| Idioms are the crystallization of national culture and a particular inseparable part of the language.With the development of globalization,idioms play an increasingly important role in the transmission of national culture.The comparative study of idioms between Chinese and different languages,such as English,French,and Thai,has received attention from the academic community in recent years.For example,the comparison of Chinese and English idioms,the comparison of Chinese and Thai idioms,and the comparison of English and Arabic idioms.However,there are few comparative analysis research results of Chinese and Arabic idioms,and in-depth comparative studies are rarely seen.Chinese idioms are closely related to Chinese culture and differ significantly from Arabic idioms in many aspects.Chinese idioms are difficult for Chinese language learners with an Arabic mother tongue background to understand,translate,and use.Based on the researcher’s native language background in Arabic and professional foundation in learning Chinese as a foreign language,this paper starts with a comparative study of the formation and understanding of Chinese and Arab idioms.On this basis,it further examines the similarities and differences in grammatical structure,semantics,rhetorical features,and other aspects of Chinese and Arab-related idioms.Analysis shows that the research results not only enrich and deepen the comparative study of Chinese and Arab languages but also can be used for Chinese teaching Dictionary translation and textbook compilation provide reference and references.This paper selected 348 commonly used Chinese idioms(set phrases and fixed expressions)and compared them with their relevant idioms in Arabic one by one.According to the degree of correspondence in semantics,vocabulary,and form between the relevant idioms in the two languages,according to four categories of complete correspondence,approximate correspondence,partial correspondence,and no correspondence,this paper identified 265 relevant Arabic idioms as a multi-dimensional comparison object.This study found that in comparing commonly used Chinese idioms and Arabic-related idioms,the number of partially corresponding idioms is the largest,accounting for 58%,followed by non-corresponding idioms,accounting for 27%,respectively,and the least is fully corresponding idioms,accounting for only 2%.Based on the quantitative investigation,this paper combined qualitative analysis from multiple perspectives and conducted a comprehensive and in-depth comparative study of commonly used Chinese idioms and Arabic-related idioms,revealing the similarities and differences between the two.The main research results are as follows:Regarding the formation and understanding of idioms,Chinese and Arabic idioms are influenced by cultural factors such as religion,lifestyle,natural environment,values,and modes of thinking.Through investigation and comparison,we have found differences rather than similarities in the formation of commonly used Chinese idioms and Arabic-related idioms,reflecting the cultural characteristics of the Han and Arab nationalities.The differences are mainly reflected in religion,lifestyle,natural environment,values,thinking patterns,and other factors.For example,Buddhism and Taoism dominate in China;Islam and Christianity are the most widespread religions in the Arab world,so Chinese and Arabic idioms related to religion have formed different cultural characteristics.At the same time,commonly used Chinese idioms about religion and their related Arabic idioms reflect completely different cultural aspects.From the perspective of formation and understanding,we found that the number of partially corresponding idioms is the highest,followed by non-corresponding Chinese idioms,while the number of approximately corresponding and fully corresponding idioms is relatively few in the comparison between commonly used Chinese idioms and related Arabic idioms.The same result was obtained by comparing Arabic and corresponding Chinese idioms.Because there are many differences in the formation of idioms between the two languages,there are differences in understanding.As a result,there are relatively few similarities in the formation and understanding of Chinese and Arabic idioms.In terms of grammatical structure and characteristics,common Chinese idioms and Arabicrelated idioms have some similar grammatical structure types,but there are also some completely different structural types.The common structures of both Chinese and Arabic idioms are subject predicate type,modifier-head type,and joint type.The unique structural types in Chinese idioms include verb object type,verb complement type,consecutive predicates type,and telescopic form.The unique structural types in Arabic idioms include genitive construct type and prepositional or adverbial phrase.The largest proportion of grammatical structures in Chinese commonly used set phrases are joint type,with a total of 35.07%;the verb object structure has the largest proportion of grammatical structures in commonly used fixed expressions,accounts for 57.66% of the total.Arabic idioms are different,the largest number of structural types is subject-predicate structure,accounting for 61.88%.In addition,Chinese and Arabic idioms also exhibit differences in word formation and external structure.The number of words in the structure of Chinese set phrases and fixed expressions is quite fixed,in which commonly used set phrases with four characters accounting for 96.68%,and commonly used fixed phrases with three characters accounting for89.78%.The Arabic idiom