English 'DOG' and Chinese 'GOU':Comparison on English and Chinese Cultural Connotations in Terms of Animal Words

摘要

Connotations refer to the additional meanings that a word or phrase has beyond its central meaning.These meanings show people's attitudes or feelings toward what the word or phrase refers to.People from different countries or regions may have different connotative reactions to the word or phrase because of their different social and cultural background.Such as the word "dog" in English and 狗(gou)in Chinese.Though they can be said to have the same denotative meaning,people from China and English-speaking countries havedifferent attitudes toward the above two words.This article is about to compare English and Chinese cultural connotations in terms of animal words.And the author hopes there will be fewer and fewer communicative problems arising from cultural differences in intercultural communication as long as people from different countries or regions could more and more understand each other's culture.