cultural difference

What leads to the cultural difference?

The cultures of the East and the West really distinguish each other a lot. This is because the culture systems are two separate systems on the whole.

The origin of the eastern cultures is mainly from two countries: China and India. Both of the two cultures are gestated by rivers. In China, the mother river is the Yellow River while the Indian one is the Hindu River. These two cultures were developed for several thousand years and formed their own styles. Then in Dang Dynasty of China, the Chinese culture gradually went overseas to Japan, mixed into the Japanese society and shaped the Japanese culture nowadays. Though a bit different from the Chinese one, it belongs to the same system.

When the two mother rivers gave birth to the eastern culture, another famous culture was brought up on the Mesopotamian Plain ---- the Mesopotamian Civilization. This civilization later on developed into the cultures of the Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome. And these two are well-known as the base of the European culture. Like the Chinese culture, the European one also crossed waters. When the colonists of England settled down in America, their culture went with them over the Atlantic Ocean. So the American culture doesn't distinguish from the European one a lot.

At the same time, the difference of the language systems adds to the cultural differences. In the East, most languages belong to the pictographic language (see the picture below) while the Western languages are mostly based on the Latin

system, for example, the one I’m using to write this paper.

Other factors like human race difference counts as well. But what’s more, due to the far distance and the steep areas between the East and West, the two cultures seldom communicate until recent centuries. So they grew up totally in their own ways with almost no interference from the other.

Pictographic charactors

Part II How differently do people behave in daily life?

The differences are everywhere. They affect people’s ways of thinking and their views of the world. Even in everyday life, the cultural differences show up from the moment the eyes are opened to the minute the dreams are invited.

In the following, I’ll give some typical example of the differences.

Section 1: Greeting

Greeting is the first step to form a culture, because people begin to communicate with others. The individuals become a community.

How do we Chinese greet each other? Informally, if we meet an friend in the street, we are used to say: “Hi, have you had your meal?” or “Where are you going?”. When it is the case of two gentlemen, they tend to shake hands.

However, in the western countries, the above questions are just questions, not greeting at all. They may think you’re inviting them to dinner if you ask about their meals. Usually, they’ll just give each other a smile or greet with a “Hi.”. They’ll shake hands only in some formal situations. By the way, Westerners can leave a party or meeting halls without a formal conge, nor should they shake hands with every attendee like most of us will do here.

Section 2: Expressing gratitude

Think of the situations below. Your mother is busy in the kitchen. She suddenly asks you to fetch a bowl for her. You do so. What’ll your mother’s response be? Probably she’ll just continue doing the cooking. After a while, the dinner is ready. Your mother hands you your bowl of rice. What’s your response? Probably just begin to eat.

That’s what I want to say. In Chinese families, we rarely say “Thank you” to other family members for receiving help or service. Neither will we say so between good friends. It’s such an unpopular response that if you say it, the counterpart will think you are treating him as a stranger, otherwise you are lacking of intimacy.

But in the West, \"thank you\" is one of the most frequently used sentences. Teachers will thank a student for answering a question; husbands will thank his wife for making a coffee.

However, as an interesting phenomenon, it’s a custom to say \"thank you\" in

Japan. No matter in family or among friends, Japanese chronically use it all the day. This is probably the aberrance of the culture.

Section 3 Dining

The ways people eat, that is, the table manner, really distinguish a lot. The reason for this is probably because of the different dining tools and menus.

Easterners use chopsticks, or sometimes even grasp rice straightly with hands as Indians do. The thin and long chopsticks cannot be used to cut food, so we usually use our teeth to act as knives. We hold our food, meat or vegetable, with the chopsticks, send them to the mouths, bite off a part of it and remain the other part on the chopsticks. That’s the usual way we eat. We are also used to hold up our bowls when having rice or soup. Japanese hold bowls to have miso soup without spoons. But all these habits are considered rude in the Western countries.

The etiquette in the West requests that when eating, bowls and plates cannot leave the tables. Food should be cut by knives to fit into the mouths. Of course your mouth cannot touch the plates or bowls. So the regular process is like this. You cut your steak on the plate with fork and knife, send the meat cube into the mouth with fork and nothing will be returned back but the fork alone.

Section 4 Symbolizing

Symbolization is how people imagine or regard something. It actually reflects

the way people think. Here I’ll only discuss some symbolization that frequently appears in daily life.

First is about the colors. We often give each color some meanings, because we feel differently when facing different colors. So people always have preference when choosing colors of clothes, decorations, etc. In the APEC summit held in Shanghai several years ago, in the last day, the presidents from all over the world wore the traditional Chinese Dang suits and took a photo together. The colors of the suits were chosen by themselves freely. However, it’s quite interesting to find that most Easterners chose red while most of the westerners preferred blue. To explain this, it’s easy to realize that what red means is almost opposite in the East and the West. Red means luck, fortune here. We Chinese often use this color to decorate in festivals, such as red lanterns, red Chinese nodes, red bangers. But red stands for blood, revolutions in the West. So the presidents avoided wearing this unlucky color.

Another interesting discovery is about the dragons. In the East, dragons are imagined as something like snake and are flowing in the sky for most of the time. The dragon is said to have the face of the horse, the horns of the deer, the ears of the ox, the body of the snake, the claws of the eagle and squama of the fish. We regard dragon as God and say that we Chinese are the offspring of the dragon. The God of Dragons of the four seas can charge the rainfalls, so we sometimes also call them the God of the water or rain. But in the West, people think dragons as dinosaurs, which can stand on the ground with feet and fly with huge wings. They lay eggs just like dinosaurs. The dragons of the West have the ability to erupt fire,

instead of water. The fire can destroy everything so the dragons are not welcomed at all. They even become the symbol of the Devil.

