A Comparative Study Of English And Chinese Animal Idioms From The Perspective Of Conceptual Metaphor

Idioms are pervasive in language,and have attracted wide attention from scholars.Animal idioms,metaphorically formed on the basis of some features of animals,are concise in structure and rich in meaning.More importantly,animal idioms encode information about national culture,and represent a human cognitive activity.This paper aims to make a comparative study of animal idioms in English and Chinese under the theoretical framework of conceptual metaphor.It is intended to probe into two research questions: First,what are the similarities and differences between English and Chinese animal idioms? Second,what are the possible factors that account for those similarities and differences.On the basis of Lakoff and Johnson's definition of conceptual metaphor in cognitive linguistics,this study in the first place makes a classification of animal idioms in terms of what conceptual metaphors they represent.Then,its focus is put on the analysis of the similarities and differences between Chinese and English animal idioms.Finally,it moves to explore the possible reasons behind these similarities and differences.The sample animal idioms were selected from authoritative dictionaries and websites as main sources,including Oxford Idioms Dictionary,A Dictionary of current English Idioms,A Comprehensive Dictionary of English Idioms and Phrases and Dictionary of Chinese Idioms,and the website http://www.ourdict.cn/.The findings are shown as follows:First,animal idioms involving metaphorical cognitive activities make up a large proportion of such idioms both in English and Chinese,which serves as evidence that conceptual metaphor is universal in language;second,some features of animals,such as appearance,behavior,physical state,character as well as personality,can be mapped onto human beings to form animal idioms in both English and Chinese,but sometimes different animal images are used to express the same connotation.In contrast to English idioms,the mapping of social relations of animals onto human beings tend to occur in Chinese idioms;third,the common features of animals and similar material and physiological bases as well as the cognitive process of understanding animals may lead to the similar understanding of Chinese and English animal idioms.Cultural factors arising from geographical environment,religious beliefs,folk stories,legends and social conventions can account for the differences between Chinese and English animal idioms.This comparative study is of significance both in theory and in practice.Theoretically,it has provided some evidence for the theory of conceptual metaphor with regard to its reliability.Practically,it provides some implications for cross-cultural communication and idiom teaching and learning.