Analysis Of Cultural Differences Between Chinese And American Talk Show

Talk show originated in America,and it started in China in 1980 s.It has gained popularity since it came into being.Born in two different cultures,talk shows in the two countries have both similarities and differences.This study chooses ten episodes respectively from Ellen Show and Intimate Talk with Li Jing,which has great popularity and pretty long history in its country as the research target.With the aim of improving our cultural awareness in intercultural communication,the study collects and analyzes data about the two common phenomena in talk show,which are interruption and questioning.Each of the two items is classified according to three criteria.Interruption is classified according to the initiator,the function and the place of interruption;and questioning is classified according to the form,the function and the initiator of questioning.The study integrates both quantitative and qualitative analysis to analyze the collected data in the two talk shows.In quantitative analysis,data in the two programs of the same classification are counted and compared in order to find the similarities and differences.In qualitative study,examples of each type are transcribed and analyzed.According to the result of quantitative and qualitative analysis,the thesis has these findings: interruption in Ellen is more often initiated by guests,is more often used to express one's own opinion,such as agreement or disagreement,and is more often occurred within the speech;as for questioning,differences mainly occur in the function of questioning.That is questioning in Jing is more often used to ask information while that in Ellen is more often used to express one's opinion or emotion.Based on Hofstede's culture dimension theory,these differences in interruption and questioning between the two talk shows can be explained by these dimensions that Chinese culture is a culture of collectivism,high power distance,high uncertainty avoidance and long-term orientation while American culture is opposite to Chinese culture in theses dimensions.