Dragons Imagined by Chinese

Dragon Imagined by the Westerners

Part III What can we do to treat the culture gap?

Now we have seen that there exists such a huge gap between eastern culture and western one. Then what should we do to face this gap in the gradually globalizing world?

Firstly, we cannot deny any of the cultures. Every nation has its own

characteristics and it’s mainly through its culture that we first begin to know the nation and its characteristics. So we cannot say that this culture or custom is right and that is wrong. Equal respect should be attached to every culture in the world, even to those that are not in existence any more.

Next, we should get to learn how to coordinate the different cultures. We say the world is becoming smaller and smaller. More foreigners come and go everyday. When it is in the same country, the same city, the same neighborhood, the cultural collision is expected to be more serious. So we should try to avoid this happening.

One important thing is to get some basic knowledge about the other cultures so as not to misunderstand some actions or habits of the foreigners.

When the above two is done, we can start to communicate. I mean we can take in some strong points from the foreign cultures. Though there doesn’t exist correctness in terms of culture, it does have the terms of more advanced or more suitable for the world nowadays. Of course, we cannot throw away our own culture and accept another one totally. Every culture is a treasure to the history of the Earth, so we should only pick out those we lack to perfect our own.

Different cultures add the most colorful element to the world of 21st century. The cultural gap should not be the obstacle to the civilization of human being. It ought to be the motivation of our going farther.

Table Manners: a Cultural Difference

For many Westerners, the Chinese dinner table is terra incognita([拉]未发现的地域). There are no forks or knives for the Westerners to use. The Chinese host makes great, sweeping（大范围的）arm movements that go over large sections of the table passing over both food and friends alike. The scene is fantastic（非常好的）, but it leaves many foreigners at a loss（让……迷惑）for what to do. In most Western restaurants and homes there are rules about how to talk, eat and sit that are highly restrictive（受限制的）, and they create an atmosphere（气氛）that is completely different from what we find here in China. In my childhood home, dinner was enjoyed with hushed(压低声音的) voices, and the topics open for discussion were

very much restricted. We were not allowed to bring up anything that was

potentially unappetizing（倒胃口的）; body functions（上洗手间）, bugs, murder and mayhem（使人肢体伤残的行为）in general were all strictly forbidden topics. If I had to leave the table to use the toilet, I had to verbally excuse myself without mentioning what it was that I was going to do. \"May I be excused, please? I need to wash my hands.\" I would say.

My mother would say, \"Sure.\" My father would often play a joke on us by saying, \"Your hands don't look dirty to me!\"

As for eating, we did it quietly. No eating noises were allowed.

Everything must be done as quietly as possible. Therefore, we had to eat with our mouths closed. To make a \"smacking\" noise was, perhaps, the worst offence possible. While drinking soup or coffee or wine \"slurping\"（咕嘟咕嘟地喝）was also forbidden. If any sound whatever was created by our intake of food or beverage（饮料）, it constituted（构成）bad manners! With that in mind, it was, of course, unthinkable to speak with one's mouth full of food, so speaking only occurred（发生）before or after one had taken in food and swallowed（吞咽）it.

How one sits at the table is also prescribed（被规定的）. One is to sit up straight with the recessive（非主导的，隐性的）hand (usually the left) in one's lap holding a napkin（餐巾）while the dominant hand (usually the right) holds the fork or spoon. The only time one is allowed to have both hands on the table is when one is using a knife to cut something, but as soon as the cutting is done, the recessive hand

goes back to the lap. Also, elbows（肘）are not allowed on the table. Therefore, one props（撑着）the arm against the edge of the table just below the elbow. One should never reach for（伸手拿）any food on the table; one should ask someone sitting near it to give it to you. \"Would you please pass the potatoes?\" \"May I trouble you for the salt?\" These are phrases that you are likely to hear on any given night of the week at a family dinner.

When a guest comes from the West to enjoy a meal with you, it would be a good idea for you to explain to your guest what will happen at dinner and to find out if a fork would be easier to use than chopsticks（筷子）. In my time in China, I have come to enjoy Chinese table manners far more than those prescribed by my own culture, but for many it is impossible to adjust（适应）. The best policy is to ask your guest questions to find out what he or she is comfortable with.

just as the degree of individual freedom that exists in america seems loose and therefore uncomfortable to many visitors . in many countries , people will tell you what they think you want to here , whether or not it is true. to them , this is the polite thing to do. to americans it is considered confusing -even dishonest -to avoid telling the true facts. even if avoiding the truth is done only to be polite . it is helpful to remember that different cultures consider some matters more important than others . wit americans , however, trust and truth are most important. one of the worst tings that can be said about someone in america is that \" you cannot trust him\"

considering such differences in values among the many cultures of the world ,

it is natural that misunderstandings [1] will occur . \"how far is it to the next town ?\" an american asks a man standing by the edge of a road . in some countries , because the man realizes the traveler is tired and eager to reach the next village, he will politely say , ' just down the road \". e thinks this is more encouraging ., gentler , and therefore the answer the traveler wants to hear. so the american drives alone for many more hours before he comes to the village. the traveler is angry , feeling \"tricked\". he thinks that the man has purposely lied to him because he must have know quite will well what the distance was.

if a visitor to the united states asked an american standing at the edge of a road how far the next town was, the american would think it dishonest if he said it was near when he knew it was really 24 miles away. although he , too , would be sympathetic with the tired traveler , he would say, \"you have a long way to go yet ; it is at least 24 miles more. \" the traveler might be disappointed , but he would know what to expect, and there would be no misunderstanding.