding and Infibulation: A Convention Account”. American Sociological Review. 61 (6): 999–1017.

[10] Ko, Dorothy (2007). Cinderella's Sisters: A Revisionist History of Footbinding. University of California Press. pp. 14–17.

[11] Whitefield, Brent (2008). “The Tian Zu Hui (Natural Foot Society): Christian Women in China and the Fight against Footbinding”. Southeast Review of Asian Studies. 30: 203–12.

[12] Hershatter, Gail (2019). Women and China's Revolutions. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield. p. 67.

[13] Hershatter, Gail (2019). Women and China's Revolution. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 67–68. ISBN 978-1-4422-1570-2.

[14] Mary White Stewart (27 January 2014). Ordinary Violence: Everyday Assaults against Women Worldwide. Praeger. pp. 4237–428. ISBN 978-1-4408-2937-6.

[15] Mary White Stewart (27 January 2014). Ordinary Violence: Everyday Assaults against Women Worldwide. Praeger. pp. 4237–428. ISBN 978-1-4408-2937-6.

[16] Ko, Dorothy (2008). Cinderella's Sisters: A Revisionist History of Footbinding. University of California Press. p. 9. ISBN 978-0-520-25390-2.

[17] Mackie, Gerry (1996). “Ending Footbinding and Infibulation: A Convention Account”. American Sociological Review. 61 (6): 999–1017.

[18] Elliott, Mark C. (2001). The Manchu Way: the Eight Banners and Ethnic Identity in Late Imperial China. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press. pp. 246–249.

[19] Elliott, Mark C. (2001). The Manchu Way: the Eight Banners and Ethnic Identity in Late Imperial China. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press. pp. 246–249.

[20] 高洪兴．缠足史：上海文艺出版社，1995：86-89

[21] Hershatter, Gail (2019). Women and China's Revolutions. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 45.

[22] Bossen, Laurel; Xurui, Wang; Brown, Melissa J.; Gates, Hill (2011). “Feet and Fabrication: Footbinding and Early Twentieth-Century Rural Women's Labor in Shaanxi”. Modern China. 37 (4): 347–383

[23] Gates, Hill (2001). “Footloose in Fujian: Economic Correlates of Footbinding”. Comparative Studies in Society and History. 43 (1): 130–148.

[24] Newham, Fraser (21 March 2005). "The ties that bind". The Guardian.

[25] Mackie, Gerry (1996). “Ending Footbinding and Infibulation: A Convention Account”. American Sociological Review. 61 (6): 999–1017.

[26] Cummings, S. R.; Ling, X.; Stone, K. (1997). "Consequences of foot binding among older women in Beijing, China". American Journal of Public Health. 87 (10): 1677–1679.

[27] Cummings, S. & Stone, K. (1997) "Consequences of Foot Binding Among Older Women in Beijing China", in: American Journal of Public Health EBSCO Host. October 1997

[28] Margo DeMello (2007). Encyclopedia of Body Adornment. Greenwood Press. pp. 116–117.

[29] Keshishian, J.M. (1979), Anatomy of a Burmese Beauty Secret (155.6 ed.), Washington: National Geographic, pp. 798–801

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[31] 李凤飞, 暴鸿昌. 中国妇女缠足与反缠足的历史考察[J]. 学习与探索, 1997(3):8.

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英语口译 时友洁 Shi Youjie 202170081624

Makeup Revolution in Ancient China Shi Youjie

Introduction

Makeup involves dressing and grooming in terms of its broad sense, while in a narrow sense, it refers to the makeup on one's face. By applying cosmetics, a particular feature of the face will be highlighted to be more charming. In ancient China, makeup is generally called “粉黛（fen dai）”，“打扮（da ban）”，“容妆（rong zhuang）”, and in most circumstances, females tend to makeup more than males. Ancient China has witnessed a clear process of evolution about makeup, in which women's makeup in different dynasties will be mainly displayed and analyzed in this paper.

Throughout history, only a few words about makeup has remained owing to the traditional preference of ancient Chinese. On the one hand, the history book prefers to narrate a male with his story of nobility, virtue or great success, or record events of historic importance, leading to a shortage of details about public daily lives, not to mention the makeup. On the other hand, the ancient Chinese artists root for preserving the essence and aroma rather than the details and forms of a painting. This is why modern archaeologists have found it difficult to investigate ancient Chinese makeup. As hard as it may be, some types of makeup in different dynasties can be accessed by a small number of records.

Despite a few historical sources, to learn the evolution of make is still significant, for it is not only the aesthetics but also the national context of ancient China that is behind the makeup. Analysis of ancient Chinese in a visual aspect is only scratching the surface, while the economic, political and cultural background that makeup mirrors is worth studying further.

Many of the unearthed artifacts about makeup can be traced back to prehistoric times at the earliest, which allow us to study makeup customs such as body painting, tattooing, ear piercing, etc at that period. But it was not until the Western Han and Eastern Han Dynasties that the makeup culture was formed with a standard aesthetic appreciation. Subsequently, distinctive aesthetic preferences were bred in Wei, Jin, Northern and Southern Dynasties, the Sui and Tang dynasties, and the Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties respectively.

This paper will focus on makeup preferences in four major times: the Western Han and Eastern Han Dynasties,the Wei, Jin, Northern and Southern Dynasties，the Sui and Tang dynasties, and the Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties, with an aim to provide insights about the integration between makeup and historical background.

Han Dynasty

The Han Dynasty was the longest dynasty in China after the Qin dynasty, lasting 405 years. While the Qin Dynasty completed the political unification of China with its power, the Han Dynasty completed the cultural unification of China with its ideas and wisdom. It was during this period that the Han nation was formed and the essence of Han culture was established. In the early Han dynasty, the recuperation policy was followed by the outstanding reign of Emperor Wu of Han, who not only made the Han dynasty socially stable and peaceful, but also rich in all kinds of products; and in military trade, expanding the territory, pacifying the Xiongnu in the north and the Southern Yue in the south, opening up the land Silk Road; and moreover, opening up the door to maritime trade in the south, greatly expanding the Han dynasty's foreign trade. This created the objective conditions for the abundance of raw materials for facial make-up, and make-up products such as lead powder, rouge and synthetic fragrances became widespread in this era. It was during this period that the aesthetic view of Chinese make-up took shape. The aesthetics of "simplicity and simplicity", "great beauty" and "modesty and gentleness"were pursued during this period. Besides, "dismissing the hundred schools and respecting only Confucianism", "meekness and softness" and "respectful and submissive" and other ideologies of this time all contributed to the preference of make-up.

There was also another reason for the Han Dynasty's preference for simple make-up. In the early Han Dynasty, women paid much attention to their inner maintenance in order to reveal their true beauty. Out of this ideology, coupled with the economic depression of the early Han Dynasty, most of the Western Han makeup was light and elegant, demonstrating the pursuit of nature, which also laid the foundation for the makeup of the mid and late Han Dynasty.

Eyebrow make-up: The Han dynasty is a woman's feminine and weak beauty, so although the Western Han dynasty was strong in the middle of the country, expanding its borders, the emergence of heroic "distant mountain eyebrows", but the long, thin eyebrows, and over time, the eyebrows are getting longer and longer, long eyebrows prevailed for a while. The slender moth eyebrow remained the mainstay of ancient Chinese women's eyebrow make-up.

Face makeup： "白妆" (White make-up) and "红妆"(Red make-up): Han Dynasty society advocates women's complexion to white for beauty, and especially in the Western Han Dynasty, the standard of beauty is slender and white skin. Thus this era, white make-up and red make-up should be distinguished from each other, as one is plain make-up, the other is graceful and luxurious make-up. This paper later will have more detailed introduction to prevalence of these two types of make-up. During the Han Dynasty, "病弱妆"(sickly make-up) was popular, with women dressing themselves in a soft and slender manner to show their morbid beauty. One type of make-up represented is the "愁眉啼妆"(sad eyebrows and crying make-up): the eyebrows are painted downwards with powder, and under the eyes with white dye to show the tear marks.

"面靥"(dimple make-up): it refers to a type of make-up generally applied to the dimples on both sides of a woman's face in ancient times. It was originally used by concubines in the palace as a marker, similar to the function of an alarm. A red dot on the cheek meant that the woman was pregnant or menstruating and could not perform conjugal acts. Originally it was only a type of make-up in the palace, while later people found that the make-up made one look charming, which increased the popularity of this make-up among the people.

The face is also decorated with"花钿"(flower inlay) and "额黄"(yellow forehead make-up). Flower inlay is a general term for thin pieces of ornamentation that can be attached to the face. With the change of dynasties and the continuous development of social economy, many new styles have emerged since the Han Dynasty. The yellow forehead make-up refers to the color yellow painted on the forehead. This type of make-up may seem strange to modern people, but it was very popular for a long time in ancient times, as is related to the ancient Chinese folk belief in Buddhism.

Lip make-up: The Han Dynasty lip make-up preference was based on a small mouth. In Confucianism's "four virtues" of women, "women's words" ranked second in terms of importance. During the Han Dynasty, people believed that women's mouths should be small, pleasing to the eye. This is why from the relative record, the lips of Han women were red and small. It was not common for women to be born with small mouths, so brightly colored, malleable lipstick was often available. A little bit of lipstick could instantly turn a large mouth into a small one, so in ancient times the use of lipstick to beautify the lips was known as "点唇"(lip-dotting). There are two main steps in the lip make-up in Han Dynasty: firstly, when applying makeup powder, the lips are applied together with white color, making it better in being dyeing. Then the lips were re-dyed with lip gloss.

Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties

In the history of ancient Chinese make-up, the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties is a beginning era for make-up variety. The make-up trend in the Tang Dynasty actually carries forward the rich make-up styles of the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties. Some of the abundant relics and manuscripts in the tombs of The Tang Dynasty were well preserved, providing us with rich visual materials for the study of ancient make-up. In fact, without the large number of make-up styles in the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, the cultural exchange of different ethnic groups like "胡" and "汉"（Hu people and Han people） and the eastward spread of Buddhism in this period, the flourishing make-up of the Tang Dynasty would not have been possible. However, since the time was chaotic and turbulent, and the nobles were not able to well bury the dead, the preserved make-up records are mostly documentary materials, and the image materials are relatively scarce, but if compared with Han Dynasties and previous era, the records remained are incomparable.

During the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, due to the division of the regime and the constant change of dynasties, accompanied by large-scale wars, the social economy suffered considerable damage. The centralized and unified empire was gone, and the exchanges and integration between various ethnic groups were more frequent than before, which speed up the ethnic integration and people's emancipation spiritually. The prevailing Confucian belief based on "benevolence" in Han dynasty faced with crisis in this period, and social turmoil brought people a sense of precarious crisis, both pushing the public to rethink the meaning of life, thus leading Wei and Jin thought to metaphysics. Metaphysics made the nobles pay attention to education and demeanor, respect and study people's talent, thinking, appearance, wisdom, etc., which brought "people's awakening". Therefore, in the Wei and Jin Dynasties, people appreciated good nature, and pursued inner wisdom, superb spirit, refined words and deeds, and beautiful appearance. The beautiful appearance exactly reflects the inner wisdom and character of people with inner beauty. The dominant thoughts not only impact female but male, and both sex are in the pursuit of making up. But, no matter how time changes, females are the making-up majority. According to the history book, women at this time show a kind of fairy detachment and beauty with various and limitless make-up.

the mainstream make-up are as following: "白妆" (White make-up)：apply face with white powder just as the name indicates, with two cheeks not applying any rouge, and it is often for maids in the palace. This kind of make-up type pursues the beauty of simplicity and elegance, similar to the plain make-up of pre-Qin period.

"晕红妆" (flush make-up): apply cheek with rouge or red powder, and the color is tend to be dark.

"紫妆" (purple make-up)：put on purple powder with brush on face. With the experience of modern make-up, if one' face is yellow, she can cover her face with purple foundation, which is the basic common sense of modern dresser.

"徐妃半面妆"(Xu Fei half face make-up): as the name implies, that is, one only has her half of the face decorated, the left and right cheeks of different colors. This method is said to have come from the hands of Xu, the consort of Emperor Yuan of Liang.

"仙蛾妆"(Immortal moth make-up): a kind of eyebrow make-up that two eyebrows are connected. When it comes to the eyebrow make-up, the most popular style in the Wei, Jin and North-South Dynasties is still the Han Dynasty eyebrow make-up, but it has developed on the basis of the Han Dynasty. The type of make-up indicated optimistic, free ad easy style just as the period itself.

"额黄"(yellow forehead make-up): it is named after the yellow pigment used to paint the forehead. Its popularity is directly related to the widespread spread of Buddhism in China during the Wei, Jin and Northern Dynasties.

"斜红"(crescent make-up): It is a kind of make-up for both sides of the cheeks and between the eyebrows, mostly shaped like a crescent moon, with a bright red colour, some of which are also deliberately painted in a tattered shape, as if two knife scars, and some with a curling pattern. The custom began in the Three Kingdoms(the kingdom Wei, the Kingdom Shu, the kingdom Wu).

"梅花妆"(The plum blossom make-up): it is a kind of flower inlay and refers to a kind of frontal decoration. A woman with this make-up will wear a plum-shaped flower on her forehead. There is a well-known story behind the make-up. In the South Dynasty, the plum tree in front of the palace was blown by the breeze and a plum blossom fell, which happened to stick to the forehead of the princess and could not be uncovered. So the Empress kept the Princess by her side for a long time and observed it. Three days later, the plum blossom was washed off, but the princess was left with a mark of five petals on her forehead. When the women in the palace saw that the plum blossom mark on the princess's forehead was very beautiful, they all wanted to follow suit, so they cut plum blossoms and put them on their foreheads, and a new beauty art was born, called "plum blossom make-up".

"碎妆"( scattered make-up)：The make-up is a kind of make-up that will be painted all over the face. Various patterns and textures are available.

