Cultural Connotations of Animal Words in English and Chinese

摘要

There are many words with relation to animals in both English and Chinese cultures.Words of languages reflect differences of cultural development.Because of the influence of cultural components in history,customs,values,religious beliefs,etc,the two languages,Chinese and English,give their own connotations to animal words.It is of vital importance to contrast the cultural similarities and differences in terms of the cultural backgrounds and fundamental origins of animal words and their connotations in English and Chinese,which,to a large extent,helps people perform better in cross-cultural communications.