摘 要

禁忌语是指由于特殊原因，使交谈双方不能、不敢或者不愿意使用的词语。禁忌文化在各国是一个重要的文化现象，由此而产生的禁忌语更是各国语言交际中的重要组成部分。古往今来，对禁忌文化研究的学者有很多，相比较而言，国外对禁忌语的研究较早，也比较系统，而国内对禁忌语的研究起步较晚，相对比较分散。

本文拟采取文献研究法和调查分析法，对禁忌语在大学生中的使用情况进行分析。通过文献研究法，对前人文献进行总结和归纳；通过问卷调查法，分析大学生中禁忌语的使用情况，特别涉及个人隐私方面禁忌语的使用。具体通过名讳、死亡、个人隐私、身体残疾、种族、性别歧视分析中英禁忌语的相同之处；通过价值观、颜色和数字分析中英禁忌语的不同之处；在此基础上再对中英禁忌语进行比较分析。籍此探索英汉禁忌语发展新趋势，以及其变化的原因；同时结合跨文化交际，探讨个体在对外交流中的言语使用策略，从而更好地促进跨文化交流。

关键词：禁忌语，隐私，发展趋势，跨文化交际，规避策略

Contents

Chapter 1 Introduction 1

Chapter 2 Literature Review 2

2.1 Definition 2

2.2 Literature Review 3

2.2.1 Domestic studies 3

2.2.2 Studies abroad 3

Chapter 3 Methodology 5

3.1 Participants 5

3.2 Questionnaire 5

3.3 Procedure 6

3.4 Results and Analysis 6

3.4.1 General understanding 7

3.4.2 Taboo topics 8

3.4.3 Evasive situations 8

3.4.4 Avoidance strategies and development trends 9

Chapter 4 Discussion 10

4.1 Similarities 10

4.1.1 Names and titles 10

4.1.2 Age and death 10

4.1.3 Personal privacy 11

4.1.4 Physical defects 12

4.1.5 Discrimination 12

4.2 Differences 14

4.2.1 Values 14

4.2.2 Colors 14

4.2.3 Numbers 15

4.3 Development Trends and the Causes 16

4.4 Strategies of Avoiding Taboo 17

4.4.1 Culture learning 17

4.4.2 Buffer zone finding 17

Chapter 5 Conclusion 19

5.1 Major Findings 19

5.2 Implications 19

5.3 Limitations and Suggestions for the Further Research 20

Works Cited 21

Bibliography 22

Appendix 24

A Comparative Analysis on the Development Trends of Chinese and English Taboos

Chapter 1 Introduction

Taboo refers to those words that people are not willing, cannot or refuse to talk out of various reasons. It is not only a very important concept in linguistics, but also a common cultural phenomenon in the language communication. Just as what Louis (1963:65) once said, “There is a taboo in any society; it plays an important role in our language world.” In addition, differences in culture are bound to produce differences in terms of use of words, while taboo is not an exception. Therefore, this paper takes the dynamic process of language development as the basis for the research, exploring the similarities and differences between English and Chinese taboos from the aspect of personal privacy in the way of questionnaire. According to statistical results, this thesis probes into the development trends with their causes. In the meantime, it deeply gropes strategies of taboo use in the foreign exchanges combined with cross cultural communication so as to facilitate the blending of different civilizations.

This paper consists of five chapters. Chapter one is the introduction part. It gives the basic information about background, purpose and significance of the study and framework of the thesis. Chapter two gives a brief definiton of taboo, and then focuses on listing the literature review both at home and abroad. Chapter three introduces the theoretical foundation, method and the source of the study data; then it gives procedure description and results analysis. Chapter four is the discussion part. It analyzes the similarities and differences of taboo words between the east and the west based on the above study data. Based on these findings, the paper explores the development trends of Chinese and English taboos along with the leading causes of the development trends and the strategies of avoiding taboo. Finally it comes for the last part, namely, the conclusion part. This part mainly concerns with three points: major findings, implications, limitations and suggestions for the future research.

Chapter 2 Literature Review

The culture of taboo has triggered interests of lots of scholars. The studies on taboo culture started from the early time in foreign countries and they are comprehensive and systematic. While in terms of Chinese culture of taboo, there is not a systematic study on it, in spite of the old history and record of taboo culture. This part is going to present a brief definiton of taboo, and then focus on listing the literature review both at home and abroad.

2.1 Definition

“Taboo”, from Tongan Language, means "divine" or "forbidden to reach".With the language development, it means “dangerous" or "forbidden". Its meaning settled as a term while was introduced in anthropology. In a word, "taboo" refers to peoples' avoidance of specific behaviors or things out of respect or contempt. Although the taboos and the vagueness share some common places, they differ from each other in a lot of respects.

First of all, people avoid the taboos by using the vagueness of the languages. For example, in China, if you come by a person who happened to pass away during the spring festival holidays or the other festival holidays, you will be told that “he took a break" by his family members. "Took a break" here shows the vagueness of languages, because “take a break" is generally understood as "sleep"; but here, "take a break" refers to "death".