Tang Dynasty

After the exchange of cultures and the emancipated ideas during the Wei, Jin and North and South Dynasties, ancient Chinese make-up reached its heyday in the Tang Dynasty. The Sui and Tang dynasties saw the end of more than 300 years of division and warfare between various ethnic groups, and the establishment of a unified multi-ethnic state with an unprecedentedly vast territory, with many northern nomads entering the Chinese family. The Hu people began to learn Han culture and were integrated to Han to a certain extent. The Tang dynasty was the climax of feudal civilization in China, not only was the north and south unified and the territory vast, but also politically stable, economically developed and culturally flourishing. As a result, the rulers had great confidence and adopted a policy of opening the country's doors to the world. Chang'an, the capital of the Tang dynasty, was not only a national capital but also the economic and cultural centre of Asia at the time. The Tang Dynasty had close relations with many countries around the world. This contributed to the Tang dynasty's cultural diversity and the boldness of the times. In the field of thought, Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism were all compatible in the Tang Dynasty, Confucianism and Confucian ritual did not become the ruling ideology and absolute authority. Thus the concept of ritual was relatively indifferent, and women were more relaxed in all aspects. all contributed to the development of a new make-up culture that reached the peak of splendour and grace in the history of ancient Chinese make-up.

The most distinctive feature of the Tang dynasty's make-up was the strong Hu style, which was very different from the traditional Han culture's aesthetic of simplicity. The Tang women not only preferred colorful make-up but also wore a variety of face ornaments, which was a far cry from the 'simple and plain' aesthetic norm of restrained make-up established during the Han dynasty. This phenomenon is closely related to the Hu people of the Li Tang dynasty. The nomads lived in a monochromatic environment of grasslands, snow-capped mountains and deserts, and therefore favoured colourful clothing, both to satisfy their psychological and physical need for colour and to facilitate identification from a distance in the wilderness. In addition, nomadic herdsmen had to live on water and grass and were constantly on the move, accumulating wealth not only in the form of sheep and cattle, but also in the form of jewellery, which was easy to carry around and of high value. This is why nomadic people have a natural tendency to dress in a high profile manner, and the demands of life have led them to be more outward looking and more flamboyant in their aesthetics.

Here are the characteristics of the make-up in different periods of the Tang Dynasty.

Early Tang Dynasty: In the early Tang Dynasty, the make-up was quite simple. The style was not that exaggerated and elaborate as women mostly painted willow eyebrows, lightly applied powder, red lips and wore little jewellery. However, make-up was also evolving during this period and became more and more elaborate as the the opening-up deepened. At this time, it was increasingly common to see a false dimple on both sides of the lips, a flower inlay painted on the eyebrows and a crescent-shaped slanting red on both sides of the cheeks, making it the most representative make-up of the Tang Dynasty. The eyebrows became thicker and broader, and the make-up became heavier and more colourful.

During the Empress Wu Zetian(the only empress of ancient China in the history) taking power, women's make-up became more flamboyant. The eyebrows were sweepingly thick, the blushes expanded from under the eyebrows to the side of the face, and the flower inlay on the forehead was not only shaped in a simple fan shape, but also in a complex pattern of flowers, curly grasses or curly clouds.

Glorious age of Tang Dynasty: At the outset, Emperor Xuanzong of Tang, who had just become emperor, wished to change the old practice of pursuing extravagant circumstance, so after his accession to the throne, he issued several edicts severely prohibiting the pursuit of extravagant jewellery and embroidery. From the tomb paintings, it can be seen that at this time there was no strong and complex make-up, but a relatively fresh and elegant style, with no red make-up or flowers and slender eyebrows. However, due to the rich and comfortable economic base and strong national power of the peaceful era, society at the time began to admire opulence and extravagance, and the noblewomen became more and more voluptuous and their preference were towards complexity. In addition, under the influence of Yang Yuhuai, the concubine of Emperor Xuanzong, one of the most beautiful women in Chinese history, the make-up was even more elaborate. There are some bold changes to the make-up. The most striking of these was the shift in 'red make-up', which was applied to the cheeks in such a way that it spread from under the eyebrows to the ear sockets and corners of the face, leaving only the forehead, the bridge of the nose and the chin white, quite exaggerated. There are many depictions of women wearing red make-up in the Tang dynasty, and we can see some of the record from the poems from the famous poet Li Bai.

Although eye make-up was not a priority in the Tang dynasty, upper eyeliner, which makes the eyes thin and long, can bee seen at that time, and in some cases eyeline even extended to the hair.

Middle Tang Dynasty: During this period the make-up became bizarre. The brow was replaced by the curved eyebrows, which had been "long and thin". The eyebrows were shaved off and re-drawn as "八-character"（八 in English means eight）; instead of applying red powder and white make-up, the face was painted with ochre red; and the lips were painted black like mud. This can also be investigated in Bai Juyi's poems. During this period, influenced by the Hu people, the ochre face gained popularity with the forehead, nose, chin, cheeks and other parts of the human face painted in various stripes, dots and blocks of ochre.

Later on, this kind of make-up was upgraded to "血晕妆"(bloodstained make-up). Women would paint herself with several horizontal lines above and below her eyes, in addition to her 八-character eyebrows, as if they were bloodstained. This is a reflection of the Tang women's preoccupation with scarred and morbid beauty.

Late Tang Dynasty: After the An-Shi Rebellion, the Tang Empire was in a state of turmoil and was plunged into the hardships, and no longer had the strong national power of the past. As the economy waned and society unstable, women's make-up gradually lost the opulence. In paintings of women of the late Tang, such as "Court Ladies Adorning Their Hair With Flowers" and "Han Xizai's Night Feast", the women's make-up was more and more pure and elegant, with a tendency to return to simplicity.

Although the make-up has become plain, the tradition decorating the face with motifs has continued. In the early time of the dynasty, the face decoration was prevalent, but mostly only in the dimples, forehead and cheeks. During the Middle and Late Tang dynasties, the style of decorating the face with flowers intensified, and in the relative records of the Late Tang dynasty, people even put various patterns and colors of flower inlays and flower dimples all over their faces. In addition to the simplest dots, there were also shapes like phoenixes and birds, flowers and plants, bees and butterflies. In terms of lip make-up, the Tang dynasty not only had a wide range of lip colors, including vermilion lips, light lips, dark lips, black lips and colourless lipstick for men. The shape of the lips was even more bizarre.

the Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties

After the Tang Dynasty, the society once again fell into chaos, and when the country was divided, the Han people established the Northern Song Dynasty. During the Northern Song Dynasty, the Song and Ming philosophies (Neo-Confucianism) gradually took their place in the realm of social thought. The idea of "preserving the Divine Principle and eliminating human desires" put forward by the Rationalists originally advocated the use of the universal moral law, the Divine Principle, to overcome those "human desires" that were contrary to moral principles and in excessive pursuit of profit. "In the course of its development, women were forced to wear heavy moral shackles due to a narrow and paranoid understanding of science, especially ethics. The people of the time interpreted gentleman's moral integrity narrowly as a woman's chastity and forced women to observe an extremely harsh chastity. This made the distinction between men and women not only a spiritual one, but also a physical one, limiting women to satisfy desire, especially the sensual pleasure. This was followed by the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties, which built on the Song dynasty's philosophy and further constrained women's desires.

Song Dynasty: Although the Northern Song consolidated its internal rule, it was always passive in the face of the powerful Liao, Jin and the western xia regimes. After the Northern Song dynasty, the Southern Song was settled in the south of the Yangtze River and did not think about recovering the Central Plains. The dynasty was shrouded in an atmosphere of depression and grief. Therefore, make-up aesthetic in Song Dynasties returned to the simple style of that of Han Dynasty, but the make-up at this time no longer have the magnificence of Western Han Dynasty, instead presenting a feminine and weak beauty. Make-up began to be simplified and refined, with excessive and exaggerated smears no longer being seen. In the face makeup, the Song dynasty is a reversal of the Tang dynasty, and replaced by light, elegant makeup. In terms of eyebrow makeup, the mainstream preference is slender and beautiful moth eyebrows; lip makeup is unlike the Tang dynasty as a variety of shapes, but prefers mouth with a spotted red for the beauty. In the Southern Song Dynasty, the overall style of make-up became more restrained compared to the Northern Song Dynasty. White was the predominant colour in make-up, and rouge was used with increasing restraint. Curved eyebrows, light rouge and cherry lips were basically the typical make-up style of Song women.

The overall style of Song dynasty eyebrow was slender, elegant and dignified, very different from the exaggerated broad eyebrows of the Tang Dynasty. The long moth eyebrows of the Song dynasty were basically a vintage style. In the mid- to late-Song period, there was a type of lip make-up that was painted only on the lower lip.

Plum blossom-shaped inlay remains popular. In the Song dynasty, there were many poems and lyrics about plum make-up, the most famous of which is the poem by the great genius Ouyang Xiu', who writes:in the morning the curtain rolls with light frost, wiping the plum make-up with my hands'.

Yuan Dynasty: The restraint on women intensified in the Yuan dynasty. Han women in the Yuan dynasty did not make many breakthroughs in their make-up grooming, basically inheriting the Southern Song style of plain make-up and advocating simplicity and elegance. However, the women from the northern grasslands, mostly lived a nomadic life with horses. The harsh and dangerous living environment and the mobile lifestyle created a robust and brave, rugged and bold character, very different from the slender, thin and shy Han women of the south. The aesthetics of these ethnic minorities also brought about some distinctive make-up looks. For example, there is a type of make-up called "佛妆"(Buddha make-up), which comes from the Khitan(nomadic minority of ancient China). With this type of make-up, one's face is painted in yellow, as it looks like the face of a golden Buddha. Besides, the red eyebrows and black lips were the complementary of the Buddha-like face.

Ming Dynasty: The Ming Dynasty was the beginning of the extreme monarchical centralization of power in China's feudal dynasties. In the field of thought and culture, the Ming dynasty set a precedent for clamping down on people's thoughts and speech with harsh laws that lasted for nearly six hundred years in the Ming and Qing empires. It had an extremely negative impact on society. During the Ming dynasty, women's survival became increasingly difficult and their make-up was naturally became more and more plain, with low brows becoming the first choice for decent women as they were in pursuit of modesty and frugality.

The overall style of the Ming dynasty makeup continued the tradition of the Song dynasty, regarded simplicity and elegance as the beauty, giving up strong and exotic make-up. This was particularly appreciated by the concubines of the emperors and the middle-aged and elderly women. Make-up in this time even approached a style that pursued plain face without make-up. In the Ming dynasty royal portraits, one can see the consorts in their dresses and regular clothes, by and large with white powder on their foreheads, noses and chins, and light rouge from under the eyebrows to the cheeks. The lip color was still applied to make the mouth look smaller, either only being applied to the lower lip or one spot of the lip. Although the flower inlay still exist in institutional records, the portraits show that these decorations common in the Song dynasty were basically no longer used by the imperial concubines of the Ming dynasty. Compared to the Song dynasty, the faces of the upper-class women of the Ming dynasty were more plain and their expressions more modest.

In terms of eyebrow make-up, Ming women catered to the aesthetic preferences of men, so they sought to extreme feminine charm and beauty. Most of the eyebrows painted by Ming women were slender and curved, with only variations in length and depth, which could particularly bring out the softness and femininity of women.

The Qing Dynasty: The Qing Dynasty was a feudal dynasty established by the Manchus, a minority group in the north-east of China, and the last great unified feudal dynasty in Chinese history. The make-up of Han Chinese women in the Qing dynasty continued the tradition of the Ming dynasty, maintaining a dignified image with low brows. Under the influence of this social climate, the make-up of Qing women became more and more simplified, and even the face ornaments that had been popular for thousands of years became less and less common. Of course, as the Manchurians and Han people lived together for a long time, dress and make-up were bound to influence or integrate with each other. By the end of the Qing Dynasty, the aesthetics of the Western world had been introduced to the Qing Dynasty, and tradition and innovation complemented each other, so that the make-up of women in the late Qing Dynasty even showed a slight Western style. Traditional Chinese make-up methods were gradually phased out and Western make-up techniques became popular.

The Qing Dynasty had a policy of non-intermarriage between Manchurians and Han people, and the selection of emperor' concubines was only available to eight Banners(the noble family of Manchu). Therefore, the make-up of women in the forbidden city basically represented the whole preference of Manchu women. In the early Qing Dynasty, most of the concubines were plain-faced, and the nobility of their status was mainly reflected in their gorgeous clothes and crowns. On the other hand, The Han women, restricted by the morals, also followed the same plain-faced make-up since the Ming Dynasty.

It is worth noting that in the late Qing Dynasty, with the transmission of Western culture, Western-style lip make-up style that represented by full and red lip began to be popular, and became widely accepted in the the Republic of China. By this time, the small lip make-up was gradually declining.

Terms and expressions

病弱妆(sickly make-up): women dress themselves in a soft and slender manner to show their morbid beauty.

愁眉啼妆(sad eyebrows and crying make-up): the eyebrows are painted downwards with powder, and under the eyes with white dye to show the tear marks.

面靥(dimple make-up): it refers to a type of make-up generally applied to the dimples on both sides of a woman's face in ancient times.

花钿(flower inlay): Flower inlay is a general term for thin pieces of ornamentation that can be attached to the face.

点唇(lip-dotting): applying lipsticks in a spotted way on the lip.

白妆(White make-up)：apply face with white powder with two cheeks not applying any rouge.

晕红妆 (flush make-up): apply cheek with rouge or red powder, and the color is tend to be dark.

紫妆(purple make-up)：put on purple powder with brush on face.

徐妃半面妆(Xu Fei half face make-up): as the name implies, that is, one only has her half of the face decorated, the left and right cheeks of different colors.

仙蛾妆(Immortal moth make-up): a kind of eyebrow make-up that two eyebrows are connected.

