Discourse As English And Chinese Like Perspective Comparative Study

Nowadays comparative linguistics develops from micro one to macro one. According to this trend we make a comparative analysis of the English and Chinese text by using the iconicity theory.The purpose of this paper is to reveal the commonness of English and Chinese at the bottom. In order to prove this kind of commonness first we list different thinking modes of English and Chinese people and analyze how these different thinking modes generate different text structures according to five types of iconicity that are sequencing iconicity, distance iconicity, quantitative iconicity, thesis iconicity and symmetric iconicity. Next through the analysis of these different text structures we find all these differences are understandable and not absolute, which means that there are text structures which are against the native thinking mode in both English and Chinese and the native reader can understand them, so this proves that English and Chinese have commonness at the bottom though they have different text structure.The discovery that English and Chinese are common at the bottom has practical significance. It can enhance the confidence of communication, improve the mutual understanding and hasten the cultural exchange of the people from two nations.