structure is composed of two words or more.Specifically,the Arabic idiom composed of two words accounts for 35.09%,the Arabic idiom composed of three words accounts for 30.18%,and the Arabic idiom composed of four words accounts for 16.22%.Thus,Arabic idioms have no fixed number of words.The differences in the external structure of Chinese and Arabic idioms mainly focus on the use of conjunctions and the variability and flexibility features.The structure of the commonly used Chinese idioms rarely use conjunctions,there are only 2% of idioms using conjunctions;while there are a lot of Arabic idioms using conjunctions,accounting for 48.30%.The structure of Chinese and Arabic idioms can change under certain circumstances.Other components can be inserted into the structure of commonly used Chinese fixed expressions,and the word order can also be reversed;There are more flexible variations in the structure of Arabic idioms,specifically include: Changes in verb tenses;Changes in the first person,second person,and third person;Changes in masculinity and femininity of words;Changes of singular,dual,and plural.On this basis,this paper believes that there are significant differences in the grammatical structure and characteristics of Chinese and Arabic idioms.In terms of semantic structure and characteristics,according to the exploration and understanding of conceptual metaphor and conceptual metonymy,both Chinese and Arabic idioms are composed of a target domain and source domain,which produce metaphorical meanings.There are non-metaphoric metonymic idioms and metaphoric metonymic idioms in both Chinese and Arabic languages,but most of them are metaphorical,metonymical or both.Specifically,Chinese metaphoric metonymic idioms account for 93%,while Arabic metaphoric metonymic idioms account for 95%.According to the occurrence of the source and target domains of metaphor and metonymy in idioms,Chinese and Arabic idioms are divided into: idioms with the co-occurrence of the target domain and the source domain,and idioms that imply the target domain.This paper found that the number of idioms that imply the target domain in Chinese and Arabic is the highest,with a total of 297 commonly used Chinese idioms(85%)and 230 Arabic idioms(87%).Whether the target domain and the source domain coexist or the implicit target domain,there are more significant differences and few similarities in the idioms of both Chinese and Arabic languages,which are embodied in the source domain and the target domain,especially in selecting the source domain.Therefore,among the 27 Chinese idioms and 22 Arabic idioms that has the co-occurrence of the source domain and the target domain,there are a total of 8 Chinese Arabic corresponding idioms.Among these idioms,the largest number is idioms with different source domains and the same target domain,with a total of 4,while the smallest number is idioms with different source and target domains,as well as idioms with the same source and target domains.Among the Chinese Arabic corresponding idioms that imply the target domain,the largest number is idioms with different source domain and the same target domain,which account for 87%,while the smallest number is those with the same source domain and target domain,and those with different source and target domains,both account for 7%.In addition,this paper conducted a comparative analysis of the source domains of Chinese and Arabic metaphoric metonymic idioms,it is found that there are similarities and differences in the understanding and cognition of the same source domain between Han and Arab people,but differences are more.Specifically,the same source domain of Chinese and Arabic idioms is mapped to different target domain,or mapped to the same target domain,but forming different metaphorical meanings.The main reason for this result is the differences in the natural environment,economic development,political system,ideology,and other factors related to Han and Arab people.Based on the vital role of rhetorical devices in idioms,this paper makes a statistical and comparative analysis of the rhetorical devices used in common Chinese idioms and Arabic-related idioms.The study found that common Chinese idioms use 16 types of figures of speech,while Arabic idioms use 11 types of figures of speech.Arabic idioms often use metonymy.These idioms account for 64.15%,while other figures of speech account for a small proportion.Common Chinese idioms often use the metaphor,which is related to Arabic metonymy,with a total proportion of 42%.However,Chinese idioms use more rhetorical devices than Arabic ones,and some rhetorical devices are unique in Chinese idioms,such as Imitation,isography,and synesthesia.There is also one rhetorical device in Arabic idioms that don’t exist in Chinese idioms,which is the complete simile.The results show many similarities and differences in the usage,form,characteristics,and classification of rhetorical devices used in Chinese and Arabic idioms,but the differences are greater.Based on the above multi-dimensional comparative study,this paper examined the difficulties faced by Chinese language learners with Arabic mother tongue background in learning common Chinese idioms and proposed teaching strategies to overcome and resolve these difficulties.In addition,it also discussed several issues that should be considered when translating Chinese idioms into Arabic,including the methods of idiom translation.The research conclusions can provide a useful reference for Chinese language teaching and translation work. |
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