额黄(yellow forehead make-up): it is named after the yellow pigment used to paint the forehead.

斜红(crescent make-up): It is a kind of make-up for both sides of the cheeks and between the eyebrows, mostly shaped like a crescent moon, with a bright red colour, some of which are also deliberately painted in a tattered shape, as if two knife scars, and some with a curling pattern.

梅花妆(The plum blossom make-up): it is a kind of flower inlay and refers to a kind of frontal decoration.

碎妆( scattered make-up)：The make-up is a kind of make-up that will be painted all over the face. Various patterns and textures are available.

胡人（Hu people）

英语口译 伍佳惠 Wu Jiahui 202170081625

Chinese Dragon Culture Wu Jiahui

Introduction

The Chinese dragon, also known as long, loong, or lung, is a legendary creature in Chinese mythology, Chinese culture, and Chinese folklore as a whole. For thousands of years, the dragon has permeated all aspects of Chinese society, becoming a cultural cohesion and accumulation. The dragon has become a symbol of China, a symbol of the Chinese nation, and a symbol of Chinese culture. To every Chinese descendant, it carries national emotions.

The creature can be found in the mythology of many ancient cultures, but nowhere else in the world is the creature quite so revered as in China. The Chinese dragon is a benevolent creature that delivers fertilizing rain to the earth. Strength, good luck, and awe-inspiring might are the spiritual meanings of the dragon. The oriental dragon is widely regarded as a spiritual or supernatural sign of heavenly power. As a result, it has long served as the emperor’s symbol.

The Chinese dragon is easily identified by its long serpentine body which is usually wingless, and its anthropomorphic face with beards. The dragon is considered the most auspicious year sign, so the image is embroidered on the robes of emperors, portrayed in the most valuable materials, such as gold jewelry and jade sculptures. In addition, it has endless references in performing arts and literature.

Generally speaking, the dragon was everywhere in ancient China and looms as large nowadays in the Chinese psyche as ever.

Origin of the Dragon

3000 B.C. The origin of the dragon image has been variously described as being derived from snakes, crocodiles, pigs, etc. There are also theories that the earliest dragons were lightning bolts in the sky when it rained. Most experts now concur that the dragon is a totem complex with a snake as the main body, with the head of a pig, the body of a snake, the horns of a deer, the whiskers of a sheep, the ears of a cow, the scales of a fish, and the claws of an eagle.

In ancient clan societies, the Yellow River Basin’s Huaxia (the old name for the Han Chinese), who used the snake as their totem, defeated other clans by absorbing their totems and combining them into the Dragon Totem. For a very long time, paleontologists held the view that the horned dragon was a fictional image of ancient ancestors, existing only in myths and legends, and there was no animal in real life. In 1987, a large tomb of the early Yangshao culture was excavated in Henan province, and a dragon made of mussel shells was unearthed beside the male tomb owner, which is the earliest dragon found so far, more than 6,000 years ago.

Cultural Connotations of the Dragon

The dragon is a special animal in Chinese culture, often used to symbolize good fortune, and is one of the most representative traditional cultures of the Chinese and other East Asian nations. Chinese culture has a long history, and there are many cultural meanings associated with dragons. Nowadays, dragon culture has permeated into every aspect of our society and culture.

3.1 Cultural Connotations of Dragon in Festivals

In festival culture, the “dragon” is frequently interpreted to stand for gods who control the weather, including clouds and rain, as well as blessings and misfortunes. The Dragon Boat Festival and the Lantern Festival both frequently feature dragon imagery. The events of the two festivals are vibrant, filled with ethnic flair, and have a strong local flavor.

At the Lantern Festival, people will have dragon dancing. The dragon’s body will be bound with bamboo into a spherical dragon shape, with each piece connected, and covered with a sizable red cloth decorated with dragon scales. Someone holds the pole every five or six feet, and it has a head-to-tail length of more than ten feet. A person in the front of the dragon is holding a pole, and a large ball is set up at the top of the pole to serve as a guide. The enormous ball swings from front to back as the dragon dances, and the dragon’s head assumes the shape of a grasping ball, causing the dragon’s body to wander and fly. Additionally, they dressed nicely in silk clothing. With the rapid development of modern society, dragon dance has gradually expanded from folk activities to the scope of school sports and competitive sports, and many colleges and universities have taken dragon dance as the opening performance of their sports meeting.

At the Dragon Boat Festival, one of the customs in China is “dragon boat racing”. The Dragon Boat Festival has been referred to as “the festival of dragons” by Mr. Wen Yiduo. Dragon boat racing is a form of sacrifice to the gods to pray for blessings. In ancient times, the royal dragon boats were extremely luxurious, and the scale of the dragon boat racing was also magnificent. Almost everyone was eager to attend and would arrive in time to watch it, which showed the significance of this activity.

3.2 Cultural Connotations of Dragon in Myths and Legends

The dragon is a divinely transformed animal in myths and legends, a symbol of supernatural power. As a worship in primitive Chinese society, the dragon is associated with the struggle of primitive humans with nature. Dragons themselves served as the leaders of the populace in their battle with nature. In primitive society, dragons emerged as a crucial primitive religious belief, which is reflected in the colorful primitive mythology. From the pre-Qin period, people began to regard the dragon as an important representative of the leader. The following four statements, in general, are the most representative in the mythology. First, the theory of human-dragon merging. Many people are all depicted as dragons with human bodies or snakes with human faces, such as the creator of the universe, Fuxi, Nuwa, who “made a man out of earth”, Huangdi, who led the people in defeating their enemies and creating material culture, and Shennong, who taught the people how to farm. Second, the dragon is a divine creature of great power. For example, when Yu the Great (大禹) ruled the flood, there was a Ying Long (a kind of winged dragon) that used its tail to divide the areas and point out the route for Yu to divert the flood, and thus came the vast rivers of later times. Third, dragons are human incarnations. For example, Gun (鲧), the father of Yu (the legendary leader of the ancient tribal alliance) did not decay for three years after his death, and later transformed into a yellow dragon. Fourth, dragons are the tools of the gods and men to drive. For example, the ancient Chinese geography masterpiece The Classic of Mountains and Seas said that Yu’s son Qi (启) and the southern god Zhurong (祝融) both ride two dragons.

As the “progenitor” of ancient mythology, the dragons appearing in The Classic of Mountains and Seas are ancient and have a wide variety. The book mentions dragons of various shapes, and even a ranking of the top ten dragons appeared. In addition to this work, dragons are also mentioned in many other ancient mythological works, such as Different Records, The Investiture of Gods, and Journey to the West, etc. In The Investiture of Gods, it is mentioned that Nezha haunted the sea, killing the young dragon king Ao Bing and pulling out the dragon tendons for his belt, and he also defeated the old dragon king Ao Guang and pulled out his dragon scales. In Journey to the West, the image of “dragon” runs through the whole work, such as Monkey King making trouble in the East China Sea, and the Dragon King Ao Guang was forced to donate their key stand—golden cudgel. It is commonly believed that there are four main dragon kings in mythology, representing each of the four seas. The East Sea (corresponding to the East China Sea), the South Sea (corresponding to the South China Sea), the West Sea (sometimes seen as the Indian Ocean and beyond), and the North Sea (sometimes seen as Lake Baikal). Because of this connection, they were considered to be in charge of water-related weather phenomena. In pre-modern times, many Chinese villages (especially those near rivers and the sea) had temples dedicated to the local Dragon King. In times of drought or flooding, local gentry and government officials used to lead the community in making offerings and performing other religious rituals to appease the dragons to bring rain or prevent the flooding.

Dragons are further divided into two kinds: good dragons and evil dragons, reflecting the aspirations and grievances of the people. Most of the dragons in myths are good ones, which also symbolize positive meanings, but there are also five major evil dragons, which can also be seen as a counterpoint to the roles of good dragons. These evil dragons may only be killed by only Yuan Shi Tian Zun (the Celestial Venerable of the Primordial Beginning) or Nu Wa (the mother goddess of Chinese mythology). For example, in Journey to the West, the son of the Dragon King of Jinghe River occupies the Blackwater River for evil, and he wanted to eat the flesh of Tang Sanzang when the monk and pupil four were passing through this place, but he was not strong enough and was killed by the son of his first cousin, the Dragon King of the East Sea. There is also the Demon King Jiao, who is sworn in as a brother with Great Sage Equalling Heaven (齐天大圣), called the Great Sage Fuhai. Among the several sworn brothers, he ranks second, and his strength should be comparable to that of the Bull Demon King. He is also a vicious dragon in the water.

With the development of human society, the image and character of the dragon have become more and more complex. There are rich dragon myths in both the thousands of years-long official history and the oral literature of folklore. The evolution of such stories is revolutionary and epochal, and the changes in dragons reflect the development of human society. Such stories all have an epoch-making and revolutionary evolution, and the changes of the dragon also reflect the development process of human society.

3.3 Cultural Connotations of Dragon in Architecture

In the architecture of the Chinese people, we can often find the dragon. Dragons have a magical beauty and therefore have an inseparable relationship with the classical art of architecture in China. Here, the role of the dragon is usually placed on the ridge of the large-scale buildings to avoid something evil in ancient times, guarding the peace of the family, people thus hope for abundant food and clothing, as well as prosperity. For this reason, the homeowners with high or low building grades are decorated with “dragons” on the ridges and horns to ward off evil spirits and show their power and status.

The dragon culture on the ridge can be traced back to the Han Dynasty. In 1960, the earliest surviving chronological ridge beast was discovered in the suburbs of Sha City, Hubei Province, China. The “Yuanguang First Year” (134 BC) is engraved on the inner wall of a tile-ribbed beast, which is nearly 2,100 years ago. It can be seen that kissing beasts appeared in Chinese architecture, and they were relatively complete at the latest in the Western Han Dynasty. Subsequently, various dynasties have buildings related to dragons, the famous ones are: The Nine-Dragon Wall in Datong, built in 1392, Ming dynasty, Pillar with dragon decoration from the Yingzao Fashi, Song dynasty, Dragon column remains, Jin dynasty (1115–1234), Column with dragon design at Temple of Confucius, Qufu, constructed in 1730, Qing dynasty, Dragon columns at the Temple of Confucius, Qufu, Stone relief of dragons between a flight of stairs in the Forbidden City, Dragon symbols on the eaves-tiles of the Forbidden City, etc.

In ancient royal palaces, pavilions, jade inscriptions, as well as the caisson and ceilings of some ancient buildings, there are countless patterns and carvings using the image of the dragon. According to ancient legends, the decoration of “dragon-sniffed beasts” on the roofs of palaces and temples can avoid fire and drive away evil spirits. At first, it was not in the shape of a dragon, but was gradually formed into animal-shaped ridges from simple warped protrusions, some in the shape of birds, and more in the shape of fish and dragons. The earliest records can be traced back to the Zhou Dynasty. There are such decorations on both ends of the roof of the Zhou Wangcheng map. The shape of the bird evolved into the tail of an owl (it is said to be a divine object that can extinguish fires in the sea), and in the middle or late Tang Dynasty, there was an owl kiss that swallowed the ridge. After the Song Dynasty, the number of dragon-shaped kissing beasts increased, and it was very common in the Qing Dynasty. The surface was decorated with dragon patterns and four claws were flying into the air. The dragon’s head glared angrily and swallowed the ridge, with a sword stuck on the ridge. The artistic image was perfect, called “positive kiss”, “dragon kiss” and “big kiss”. On the vertical ridges other than the main ridge, animal heads are often used on the ridges. These animal heads look out in the direction of the ridges, so they are famous as beasts. The use of snout beasts has gradually formed a stricter customization and stricter pattern. In addition, at the two ends of the roof of the ancient buildings in our country, there is a raised dragon head, which spit out a zigzag metal tongue and stretched out to the sky, and the back root is connected with a thin wire, which goes straight to the ground. Such a wonderful device, in the event of a lightning strike, the current will descend from the dragon tongue to the ground, acting as a lightning rod. According to textual research, buildings in my country during the Three Kingdoms and Northern and Southern Dynasties once had this kind of “dragon’s tongue”. At that time, there were many temples and ancient pagodas like forests in the land of Shenzhou. There were “four hundred and eighty temples in the Southern Dynasties, how many towers were in mist and rain”, but the records of being struck by lightning were rare. Of course, it is not the blessing of the gods, but the magical protection of the “dragon’s tongue”.

With the changes of the times, even today, people can still see the “dragon culture” displayed on the newly built antique buildings. Today's dragon culture on the ridge is not only for “avoiding evil spirits”; it has also become a symbol of the Chinese nation (at home and abroad, any house decorated with "dragon to avoid evil" must be a Chinese house), and it is the soul of the nation. The Panlong on Tiananmen Square, the Yunlong Stone Steps behind the Palace of Preserving Harmony in the Forbidden City, the Nine Dragons Wall in Beihai, the Feilong Danbi in Beijing Confucius Temple, the Yunlong Stone Pillar in Qufu Confucius Temple, the Panlong stone carvings on the railings of Zhaozhou Bridge in Sui Dynasty, the Sima of Northern Wei Dynasty The dragon pillar foundation of the Golden Dragon Tomb, etc., are all famous historical and ancient architectural relics related to the image of the dragon. These dragon carvings are either brightly colored and vividly shaped, or round and straight, with magnificent momentum. Some are floating on the “waves”, and some are galloping between the “sea of clouds”. Up or down, lifelike. It is indeed a masterpiece of historical architectural relics of the motherland, and a wonderful work in the treasure house of architectural art. It is an artistic masterpiece created by those folk art masters who have not left their names.

3.4 Cultural Connotations of Dragon in Clothing

Since the Han Dynasty, with the increasing sanctification of dragons, people were also keen to display dragon culture on their clothing. Here, the dragon was a symbol of power, nobility, and honor.

The dragon has become one of the most striking creatures, judging from the spoons decorated with images of dragons during the Xia Dynasty and the garments decorated with dragon patterns during the Zhou Dynasty. Later in the Song and Yuan dynasties, the dragon became a symbol of divine and imperial power. Later in the Song and Yuan dynasties, the dragon became a symbol of divine and imperial power. The supreme ruler, called “the True Dragon, Son of Heaven”, wore a dragon robe, sat on a dragon chair, reclined on a dragon bed, and even the throne of their place was also called the “dragon seat”, which symbolized the elevated status of the dragon. Dragons and phoenixes were traditionally reserved for the emperor and the empress in ancient times. The dragon pattern was a decoration on ancient costumes, and as the status of the dragon rose, the use of the dragon pattern was gradually restricted.

The dragon robe is the emperor’s dress, and it is also named “Long Gun” because of the embroidered dragon pattern on the dress. The dragon pattern on the dragon robe has changed over the generations. During the Qing Dynasty, the emperor’s special five-clawed dragon and the king’s special four-clawed dragon were called pythons at that time. The emperor’s robes were embroidered with nine dragons. The ancient emperors were deeply influenced by I Ching or Yi Jing (, and they advocated the “nine and five respects”. "Easy Gan" also records that "Nine Five, the flying dragon is in the sky, and the benefit is seen by adults". This reflects a very high state. That’s why the emperor uses the numbers nine and five for all things, which is a manifestation of a high degree of concentration of power.

The significance of the dragon pattern on ancient costumes is the symbol of power. The dragon and the dragon pattern will have an affinity, which also gives the dragon pattern an artistic conception and achieves a realm of “the unity of heaven and humanity”. Moreover, the smooth lines of the dragon pattern will reflect a kind of beauty of lines and a charm. The ancient emperors showed their solemn status and majesty through the dragon pattern on their clothes. We are a country with many ethnic minorities and have various kinds of minority costumes. In addition to the Han Ethnic Group, other Ethnic Groups such as the Miao, Yi, Dong, and Bai all believe in the Dragon Totem. The Miao people will embroider dragon patterns on the brim of their hats and belts, as well as on their silver jewelry. In the Wa Ethnic Group, some men with noble status will also wear gold embroidered dragon clothes. There are also silver horns worn by women in noble areas on their heads as a symbol of dragon horns. There are also silver horns worn on the heads of women in noble regions as a symbol of dragon horns. The dragon patterns on these folk costumes are deformed and exaggerated dragon patterns. This creative approach does not limit the traditional shape of the dragon in terms of space and image. The folk costumes of ethnic minorities also have dragon totems, which hold a good aspiration of people, because they consider the dragon totems as the embodiment of nobility and spirituality.

The dragon costume shows Chinese beauty, and its aesthetic value is worth exploring.

Differences Between Chinese Dragons and Western Dragons

In Chinese, dragon is always used in a good sense (with adjectival restrictions before it is used in a bad aspect such as evil dragon or sinful dragon, distinguishing between dragons in general and their minority), for example, dragon and phoenix refer to people with excellent talents, and spirits of dragon and horse are praised. Dragon and tiger are metaphorical for great heroes. In many idioms there is the word “dragon”, which is almost always used to praise others. In the previous content, we have also mentioned the connotations of dragon culture in various fields. Therefore, it can be seen that the status of “dragon” in the hearts of Chinese people is so noble and perfect. Now, Chinese dragon culture has also penetrated into every aspect of Chinese society. Next, we will focus on the representatives of the image of “dragon” in the Western world, so as to better compare its differences with the Chinese dragon.

In the Western world, “dragon” is a bad symbol. Dragon represents evil in Western Bible, which is different from the essence of Chinese dragon. After a variety of mythological influences, probably around the 2nd century A.D., Western dragons began to be poisonous, fire-breathing, money-hungry, and with bat-like wings, and later the dragon guarding the treasure in the European national epic Beowulf began to become the standard and concrete image of the Western dragon. And at this time, Christianity, in order to better propaganda, also gradually portrayed the dragon as an evil force, the biblical king of hell Satan turned into a big red dragon with seven heads, each with a crown kind of head, but also like to eat babies. Medieval Europe also saw a large number of stories of dragon slaying, although the story is logically simple, childish and fairy tales, it left a deep impression on people. For example, in the famous story of Saint George and the Dragon in Christianity, it is said that there was an evil dragon in Libya. He ate sheep every day. After eating the sheep, he began to eat people. In the city, it was said that if people converted to Christianity, he would kill the dragon, and people started to convert to Christianity, which is a typical threat and hardcore preaching, and since then, the notoriety of Western dragons has spread further.

The Bible criticizes the devil Satan, saying that “Sadan is the great dragon”, and Satan is the greatest devil, and the abstract semantics of dragon here is the devil. The German word “drache” comes from the Latin “draco” and the Greek “drakon”, both of which mean “snake”. In Western culture, the dragon is seen as an evil creature. It destroys everything, spreads disasters, and is the enemy of all things in the world. In Western folktales, dragons are eventually killed by brave heroes. In Germanic and Norse cultures, Siegfried, the dragon slayer was such a hero. In the German epic The Song of the Nibelungs, he killed a dragon and bathed in its blood, making it invulnerable ever since.

In the early days, the Western dragon was a divine creature or spirit, but as native Western beliefs declined and Christianity flourished, the Western dragon gradually became a demon-like being, giving it a more negative connotation after the Middle Ages. But as time goes by, and as China’s status in the international community grows, the Western world’s perception of the “dragon” has improved, and we Chinese are proud to be the “descendants of the dragon”.

Importance of Chinese Dragon Culture

The Chinese dragon culture, which has been up and down for 8,000 years, has a long and profound history. The image of dragons has penetrated into all corners of society, and the influence of dragons has spread to all dynasties and all levels of culture in a colorful way, which shows the importance of dragon culture in China. Generally speaking, the importance of dragon culture is mainly manifested in the following aspects.

5.1Important Force of National Unity and Peaceful Reunification

The dragon is a symbol of national unity and peaceful reunification. With its inclusiveness, the dragon culture has brought the Chinese nation together, and it plays an active role in China’s national unity and national reunification as a symbol of China’s peaceful reunification.

The image of “dragon” has been used throughout the Chinese dynasties, which is also one of the symbols of the long history of Chinese culture. Since the establishment of a unified centralized state in Qin, China has been unified throughout the long years of history and the unity has always been the mainstream, although there have been some division. This is because all Chinese ethnic groups have a strong sense of identification with the dragon, creating a strong national cohesion and promoting the unity of all ethnic groups. As time goes by, more and more people are convinced that we are the “descendants of the dragon” and that the reunification of China is the voice of all the Chinese people. After the establishment of the People’s Republic of China, all ethnic groups have prospered and communicated together, and the implementation of regional ethnic autonomy has strongly guaranteed the equality and autonomy rights of ethnic minorities, promoted the development and prosperity of ethnic minorities, and enhanced the centralized unity and wealth of the country. Numerous people have made great contributions to the prosperity of the motherland, which is the solid cornerstone of China’s national unity and ethnic solidarity. Chinese people of all ethnic groups have long been integrated as one because of the same cultural background and a strong sense of national identity. This kind of national unity and friendship created by the same dragon culture and sense of national identity cannot be destroyed by any external force. From here, we can see the great practical significance of the dragon culture, and it also reflects the important role of the dragon culture in the development of the Chinese nation.

5.2 Spiritual Pillar of Economic Take-off

In the world, it is customary to call China the “Oriental Dragon”. Since the reform and opening up in 1978, this giant dragon has truly awakened. China’s economic take-off depends on reform and opening up. Dragon Culture has played an important role in both and is a spiritual pillar of China’s economic growth.

The role of dragon culture in reform is mainly to use its strong cohesive power for the Chinese nation to promote social stability and provide a good environment for reform. For more than two decades, China has made great strides in reform, but has never experienced major social unrest, it is because of the role of the strong cohesive power of dragon culture.

The role of Dragon Culture in opening up is mainly to use its strong national cohesion to overseas Chinese to attract these people to invest in the mainland, thereby promoting economic development. These overseas entrepreneurs, who are also the descendants of the Yellow Emperor and the heirs of the Dragon, share the same culture, language, family ties and historical origins as thousands of Chinese people, and they also want to help the economic development and modernization process of their motherland in this way, which further promotes overseas Chinese investment in the Chinese mainland. The belief of “descendants of the dragon” is undoubtedly a great spiritual motivation for overseas Chinese to invest in the Chinese mainland, and provides a constant impetus for China’s strong development momentum.

China’s economy is developing rapidly, and the Chinese people also take the soaring dragon as a symbol of economic development. It is said that “the 21st century is the Pacific Century”. And China, as the center of economic growth in the Pacific Rim, will become one of the important forces of the new century!

5.3 Inheritance Bond of Chinese National Spirit

The Chinese people have cultivated, inherited and developed a deep-rooted and enduring Chinese national spirits during their long struggle. Dragon culture has played an important role in inheriting and promoting the Chinese national spirits throughout the thousands of years of history of the Chinese nation, and is a link passed down from generation to generation.

Dragon culture inherits the spirit of the Chinese nation, or a certain expectation of the descendants of the Yellow Emperor for the spirit of the Chinese nation. The dragon has a boldness that rides the clouds, a domineering spirit that penetrates the sky and the earth, an unpredictable spirit, and a righteous spirit that calls for rain and wind, showing a feature that is fearless, unstoppable, and omnipotent. The spirit of the dragon is progressive and unstoppable. From being a totem to be worshipped and revered, the dragon has gradually become a symbol of the Chinese spirit, guiding the Chinese people’s appearance. The Chinese use the dragon as a metaphor for themselves, hoping that they and their nation will be like the dragon, running freely in the sky and moving forward. The dragon’s various forms also show the characteristics of Chinese culture.

The dragon runs through all dynasties, and even though our social development differs from dynasty to dynasty, the dragon is able to pass down the most basic spiritual outlook of the Chinese people. No matter how the dynasties change, the heritage of dragon culture remains the same, which is an important reason why Chinese culture is long-standing and everlasting, and dragon culture plays a very crucial role in it. Through the dragon culture, we can see the innovative, comprehensive, tolerant, enterprising and independent spirits that the Chinese have always had, and we can also find the power of the Chinese national spirits, and a nation with a strong vitality and appeal.

Since modern times, the historical process of the Chinese nation moving from being a “disadvantaged group” in the world to being a big and powerful country. The progress of pursuing further development is very similar to the gesture and form of the dragon soaring upwards, which is still loved by the Chinese people today. It can be said that the essence of the dragon is in the essence of the Chinese people, and the genes of the dragon are also in the genes of the Chinese people. The pursuit and worship of the dragon and the spirits of the Chinese nation are tightly fused together.

The Chinese have always worshipped the spirit of the dragon because it is “spiritual”. It is the spirit of the dragon that brings well-being and good luck to the Chinese people. The magnificent projects we are concentrating on now, such as economic transformation, targeted poverty alleviation, strict governance of the Party and beautiful China, can also be said to be the dragon's way to clean up the haze around itself in the process of moving forward and further optimize the environment in which it takes off, making it purer and purer. In this environment, the Chinese dragon will also gain a higher ability to take off and take its rightful place in the international community.

Conclusion

In short, dragons have always remembered in the hearts of Chinese people for thousands of years, occupying a vital position. In addition to spreading and inheriting the dragon culture on the Chinese nation, it has also been brought around the world by Chinese who have traveled overseas. In Chinese settlements or Chinatowns around the world, dragons are still one of the most numerous and eye-catching ornaments.

Dragon culture can be traced back to thousands of years ago. Maybe there is no such creature in real life, but it reflects the innovation, comprehensiveness and inclusiveness of Chinese culture. Dragon culture has become one of the most profound and far-reaching cultures in Chinese culture. It has penetrated into all aspects of Chinese festivals, myths, architecture and costumes, and has profoundly affected the Chinese nation and the lives of the Chinese people. Different from the dragon in the western world, the “dragon” has always been a good symbol in the hearts of Chinese children, representing luck, auspiciousness and hope. The dragon has a deep historical origin, promoting national unity and peaceful reunification, boosting economic take-off, carrying forward the Chinese national spirit, and showing the appearance of the Chinese nation, so all the Chinese people will proudly call themselves “descendants of the dragon”.

The dragon has become a symbol of national spirit, signifying the unity and love, inclusion, diligence and brave, and perseverance of the entire Chinese nation. It also encourages generations of Chinese people to be brave and work hard, making the Chinese nation stand among the world and be powerful in the international community.

References

[1]Beowulf. Trans. Michael Alexander. New York：Hazell Watson & Viney Limited,1987:44

[2]顾雪梁,刘法公.中西文化对比[M].国防工业出版社,2008:75.

[3]吉成名.中国崇龙习俗[M].天津:天津古籍出版社,2002:24.

[4]刘杨.论神话龙形象表征含义的变迁[G].河南师范大学学报(哲学社会科学版),2009:57.

[5]王东.中国龙的新发现[M].北京:北京大学出版社,2000:221.

[6]周明初.山海经校注[M].杭州:浙江古籍出版社,2000:16.

Terms and expressions

龙图腾 the Dragon Totem

远古氏族社会 ancient clan societies

划龙舟 dragon boat racing

《山海经》The Classic of Mountains and Seas

《西游记》 Journey to the West

《封神演义》 The Investiture of Gods

真龙天子 the True Dragon, Son of Heaven

龙袍 dragon robe

龙纹 dragon pattern

天人合一 the unity of heaven and humanity

汉族 the Han Ethnic Group

《圣经》 Bible

《贝奥武夫》 Beowulf

《圣乔治与龙》Saint George and the Dragon

《尼伯龙根之歌》 The Song of the Nibelungs

龙的传人 descendants of the dragon

兼容并蓄性 inclusiveness

民族团结和国家统一 national unity and national reunification

民族认同感 sense of national identity

东方巨龙 Oriental Dragon

炎黄子孙 descendants of the Yellow Emperor

Questions

1. How many years ago was the earliest dragon discovered?

2. What do most experts now think dragons usually look like?

3. What are the festivals related to dragons?

4. Why did ancient emperors carve dragon patterns on their costumes?

5. In the architecture of the Chinese nation, what connotations are given to the image of “dragon”?

6. What is the biggest difference between the image of the “dragon” in the hearts of Chinese people and those in the West?

Answers

1. The earliest dragons discovered are about 6,000 years old.

2. Most experts now concur that the dragon is a totem complex with a snake as the main body, with the head of a pig, the body of a snake, the horns of a deer, the whiskers of a sheep, the ears of a cow, the scales of a fish, and the claws of an eagle.

3. Festivals related to dragon culture include the Dragon Boat Festival and the Lantern Festival, etc.

4. The ancient emperors showed their solemn status and majesty through the dragon pattern on their clothes.

5. In architectural culture, “dragon” is often used as a ward off evil to protect the safety and prosperity of the family. Different dragon images can also show the power and status of the house owner.

6. In Chinese minds, “dragon” is usually a symbol of something good, but in the West, it represents negative images such as evil.

英语口译 夏晶 Xia Jing 202170081626

Differences of Table Manners Between China and West Xiajing

Introduction

Manners are different in every country. Some manners that we consider are polite in China are not necessarily polite in other countries. It is widely acknowledged that Western people like to dine separately while Chinese people like to dine together. Chinese people advocate the values of collectivism, so Chinese people like to eat together and the table atmosphere in China is lively and harmonious. Besides, the Chinese hosts like to serve the dishes for their guests. But in the West, as western philosophy tends to focus on individualism and personal development, individualist values predominate in western countries. [1]So, people just like to eat the food on their plate. What’s more, it is not a mistake although western people can’t understand the way we serving dishes to guests. This is just a cultural difference between China and West. Food is so fundamental to our life so that all the other aspects of our living are influenced by and built on it. Healthy daily meals ensures physical fitness for us to work and play. Table manners culture belongs to the diet culture. As cultures various from country to country, so do table manners. Inevitably, there are some differences between Chinese and Western cultures. Sometimes, the differences in etiquette can cause misunderstandings between different cultures, which consequently leads to the failure of cross-cultural communication. Learning the differences of table manners between China and the West can not only enhance the understanding of the target language culture, but also help people perform well during cross-cultural communication, so as to avoid the misunderstandings caused by improper behaviors or manners. [2]In addition, with more and more cross-cultural activities, cross-cultural communication, like the bridge and ties, becomes increasingly essential. It is helpful for us to learn table manners in different countries, because there are more and more international exchanges in the globalized world and banquet is an important part in such communication. Avoiding abruptness and rudeness can ensure the activities of diplomacy go successfully. Therefore, understanding table manners and the differences of them between China and West is of great importance to promote the development of Chinese diplomacy.

Table Manners in China and West

Chinese Table Manners

For many Westerners, Chinese dinner table is quite unique and complex. At the Chinese table, you can not find forks or knives. The Chinese host makes great, sweeping arm movements that go over large sections of the table passing over food. The scene is fantastic, but it leaves the foreigners at a loss for what to do and how to do. As for eating, Chinese people usually did it quietly in the past. There was no eating noises allowed to make, and everything must be done as quietly as they could. Therefore, people had to eat with their mouths closed. Perhaps, to make a "smacking" noise was the worst offence behaviors. While they are drinking soup, wine or any other kinds of liquid, "slurping" was also forbidden. If any sound whatever was created by our intake of food or beverage, it constituted bad manners! Of course, it was unthinkable to speak with one's mouth full of food, so speaking only occurred before or after one had taken in food and swallowed it. But nowadays, you can see this scene when you are attending a formal party. China has a long history, traditionally speaking, there are many taboos at Chinese tables, but these days not many people pay attention to them. [3] However, there are a few things to keep in mind, especially if you are a guest at a private home. l) Don't stick your chopsticks upright in the rice bowl. Instead, lay them on your dish. The reason for this is that when somebody dies, the shrine to them contains a bow of sand or rice with two sticks of incense stuck upright in it. So if you stick your chopsticks in the rice bowl, it looks like this shrine and is equivalent to wishing death upon a person at the table! 2) Make sure that the spout of the teapot is not facing anyone. It is impolite to set the teapot down where the spout is facing towards somebody. The spout should always be directed to where nobody is sitting, usually just outward from the table. 3) Don’t tap on your bowl with your chopsticks. Beggars tap on their bowls, so this is not polite. Also, in a restaurant, if the food is coming too slow people will tap their bowls. If you are in someone’s home, it is insulting the cook. 4) The napkins should be laid on the knee, the elbows should close to the body. 5) Everyone should make preparation before the host or the hostess announces the beginning of the meal. 6) You should let the lady on your right side begin first.

Western Countries'Table Manners

There are many taboos at Western tables. It is the common sense of the Europeans and Americans to dress formally when they are attending a party. If you are invited to someone’s party, you should sit from the left side of the chair and do remember that“lady first!" 1) The napkin should be laid on the knees, usually you should not round the neck with the napkin, it’s not proper. 2) Do not make any noise when you are drinking soup or eating. 3) Do remember that use your right hand to hold the knife and left hand to use the fork to take food. 4) Do not fork some food to eat but plow them up to eat. 5) Do not stand for the foods, it is not polite. 6) Do not wave the knife and fork in your hand, it is impolite. If you want to talk with somebody else, just put down the table wares first and then you can talk with them. 7) It is not proper to keep silence all the time at the table, but it doesn't mean you can keep up a constant flow of words.

Differences between Chinese and Western Table Manners

As is known, there are many differences in diet concept, eating habits and eating atmosphere between Chinese and Western table manners. For example, if you are quiet on the table, it will make the master feel that he does not entertain you well. On the contrary, Western people only communicate with the guest who sits next to him, and the voice of the conversation is very light. Because others will think you are impolite supposing you talk loudly on the table. [4]So, in order to promote the exchange and integration of Chinese and Western table manners, reducing the conflict and misunderstanding, the following is about the analysis of the differences between China and West in the table from the aspect of seating arrangement, tableware placement, meals order, food culture, and payment and tips.

Seating arrangement

Whether it is in China or in the Western countries, masters are always pay attention to their guests’ seating arrangement.According to the works of Mencius, “There should be affection between fathers and sons, affiliation between monarchs and courtiers, distinction between husbands and wives, order between seniors and juniors, and trust among friends.” In China, people advocates to compare the status of the noble and the humbler, arrange the guests’ seat according to the order between seniors and juniors. On the basis of traditional culture “the east is noble” and “the direction of facing in the main door is noble”. That is why the seat towards the east or facing in the main door is always arranged for the noblest guest. Chinese people usually use the table whose shape is round. That means reunions, harmony and peace. [5]And there is a distinction between the status of the noble and the humble. The seat directly facing the door of the round table is the main seat, and the order of table is loftiest, it is generally offered to the elderly, the main guest or the people who has high status. The seat on both sides of the main seat is secondary seat and its importance is second only to the main seat. It means that the status of the people who sits on the secondary seat is only next to the main seat’s people. The farthest seat from the main seat, the last seat near the door, is the lowest in round table. It is generally offered to the male and female owners or people who accompany guests to sit down. If it’s a family dinner, the seat is usually arranged for children. If it’s a department banquet, it will be seated by the people whose position is lower. Therefore, the order of seating arrangement has presented a thinking of distinction between the noble and the humbler to some extent.

Ladies first are always preferred as a traditional social rule in the West. If it is a party which invites male and female together, the most honorable seat is reserved for the hostess, while the host sits opposite the hostess. The right is generally considered as superiority in the West. In other words, seat on the right is higher than the left. Western food is usually served with a long table, and guest will center on the host and hostess. Man and woman should be seated crossly rather than adjacent to sit, and man should let the woman sit on his right side rather than in the aisle. At the period of seating, man should pull the chair for lady, and sitting after the lady.

Tableware placement

In China, there is tableware including chopsticks, bowl, cup, plate and so on. The layout of tableware is relatively simple. The plate is placed closest to the body, water cup is placed on the left side of the plate, and wine glass is on the right. Small plate should be put on the above of big plate, and bowl should be placed ahead to the left of the body, then spoon should be put in it. Meanwhile, chopsticks have occupied an important position in Chinese food culture since ancient times. Chopsticks are essential on the Chinese table. It should be careful not to lick the residue on the chopsticks, and put down your chopsticks when talking to others. Don’t stick chopsticks in the food or use them to beat anything. It is impolite to point at others with chopsticks and use chopsticks to pick teeth or get something. In the West, people tends to use knives, forks, spoons, cups and so on, and the tableware placed more complicated than China’s. People often put tray in the middle, fork on the left and knife on the right.[6] The tip of the knife must be placed up and the edge of the knife should be placed inside. If the knife and fork or other tableware is fallen to the ground, it is a decent way of asking the waiter to help you pick up than picking it up by yourself. Put the spoon on the plate, staple food on the left and tableware on the right before dinner. Meanwhile, you will find that the placement of cups is also exquisite. The order that the glasses are placed variously according to the type of wine, from left to right is spirits wine glasses, wine glasses, champagne glasses and beer glasses.

Food Culture

There is a Chinese saying,"food is the basic of the people, taste is the basic of the food." In the Book of Rites, Confucius has also talked “dining between male and female are the most basic important requirement”. It can be seen that the Chinese people attach great importance to diet. In the same way, Mr. Sun Zhongshan had said that, “it shows that the skill of cooking is not good if you can’t distinguish the taste well”. So the charm of Chinese food is “taste”. Chinese people often say whether a dish is delicious depending on its color and flavor. Chinese people are emotional thinker, that is, people are more sensitive to food than the rational. And people often comment on a dish depending on whether it’s delicious or not rather than its nutrition when they taste the food. Because of paying attention to the taste of food, Chinese people will often ignore the basic nutrition of food. The traditional foods like spring rolls and deep-fried dough sticks, the nutrients of the foods are lost after frying or prolonged stewing. [7]On the other hands, due to Chinese people regarding the “taste” of dishes as very important, so here are five kinds of cooking methods: steaming, boiling, roasting, frying and stir frying. Therefore, there are eight major famous cuisines, or eight styles of dishes. They are Shandong cuisine, Sichuan cuisine, Cantonese cuisine, Fujian cuisine, Su cuisine, Zhejiang cuisine, Hunan cuisine and Anhui cuisine. It makes Chinese food standing in the world food.

But in the West, their dishes are more reasonable than China’s in terms of nutrition. The western diet concept is very reasonable and they attach great importance to nutrition balanced collocation and pay attention to science and nutrition. In the West, people usually care about how many proteins, fattiness, vitamins and calories their food contain, and they also consider the absorption of food for nutrition. On the contrary, they don’t care whether the dishes and the taste are good or bad. Because these foods are nutritious and can satisfy the needs of their body functions, they still eat even if the food seems to be unappetizing. For example, Westerners usually eat a cup of milk or oatmeal, a few slices of bread, a fried egg plus a few slices of meat in the morning. And scientists point that such breakfast is very healthy and meet the nutrition and enough energy needs of the body.

Tableware use

The difference about the use of tableware between China and the west is always very distinct. Chinese use chopsticks, spoon, bowl and plate. Chinese tackle any food with chopsticks and spoon. Meeting changes with constancy can describe Chinese tableware. Chinese feel proud about it for long and regard it as a symbol for advancement. Westerners cut food with forks, knives, spoon, bowl and plate. They cut food with knives and forks while serving food in plates. And they have a special spoon for soup. The most iconic tableware between China and the West are chopsticks and knives and forks have an effect on the lifestyle also shows two different kinds of wisdom. It’s common that different regions have different cultures and influences on people in there. Diet, which is important in our daily life, can also influence the tableware between China and West. Since ancient times, Chinese subsisted mainly on agriculture and their staple food is rice and noodles that can be easily placed food in mouth with chopsticks. But in many Western countries, their ancestors live in a hunting lifestyle and their staple food is kinds of meat that they have to cut big animals up with edge tool. These two almost the opposite cultures are reflected in the diet and naturally be embodied in the choice and use of tableware.[8] Chinese always eat together that partly due to chopsticks and they like to sit around the table while eating like a big family. It makes Chinese keep stronger traditional family values than Westerners. And, the opposite eating system in the West are caused by knife and fork. This extends their free spirit, and independent nature.

Payment and Tips

Chinese people like to pay for their guests. In China, if two people have a meal together, generally, one of them would pay for the other. And if many people eat together, people are usually seen to grab bills. However, in Western countries, it is common to pay for bills separately. The AA system is not a new thing on their table. Tips are originated in British restaurants in the 18th century. As long as you put a small amount of money in the bowl of the dining table, you can get the service as fast as possible. Then this method has been applied to other industries. [9]In the West, many countries have a tipping approach. It not only provides an important income for service personnel, but also can be exchanged for customers with satisfactory services. Tips are performed privately. Westerners usually put tips under the tea tray or wine glass, or directly stuffed it in the hands of the waiter. Or they don’t take the change when paying the account. However, tips can’t be seen in China.

Reasons for the Different Table Manners Between China and West

People don’t grow to maturity without regulations, it will do unsuccessful if you do not follow the rules, and the state will not be peaceful without patriarchal etiquette. Every kind of traditional etiquette can reflect the culture it represents. So, different table manners in China and the West are influenced by many factors, such as climate, religions belief, lifestyle, cultural connotation, the impact of gender and age and so on.

Climate

As we all know, China lies in the southeast of the Asian continent. The southeast of China is near the ocean and the northwestern part is a large area of desert. And the topography of China is high in the west and low in the east, showing a ladder-like distribution. The area of mountains and plateaus is vast and the distance from east to west is about 5000 kilometers. Therefore, the combination of temperature and precipitation is varied, forming a wide variety of climate. Due to the geographical differences in each region, people in all regions usually live according to actual conditions. Therefore, Chinese staple food is usually rice and pasta. However, many western countries have a temperate maritime climate, which influenced by the westerly winds and warm current from the ocean, so that the sunshine time is short and the whole year is mild and rainy, suitable for the development of animal husbandry. So Westerners are used to eating meat.

Religion belief

The Chinese cultural traditions for thousands of years are reflected in Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism. The Buddhists believed that people needs to be compassionate and help others out of trouble. [10]For example, the tableware “chopsticks” are made from nature, and the cost of chopsticks is cheap and its workmanship is simple. Moreover, the whole use of chopsticks is collective work, which can’t be completed without either party. It shows that the Chinese nation is centered on collectivism. But in the West, people generally believe in Christianity. The Christian doctrine believes that god created man and the basis of Christian ethics is original sin. Adam and Eve, the human ancestors, committed crimes because they ate the forbidden fruit, and passed on to their descendants, which becomes the root of all evil.

Therefore, the theory of original sin has been developing into the original sin culture in Western countries, which has a profound influence on the Western people’s psychology. So, Western countries advocate democracy, freedom, equality and individualism. And Christians are forbid to eating bloody food and offerings. In the past, Christians have a simple ritual before dinner, crossing their hearts to thank god for the gift. So, Westerners think highly of superiority are not as strong as China’s in table manners.

Lifestyle

Culture and life are inseparable. Chinese people advocate eating and chewing food slowly. So three meals a day are usually hot and they pay attention to the color and aroma. And there are a variety of cuisines in China, such as Sichuan, Guangdong, Shandong and other regional cuisines and snacks, which are more adapted to the use of chopsticks and other tableware. But in the West, people pursuit freedom and their sense of rhythm are also strong. So they usually eat cold breakfast and dinner, only hot for lunch. Due to the Westerners’ fast-paced life, the fastfood industry is prevalent in the West.

Cultural Connotations

Since ancient times, China has been deeply influenced by Confucianism. Confucius regarded “kindheartedness” as the highest moral standard, and Taoists advocate the idea of “harmony with nature, quiet and inaction”. And Buddhists advocate delivering all living creatures from suffering compassionately. So, China has formed the ethical standard which is the core of Confucianism, including love, justice, etiquette, knowledge, integrity, tolerance, filial piety, fraternal love and so on. For example, in Chinese people's concept of self-cultivation, regulating the family, governing the country and the world, character is of crucial importance, which is based on his concern for the country, love for the team, harmony of his family and interpersonal relationship. If he only cares his own interest, his character would be devalued greatly.

However, most people in the West believe in Christianity. They think God created all things, and God is omnipotent and unique. So, Western countries advocate freedom, democracy and equality, proclaiming the power of the individual, focusing on personal values and individualism. In the West, people have a strong legal concept. They advocate individual liberty, do what they want to do and do not want to be interfered by government, church, or any other organization. At home, children grow up with the concept of self-reliance. Young people always want to be independent as early as possible in order to get rid of their parents. They do not want over-reliance on their family and parent; otherwise, they will lose their freedom as well as the respect from other people. Chinese culture is totally different with the western's on this point. For Chinese people, family is the most important collectivity. Chinese parents cherish their children so much that they even want to do everything for them. For example, when their children become adults and get married, they would provide them with a profile wedding ceremony. When their children have children, they would take care of their grandchildren rather than enjoy an ease and peaceful old life. They put all their hopes on their children and take too much care of them, resulting in theirs poor self-care ability. Even in today's transition from planned economy to market economy, the workers of state-owned enterprises extremely reluctant to lost their permanent job. The dependence is the heritage of Chinese traditional culture and has a far-reaching impact on the cultural concept of modern Chinese people.

The Impact of Gender and Age

In oriental culture, men are usually highly respected, which is mainly due to the impact of the concept that men enjoy more respect in the feudal society. Whereas in modern society, oriental culture also argues the equality between men and women, but that is not always the case. Men still enjoy more superiority than women in many situations and the phenomenon that women are discriminated still exits. In Western countries, the respect for women is a traditional custom and "Ladies First" is one of the principles of Western social activities. Men have to take care of women in any public places. As the inter-generational relation, Chinese people honor and respect the elderly particularly. In Western countries, because of the concept of independence of children, many elderly people often feel lonely and bleakly in their later life.

Conclusion

Chinese food and Western food are one of food cultures. Despite that different social histories, different ethnic cultures and different geographical features, different diet backgrounds have been existed between China and the West, the connotation of “eating” won’t change because of these differences. It has become the consensus of Chinese and Western food to emphasize variety of food, balanced nutrition, rational matching and health. As part of the social culture, table manners not only embody custom and culture of a country, but also reflect the cultural connotation and values of a nation. Through the differences between Chinese and Western table manners, we have opportunities to learn about the differences between Chinese and Western cultures. If we have a good understanding of the differences of table manners between China and West, we will avoid cultural conflicts and some contradictions, and ensure the progress of exchanges smoothly. Just as the saying goes, “While in Rome, do as the Romans do”. Understanding the differences of table manners between China and the West, as well as the reasons for these differences, is a good way to understand the local culture. That permits expressing ideas accurately and properly in cross-cultural communication. Similarly, it can avoid communication obstacles and misunderstandings caused by inappropriate ways or behaviors. It can also further improve the success of economic and cultural exchanges and cooperation between China and West, promoting the development of both sides. For foreign language learners, they can learn more about the foreign language. By knowing about Western custom and culture, they can easily understand the profound cultural connotation and improve cross-cultural abilities. This lays a solid foundation for Chinese people and Western people to enhance further cooperation and exchanges.

References

[1] Strauss, C. L. The Origin of Table Manners [M]. USA: University of Chicago Press, 1999. [2] Sizhi Xiong. The Mystery of Chinese Diet. [M] Henan. Henan people press. 2014. [3] Pamela, M. S &Kathryn, R. D. Food and Culture in America [M]. USA: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 2015. [4] Scollon. Intercultural Communication: A Discourse Approach [M]. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press, 1995. [5] Visser, Margaret. The Rituals of Dinner [M]. London: Penguin Group,2012. [6] Xiaoping Duo. A Brief Introduction to Chinese and Western Culture from the Perspective of Food. [M] Lanzhou: People Press. 2005. [7] The Comparison of Chinese and Western Table Manners[C]//.Proceedings of 2016 2nd International Conference on Education Technology,Management and Humanities Science(ETMHS 2016).,2016:520-523. [8] 彭陈艳.The Difference of Table Manners between China and the West[J].青春岁月,2016(19):235. [9] 孔凡利.中西方不同餐桌礼仪折射下的价值观差异[J].湖北开放职业学院学报,2021,34(11):186-188. [10] 林伟杰.中西方国家饮食文化与餐桌礼仪对比分析[J].大众文艺,2019(20):261-262.

Terms and Expressions

individualist values个人主义价值观 cross-cultural communication跨文化交际 forks 餐叉 smacking 咂咂声 slurping 叭嗒叭嗒地吃 prescribe规定 taboos 禁忌 spout of the teapot茶壶嘴 tableware placement 餐具摆放 Mencius 孟子（孟子是战国时期伟大的思想家、政治家，儒家学派的代表人物。与孔子并称“孔孟”。） There should be affection between fathers and sons, affiliation between monarchs and courtiers, distinction between husbands and wives, order between seniors and juniors, and trust among friends. 父子有亲,君臣有义,夫妇有别,长幼有序,朋友有信。 department banquet 部门聚餐 aisle过道 lick the residue 舔筷子 spirits wine glasses 烈酒酒杯 The Book of Rites 《礼记》 spring rolls 春卷 deep-fried dough sticks 油条 balanced collocation of nutrition 营养均衡搭配 oatmeal 燕麦粥 cultural connotation文化内涵 patriarchal etiquette 宗法礼仪 topography 地势 ladder-like distribution阶梯状分布 precipitation 降水量 pasta面食 westerly winds西风 warm current 暖流 husbandry畜牧业 omnipotent 全能的 inter-generational relation 代际关系

Questions

1、What are differences between Chinese and Western table manners? 2、What are reasons for the different table manners between Chinese and West? 3、How many kinds of cooking methods are there in China? 4、What types of major famous cuisines are there in China?

Answers

1、Seating arrangement, tableware placement, food culture, tableware use, and payment and tips. 2、They are climate, religions belief, lifestyle, cultural connotation, and the Impact of gender and age. 3、There are five kinds of cooking methods: steaming, boiling, roasting, frying and stir frying. 4、There are eight styles of dishes. They are Shandong cuisine, Sichuan cuisine, Cantonese cuisine, Fujian cuisine, Su cuisine, Zhejiang cuisine, Hunan cuisine and Anhui cuisine.

英语口译 向师琦 Xiang Shiqi 202170081627

The Collision between Confucian Culture and Chinese Modernist Literature Xiang Shiqi

Abstract

As the traditional political culture of China, Confucianism permeates all aspects of Chinese national thought, behavior and political life. While influencing Chinese political culture, Confucianism is also constantly being combined with the most popular culture of the times. As the most dominant culture in China today, Chinese modernist literature is merging and colliding with Confucian culture. This paper aims to examine the connotations of Confucianism and Chinese modernist literature in political culture and to analyze the positive and negative influences of Confucianism on the fusion of Chinese modernist literature. It is hoped that the study will enable people to understand, inherit and carry forward the excellent Confucian culture, thereby further improving the overall quality of the nation and enhancing the effectiveness of ideological and political education.

In Chinese history, Confucianism has been the official guiding ideology of feudal society since Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty adopted Dong Zhongshu's advice to "dismiss a hundred schools and revere only Confucianism". As the mainstream of traditional Chinese culture, Confucianism has played a pivotal role in the history of feudal China for over 2,000 years and has had an immeasurable impact on shaping the national character and spirit of the nation. Exploring the collision between Confucianism and modern Chinese culture is of great theoretical and practical significance to the development and construction of modern Chinese culture.

As the backbone of ancient Chinese thought and culture, traditional Confucianism has always occupied a dominant ideological position from the two Han dynasties to the Ming and Qing dynasties. At the same time, the values advocated by Confucianism became the core values of traditional society. It is therefore of great importance to study the collision between Confucian culture and modern Chinese culture.

Key words

Confucian culture; Chinese modernist literature; political culture; national comprehensive quality; ideological and political education

Introduction

Confucian culture is a cultural school with Confucianism as its guiding ideology. Confucianism was created by Confucius in the Spring and Autumn Period, who advocated blood relations, social achievements, self-cultivation and moral rationality. Its central ideas are forgiveness, loyalty, filial piety, fraternal respect, courage, benevolence, righteousness, propriety, wisdom and faithfulness. In the new era of socialism with Chinese characteristics, inheriting the essence of Confucian culture plays an important role in promoting China's socialist modernization. The inheritance of Confucian culture can effectively promote the five-pronged construction of China's political, economic, cultural, social and ecological civilization. Each of us should be the disseminator of excellent traditional culture and contribute to the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.

In the course of the development of Confucian culture, how to integrate modern Chinese literature with it is significant. Based on this, a large number of scholars and research institutions have carried out research and analysis on it. The earliest scholars who studied the integration of Confucian culture and contemporary modern culture were Japanese scholars. Japanese scholars believed that the role of traditional Confucianism itself was limited and that it should be interrelated with the culture related to modernization. Korean scholars believed that Confucianism lies in the development of contemporary culture. The influence of Confucianism on politics and the corresponding political spirit should be fully considered. American scholars made a full study and analysis of the integration of Confucianism and modern culture, mainly from the past, modern and corresponding values, pointing out the profound connotation of Confucianism and Confucianism. Want to change in the evolution of modern society and its corresponding role.

As China's traditional political culture, Confucian culture runs through all aspects of China's national thinking, behavior and political life. Confucian culture influences Chinese political culture while it is also constantly combined with the most popular culture of the times. As the most mainstream culture in China today, Chinese modernist literature is blending and colliding with Confucian culture. The purpose of this paper is to study the connotation of Confucian culture and Chinese modernist literature in political culture and to analyze the positive and negative effects of Confucian culture on the integration of Chinese modernist literature. Through this study, we hope that we can make the people understand, inherit and carry forward the excellent Confucian culture, so as to further improve the overall quality of the people and enhance the effectiveness of Ideological and political education.

This essay aims to explore the collision between Confucianism and modern Chinese culture. The structure of this paper is as follows: The second section of this paper will specifically analyze the contemporary value of Confucianism. In the third section of this paper, I will introduce the combination of Confucianism and modern Chinese literature. In the third section, I will give some ways to realize the value of excellent Confucian culture in Chinese modernist culture. The next part will illustrate the contemporary insights from Confucian culture. And in the final part, I will make a brief summary of this paper.

The Contemporary Values of Confucianism

For our country, Confucianism is the hallmark of Chinese culture, as well as the unique spiritual symbol and soul of China, which under its own characteristics can make China stand among the nations of the world. In the current multicultural context, various cultures are flooding into China and impacting Chinese culture. If China does not have its own culture, especially Confucianism, then China will have lost its soul. For this reason The leaders of the country also attach great importance to culture and have been close to Confucianism three times in one year, considering the study of Confucius and Confucianism to be "an important way to understand the historical origins of the spiritual world of Chinese people today".

For schools, Confucian culture is conducive to the realization of the ideological and political education objectives of universities, as Confucian culture advocates such moral cultivation methods as "self-reflection" and "prudence", which are in line with the standards of socialist successors required to be cultivated by the ideological and political education objectives of universities. At the same time, Confucian culture is also conducive to the formation of a correct worldview, and outlook on life and values, helping university students to fully understand their responsibilities and missions; secondly, Confucian culture can enrich the content of ideological and political education in universities, combining Confucian culture with ideological and political education in universities, allowing university students to achieve the purpose of patriotic education through the understanding, appreciation and analysis of Confucian culture, and enhancing Finally, Confucianism culture has certain significance for the teaching concept of colleges and universities. Teachers should respect students, pay attention to them, try to explore the bright spots in their bodies, and at the same time constantly promote students' self-education so that they can see their own value.

Personally, society as a whole is gradually modernizing, but at the same time this has brought about some problems for mankind. In addition to the often mentioned environmental problems between man and nature, there are also problems between man and man, such as the alienation of man, the lack of morality and the confusion of life. Confucian culture is an excellent culture with rich connotations and abundant wisdom, which can give full play to its own characteristics and provide valuable guidance and direction to solve these problems of people.

The Combination of Confucianism And Chinese Modernist Culture

The Confucian culture was combined with political systems, political relations and certain economic bases within a certain period, which in turn led to the formation of the corresponding political culture. In the course of its historical development, Confucianism has been the dominant ideology of traditional Chinese political culture. We can see that Confucian culture has changed in connotation accordingly from ancient times to the present day, but its corresponding development has a historical inheritance. Confucian culture followed the idea of "harmony" in its early emergence, followed the idea of putting people first and emphasizing "people" in the course of its historical development, and in its later years, it emphasized the idea of "applying knowledge to the world and learning from it", stressing the unity of knowledge and practice. In terms of political culture, Confucianism emphasizes the idea of integrity in politics. It emphasizes that the moral quality of politicians and the ability of saints should be raised to a certain level. It emphasizes that the upper class of the state should have the awareness of the people. In the course of its continuous development, Confucianism has continued to merge with contemporary culture. Its corresponding basic characteristics are mainly manifested in the following three points. As the dominant culture of modern Chinese culture, modern Chinese literature represents contemporary Chinese thought and influences, to a certain extent, people's daily behavior and habits. In some important cultural and literary works, it even represents the dominant thought of the era. Contemporary mainstream modern Chinese literary culture emphasizes the same core values as Confucianism. The values of benevolence, righteousness, propriety, wisdom and trust permeate people's daily lives while guiding their habits and daily behavior. The collision between contemporary Chinese modernist literature and Confucianism is conducive to the better dissemination and development of Chinese political culture in three main ways, corresponding to the following: 1) Promoting education in worldview The integration of ideas is conducive to a better grasp of Marxism, further promoting people's worldview education and helping them to establish a correct worldview. The integrated Confucian culture embodies simple materialism and dialectics, which has much in common with the core ideas of Marxism.

2) It is conducive to improving life outlook education It is conducive to helping educators to develop a correct outlook on life and helping people to develop a "selfless" outlook on life, as well as a view of life in the service of the people.

3) Promotes education on collectivism It is conducive to helping people develop a sense of family and country, a sense of subordination of individual interests to national, social and collective interests, and a collective consciousness that "the rise and fall of the world is the responsibility of the individual".

Ways to Realize the Values of Excellent Confucian Culture in Chinese modernist Culture

In terms of the integration and collision of excellent Confucian thought with contemporary Chinese literature, the methods and relevant details of realizing the value of excellent Confucian thought in Chinese modernist culture are as follows.

(1) Consciously accepting the influence of excellent Confucian culture and improving personal moral cultivation The corresponding details are mainly reflected in the need to improve the ability to discriminate, cope with the impact of cultural diversity, practice excellent culture, achieve the unity of knowledge and action, internalize the value connotation of culture in the heart, to externalize the value connotation of excellent Confucian culture in action, and to advocate the practice of Confucian cultural thought in study, life and work. I would like to combine it with contemporary Chinese culture.

2) Emphasis on school education, allowing Confucian culture to enter schools Its concrete measures are mainly reflected in entering primary school campuses to play an enlightening role, entering secondary school campuses to play an inculcating role, and entering university campuses to play a guiding role.

3) Use social power to create an educational atmosphere Adhere to academic taste, classics to the masses and popularize Confucian culture. Enterprises should incorporate excellent Confucian culture and promote a correct view of interests. Enterprises should combine Confucian culture with contemporary cultural products and integrate relevant Confucian culture into the institutional and spiritual culture of the enterprise. In terms of cultural popularization, the power of parks and grassroots mass organizations can be used to popularize Confucian culture.

Contemporary Insights from Confucian Culture

(1) Incorporate the essence of Confucian culture into the ideological and political education of university students

Confucian culture has important inspirations for the ideological and political education of contemporary university students. The Confucian culture emphasizes the need to establish ambitious aspirations. Confucius said: "The three armies can be more handsome, but a man cannot take away his will. During university studies, students should set up ambitious ideals, study diligently, strive to build a solid foundation of theoretical knowledge, enrich their skills in practical exercises, improve their skills to serve the people and strive for the communist cause for the rest of their lives. At the same time, students should pay attention to cultivating the quality of being helpful to others, and be good at helping their classmates to answer questions and solve problems in their studies. The excellent Confucianism, such as "loving people with benevolence" and "restoring rituals to oneself", should be introduced into the ideological and political education of students, and we should practice them in our study life. To become a good youth of the new era. Finally, contemporary students should also adhere to the principle of honesty, as no one can be established without trust. There are many other essences in Confucian culture, which should be incorporated into the ideological and political education of students.

(2) Promote the integration of excellent Confucian culture into the contemporary economic development of China

Confucian culture advocates faith, and in contemporary society, faith means being honest and trustworthy and not deceiving others. Only in this way can we create a good business and consumer environment and implement the concept of honesty in all aspects of production, management, exchange and consumption, so as to speed up the healthy flow of economic activities and create more wealth for the people. In reality, all major merchandising platforms must operate in good faith, abide by their principles, put consumers first and provide them with the best services to achieve steady and rapid economic growth. In reality, all major merchandising platforms should operate with integrity, abide by their principles, put consumers first and provide them with the best services, achieve steady and rapid economic growth and realize common prosperity for all people at an early date. As for Confucianism, we should remove the essence of the culture, remove the falsehoods and preserve the truth, effectively promote the integration of good Confucian culture into the construction of the contemporary Chinese economy, and contribute to the achievement of high-quality and sustainable development of the Chinese economy.

(3) Promote the core values of socialism and disseminate the essence of Confucian culture

The core values of socialism in the new era are "wealth and strength, democracy, civilization, harmony, freedom, equality, justice, rule of law, patriotism, respect for work, honesty and friendliness". There are many similarities with the Confucian culture, for example, there are also similarities between "the people are precious" and "democracy", as Mencius also emphasized: "The people are precious, the community is second, and the ruler is light. There is a degree of similarity, albeit a difference in degree, with today's emphasis on full respect for the subjectivity of the people and the promotion of their democracy. "Ritual" is consistent with civilization in that it emphasizes the need for people to live in peace and be courteous in dealing with others and building a harmonious socialist society. It requires people to treat each other with honesty and integrity in daily life and to exercise self-discipline. "Justice" and "rule of law" are a transcendence of "benevolence" and "righteousness", and it can be seen that the core values of socialism are similar to the essence of Confucianism. In promoting the core values of socialism, we should combine them with the essence of Confucian culture, promote advanced socialist culture and advance the construction of socialist modernization in China.

(4) Strengthen education on gratitude and build a harmonious socialist society

Education on gratitude is very important for the development of society. Thanksgiving education mainly includes: "filial respect for parents, respect for teachers, love for others, love for the motherland, and gratitude for nature." Respect for teachers means respecting teachers in academic life, humbly accepting their advice and striving to improve oneself to become even better. Loving others means having a loving heart and treating those around you with kindness. We should also love our country, which is a great land in which we are growing up healthy and strong, and cherish it and be grateful to it. Learn to be grateful to nature, live in harmony with nature, respect the laws of nature, act in accordance with objective laws, and strive to build a harmonious socialist society. The ideas of filial piety and fraternal brotherhood emphasized in Confucian culture are similar to gratitude education. In contemporary society, only when a person learns to be grateful can he or she go farther and higher. If we all learn to be grateful, then society will certainly become more harmonious.

(5) Advance the ecological conservation and build a beautiful China

The ancient sages of China emphasized the "unity of heaven and man", which means that the relationship between man and nature should be well coordinated to achieve a harmonious co-existence between man and nature. In Confucianism, man and nature as a whole must be in a relatively stable state, and both "too much" and "not enough" will result in an ecological imbalance, thus disrupting both. In Confucianism, man and nature as a whole must be in a relatively stable state. Without ecological balance, the evolution of life and mankind would be unsupported. If ecology flourishes, civilization will flourish; if ecology fails, civilization will fail. To build an ecological civilization, we must take the carrying capacity of the resources and environment as the basis, the laws of nature as the guideline, sustainable development and harmony between man and nature as the goal, and firmly follow the path of civilized development with development in production, prosperity in life and good ecology, so as to build a beautiful China.

Conclusions

Generally speaking, Confucian cultural values have existed for thousands of years and have been the source of their longevity in the construction of family and state culture into a dualistic structure of family and state, shaping the Chinese people's traditional virtues of hard work, and respect for the elderly and love for the young. This is constructive and the path to the construction of core socialist values. The Chinese people's traditional virtues of hard work, respect for the old and love for the young have been shaped by the dual structure of the family and the state. Therefore, a sound institutional mechanism for the construction of core socialist values should be established to ensure that the core socialist values are The Chinese people's traditional virtues of hard work, respect for the elderly and love for children has inspired the construction of socialist core values. The core values of socialism should play a leading role in the construction of culture in China.

The transmission of traditional Confucian culture needs to be passed on and innovated from generation to generation. And a nation without innovation and change can hardly stand in the forest of the world's nations. Confucianism is not only the source of strength of contemporary Chinese culture, but also the core of the traditional culture and national spirit of the Chinese nation, and an important basis for our next generation to establish themselves in the world and build socialism. The development of individuals and nations needs to be rooted in the soil of culture and draw on its nourishment.

Questions

1. What are the central ideas of Confucian culture?

2. When was Confucianism created?

3. Where did the earliest scholars who studied the integration of Confucian culture and contemporary modern culture come from?

Answers

1. Forgiveness, loyalty, filial piety, fraternal respect, courage, benevolence, righteousness, propriety, wisdom and faithfulness.

2. Japan.

3. The Spring and Autumn Period.

References

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英语口译 向望 Xiang Wang 202170081628

Fandom Culture in China Xiang Wang

Introduction

A fandom is a subculture composed of fans characterized by a feeling of empathy and camaraderie with others who share a common interest. It can grow around any area of human interest or activity. Fandom culture, or the so-called "fanquan" culture, refers to online youth communities that coalesce around shared obsessions with celebrity idols. Fanquan, literally meaning "fan circles," are highly organized groups of passionate, loyal fans who voluntarily use their time, money and expertise to make their idols, usually budding pop singers or actors, as popular and influential as possible. China has seen a meteoric rise in fandom culture in recent years.

英语口译 徐舞 Xu Wu 202170081629

The Analysis Of "Chi+O" Xu Wu

Abstract

The structure of "Chi + object" widely exists in Chinese, and studies on this kind of phenomenon emerge in an endless stream. The word "Chi" ranks 105th in the top 8000 words and 77th in the 4000 words commonly used in daily life. Therefore, it is of typical significance to choose the verb "Chi" with object as the research object. Based on the research results, this paper attempts to make a comprehensive and multi angle investigation and research on the phenomenon of "eat" with object through corpus data statistics. This paper mainly discusses the phonetic distribution, semantic types and deep semantic structure of the object after "Chi". Finally, it comes to the conclusion: from the phonetic point of view, the object is mostly monosyllabic and disyllabic; From the perspective of word meaning, food objects are the first; From the perspective of deep semantic structure, patient object is still the most typical type of object. Secondly, by summarizing the diachronic changes of "Chi" with object, we find that the types of object increase after "Chi". The reasons include the change of word meanings, cultural influence, network development and so on.

Key words

Chi; Object

Introduction

"Chi"(eating) has a crucial impact on human life. Its purpose is not only to maintain life, but also to meet people's spiritual needs, and it has become a manifestation of people's enriching life. In Chinese, there are multiple "Chi" structures to describe people's experiences, expressing their inner feelings and thoughts, the semantic and syntactic features of which can always be predicted from the constituent terms. This phenomenon has attracted many scholars to conduct a lot of research on the structure of "Chi" from different perspectives. In modern Chinese, "Chi", as a transitive verb, appears frequently, and it is usually followed by objects, which is also very complicated. Therefore, it has certain scientific value to choose this topic for research.

Literature Review

Through extensive reading and material analysis, the following research directions can be summarized.

1.Analysis from the Perspective of Verb-Object Semantic Relationship Classification

Different scholars hold different views on the semantic relationship of verb-object collocation. Xu Wenhong (2001) believes that verbs, nouns and adjectives usually appear after "Chi". At the same time, he divided the "O" in the "Chi+O" structure into abstract and concrete nouns, and then divided concrete nouns into categories such as place, object, method, and tool. Guo Jimao (1998) believes that in order to carry out the semantic analysis of the verb-object relationship, we should firstly distinguish between the definite object and the non-specified object. Fan Xiao (2006) believes that typical objects and atypical objects should be distinguished. Typical objects often appear in verb-object phrases, such as subject objects and result objects. The relationship between these verb-object phrases is the relationship between the verb and the following object. relationship, such as "Chi" and "He"(drink), while atypical objects such as manner objects and instrumental objects are not common.

2.Analysis from the perspective of cultural linguistics

Wen Suolin (1994) believes that many things and concepts in Chinese are used with "Chi", which reflects the characteristics of traditional Chinese culture and psychology. Xie Xiaoming and Xiong Jinxing (2006) studied the cultural characteristics of common verbs such as "Chi" and "He" with objects based on the differences of national civilization, local products, and characteristics of folk culture.

3. Analysis from the perspective of English and Chinese

Wang Yingxue (2009) expounded the metaphors related to the action of "Chi" in Chinese and English, and compared the similarities and differences between "Chi" and "He" in English and Chinese. Hao Ran (2010) compared the differences of eating and drinking verbs at the cultural level, listed 21 eating and drinking verbs and their corresponding English vocabulary, and summed up the cultural similarities and differences of Chinese and English eating and drinking verbs. Ding Xiaoyu (2015) analyzed the syntactic structure and characteristics of "Chi" in English and Chinese in terms of syntactic generation, and came to the conclusion that English expressions adopt a grammatical passive structure.

4. From the perspective of teaching Chinese as a foreign language

Liu Hongyun (2013) proposed corresponding teaching strategies by analyzing the structure of "Chi+ O". However, since the article focuses on analyzing "Chi + O" from a cultural point of view, and regards this collocation as an idiom for teaching, the teaching plan proposed on this basis is debatable. Li Liye (2017) explained the reasons for choosing "Chi" and "He" verbs as the research objects, and also classified the verbs while conducting etymological analysis respectively.

5. From the perspective of metaphor and metonymy

Xie Xiaoming (2002) took "Chi" and "He" as a case study from the perspectives of dialect, Putonghua and classical Chinese. It mainly discusses the influence of metaphor and metonymy on the change of verb meaning from the perspective of cognition. Jia Yanzi and Wu Fuxiang (2017) conducted lexicalization and categorization research on the concepts of "Chi" and "He" in Chinese, and explained the motivation from the perspective of metaphor and metonymy. The phenomenon of "Chi" and "He" followed by unconventional objects is regarded as the semantic extension of "Chi" and "He".

Research Significance and Corpus Sources

"Chi" is the most basic way of human behavior, and it is a high frequency verb in modern Chinese. Therefore, it is typical to choose the situation of "Chi + O" as the research object. Based on the research results, this paper hopes to pave the way for the overall research by examining the situation of "Chi + O", and bring some new inspirations to the research in this direction. At the same time, in the process of research, the necessary research and discussion are carried out on the theoretical issues involved, and efforts are made to obtain theoretical gains. The final conclusions can make the research of modern Chinese characters develop in a deeper and updated direction. This paper uses the Media Language Corpus of Communication University of China. Through the statistics of the Media Language Corpus of the Communication University of China, 25,429 corpora were obtained, and 13,096 corpora that met the requirements were obtained after screening.

The syllable distribution of "Chi" with object in modern Chinese

1.Syllables Voice is ubiquitous, and people are inseparable from voice in the process of daily oral communication. Voice is the material shell of language symbols, a product formed by the development of human society, and a convention. Speech includes several units of different sizes such as phonemes, syllables, etc. Among them, the unit of speech that is most easily perceived by the human ear is the syllable. Syllable is the most natural structural unit in speech, to be precise, syllable is the smallest unit that can be freely combined segment structure unit [1]. In Chinese, a syllable often corresponds to a Chinese character. According to the number of syllables, words can be divided into single-syllable words, two-syllable words, three-syllable words and so on. The following will count and analyze the syllable distribution of the object after "Chi" according to the corpus data.

2.Statistics Enter the word "Chi" in the corpus and we will find 25429 records. Among them, there are 13,096 records with the object of "Chi". After summarizing, it is found that the syllables with the object after "Chi" are more diverse, such as the one-syllable object "difficulty", "suffering", "melon", etc.; "breakfast", etc.; objects with three syllables such as "ice cream", etc.; and even objects with four or more syllables, as shown in the following table:

Syllable Type Total Percentage Monosyllable 7128 54.43% Two-syllable 4736 36.16% Three-syllable 1006 7.68% Four-syllable 144 1.24% Four or more syllables 58 0.49%<math>Insert formula here</math>

3.Conclusion There are various types of objects after "Chi", including monosyllabic, two-syllable, three-syllable, four-syllable and even five-syllable and so on. Among them, the frequency with single syllable is the highest, accounting for more than 54% of the total. Specifically, The more commonly used collocations include "Chi Ku"(endure hardship), "Chi Gua"(eat melon) etc., most of which are abstract nouns that are subject objects and express results. The two-syllable object ranks second, accounting for 36% of the total. The more commonly used collocations include "Chi Da Can"(eat a substantial meal), "Chi Huo Guo"(eat a hot pot), "Chi Di Bao"(receive a subsistence allowance), etc. , which covers more than monosyllabic objects, and involves the phenomenon of using tools as objects. The proportion of objects with three syllables and above is relatively low, and the total is less than 10% of the total. Most of these objects are proper nouns or common sayings, with three syllables such as "Chi Banlangen"(take a medicine), "Chi Qiaokeli"(eat chocolate). In addition, there are objects with four syllables and above, such as "Chi Da Yu Da Rou"(eat a substantial meat); five syllables such as "Chi Fan Shi Zhi Fang Suan"(eat trans fatty acids) and so on. According to this rule, the syllables of the object after "Chi" can be expanded infinitely according to its name, such as "Chi Qiaokeli Bingjilin"(eat chocolate ice cream) with a six-syllable object.

The word meaning distribution of "Chi" with object in modern Chinese

1.Word meaning

"Word meaning" can be divided into two categories, one is conceptual meaning, the other is color meaning, which is divided from the perspective of content. Conceptual meaning reflects the content of objective things, which is objective and cannot be changed according to people's subjective guesses; on the contrary, color meaning is more subjective, such as emotional meaning [2]. From a conceptual point of view, word sense types include food, place, tool, and so on. In the following, from the perspective of conceptual meaning, statistics and analysis of the object after "Chi" will be carried out.

2.Statistics

According to the corpus data statistics, the word sense types of the object after "Chi" are mainly concentrated into five categories, namely tools, food, places, abstract nouns and common sayings. Here is a special description of the category of abstract nouns, which mainly includes four types: one is typical abstract nouns such as "power" and "bitter"; the second is adjective words such as "fragrance" and "spicy"; the third is Words with symbolic meanings such as "soft rice", "free rice"; fourth, some phenomena and activities, such as "subsistence allowances" and so on. The above is the author's classification criteria, and the specific distribution is shown in the following table:

Word Meaning type Total Percentage Tool 440 3.37% Food 10736 81.99% Place 24 0.19% Abstract noun 1680 12.84% Colloquialism 210 1.61%<math>Insert formula here</math>

3.Conclusion

There are many types of word meanings with objects after "Chi", especially with the development of the times, the scope of which has been expanded. By summarizing and summarizing, according to the different meanings of words, its objects can be divided into the above categories. According to the chart, it can be seen that the object of food is the most frequently used, accounting for more than 80% of the total. The second is the use of abstract nouns, accounting for more than 12% of the total. Specifically, it includes four types: one is typical abstract nouns as objects, such as "difficulty", "hardship", etc.; the other is some adjective objects, including"eat spicy"; The third is some symbolic words, such as "Chi Ruan Fan"(live relying on one’s wife); the fourth is some social activities or phenomena as objects, including "Chi Di Bao"(live by receiving a subsistence allowance), "Chi Fang Zu"(make life by rent). The third is the object of tools, which accounts for only 3.37%, including "Chi Zhuo"(people eat around a table). From here we The evolution of language can already be seen. The least proportion of the total is the location noun, which is less than 1%, but it has obvious characteristics of the times, such as "Chi Can Guan"(eat at restaurant) and so on. There is also a category of "Chi" with an object, which has cultural characteristics and is different from the previous categories, so it is classified as a common saying, such as "Chi Ding Xin Wan"(feel relieved), etc. The frequency of use is not high in comparison, only accounting for the total number of 1.61 percent.

The semantic structure of "Chi" with object in modern Chinese

1.Semantic structure

According to Xing Fuyi, the meaning of language is semantics. People will have a certain understanding of external objective things, and semantics is the result of expressing this understanding formed in the mind in the form of language. From this, we can deduce that the semantic structure refers to the semantic relationship between the language units hidden in the structure [3]. Starting from the semantic relationship of verb-object, objects can be divided into receiver objects, result objects, source objects, instrumental objects, source objects, location objects and so on. The following will stand in this perspective, classify and summarize the objects after "Chi".

2.Statistics

As mentioned above, from the perspective of deep semantic structure, the objects after “Chi” in the corpus can be divided into many types, such as subject objects, location objects, result objects, source objects, reason objects, and tool objects. Among them, there are four major categories of objects in terms of statistics, including objects of reception, objects of location, objects of results and objects of tools. The specific distribution of these four categories of objects is shown in the following table:

Object type Total Percentage Recipient object 10792 82.41% Object of place 212 1.62% Result object 1472 11.24% Instrumental object 836 4.73%<math>Insert formula here</math>

(3)Conclusion

According to the statistical data, it can be found that the frequency of use of the subject object after "Chi" is the highest, accounting for more than 80% of the total. The classification situation is consistent. The second is the result object, that is, some words that express the result, and some also have the part of speech of adjectives, such as "Chi Jin"(be surprised or shocked), "Chi Ku"(suffer) and so on. The proportion of place object and tool object is relatively low, at 1.62% and 4.73% respectively. Some typical collocations include "Chi Shi Tang"(eating in the cafeteria). To sum up, from the perspective of the phonetic distribution of objects after "Chi", monosyllabic words are the most frequently used, followed by two-syllable objects, and objects with three or more syllables are relatively low; From the perspective of lexical type, food objects are the most frequently used, followed by abstract nouns, tool objects are the third, and place nouns are the least frequently used. From the deep semantic structure analysis, the use frequency of the subject object after "Chi" is the highest, the most typical of which is the food object, followed by the result object, and the proportion of the location object and the tool object is relatively low.

Reasons

Among the diachronic changes of "Chi" with objects, one of the most notable features is that the number of object types has increased, from the original subject object to other types such as tool object, location object and so on. The reasons include cultural influence, network development and changes in word meaning. From the point of view of the development of word meaning, under the circumstance of the dual effects of internal and external factors, the expansion of word meaning is a necessary stage of language development; from the point of view of cultural influence, the Han people attach great importance to the problem of eating, so they prefer to use "Chi" various expressions to express inner feelings and evaluation of objective things, which also promotes the diversified development of the "Chi + O" structure; from the perspective of network development, the development of online buzzwords has also penetrated into the “Chi+O", thus promoting the evolution of "Chi +O".

Conclusion

The culture of the Han nationality is rich and colorful, and "Chi + O" is one of the language structures widely used in society. On the basis of the existing research results, through the statistical corpus data, this paper makes an all-round and multi-angle sorting and analysis of the phenomenon of "Chi" with an object.

First of all, from the perspective of the phonetic distribution of the objects after "Chi", monosyllabic words are used most frequently, accounting for more than 54%; disyllabic objects are the second, accounting for 3%. Sixteenth, it covers more than monosyllabic objects, and involves the phenomenon of using tools as objects. The proportion of objects with three syllables and above is relatively low, and the total is less than 10% of the total. Most of these objects are proper nouns or common sayings, and according to this rule, the syllable of the object after "Chi" can be expanded infinitely according to its name.

Secondly, from the perspective of the lexical type of the object after "Chi", the object of food is the most frequently used, followed by the use of abstract nouns. The third is the object of tools, and the least is the noun of place. We can see from these two categories but have obvious characteristics of the times, such as "Chi Shi Tang"( eat at canteen) . There is also a category of "Chi" with an object, which has cultural characteristics and is different from the previous categories, so it is classified as a common saying, and the frequency of use is not high in comparison, accounting for only 1.61%. It can be seen that the word meaning of the object after "Chi" is diverse, and it has exceeded the type of object that the original meaning of "Chi" can bring, reflecting the flexibility of language.

Finally, from the deep semantic structure analysis, the use frequency of the subject object after “Chi” is the highest, and the most typical one is the food object. The second is the result object, the proportion of place object and tool object is relatively low. By summarizing the above conclusions, and comparing the characteristics of objects with objects after "Chi" in different periods, we have drawn a significant conclusion that the number of types of objects after "Chi" has increased. The analysis shows that the reasons include cultural influence, network development and word meaning changes.

From the point of view of the development of word meaning, under the circumstance of the dual effects of internal and external factors, the expansion of word meaning is a necessary stage of language development; from the point of view of cultural influence, the Han people attach great importance to the problem of eating, so they prefer to use "Chi" It also promotes the diversified development of the "Chi + O" structure; from the perspective of network development, the development of network buzzwords has also penetrated into the "Chi + O" structure, thus promoting the evolution of "Chi +O".

References

[1]Shi Feng石锋, Liu Zhangcai刘掌才.汉语作为第二语言的语音教学问题[Problems in Phonetics Teaching of Chinese as a Second Language][J].天津师范大学学报(社会科学版),2021(02):1-9.

[2]Wang Xinqing王新清.从文化和认知视角看汉语“吃”的隐喻[The Chinese metaphor of "eat" from the perspective of culture and cognition][J].湖南广播电视大学学报，2014(02):22-25.

[3]Cao Xianghua曹向华.论汉语动宾类惯用语语义认知机制与类型[On the Semantic Cognitive Mechanism and Types of Chinese Verb-Object Idioms][J].河北科技大学学报(社会科学版),2020,(01):77-83.

Terms ans Expressions

Chi+O 吃+宾语 phonetic distribution 音节分布 semantic types 词语义类型 deep semantic structure 深层语义结构 recipient object 受事宾语   metaphor 隐喻

metonymy 转喻 Media Language Corpus of Communication University of China中国传媒大学媒体语言语料库 conceptual meaning 概念义 color meaning 色彩义

Questions

Where does the word "Chi" rank in the top 8000 words that are used most frequently?

How many types can word meaning be divided into and what are they?

What’s the main reasons why the number of object types after “Chi” increased?

Answers

It ranks 77th.

Two types. They are conceptual meaning and color meaning.

They are cultural influence, network development and changes in word meaning.