大学英语跨文化交际论文.doc

Cultural differences reflected in Western and Chinese Films
—— Exampled by Gay Films
中文摘要：
电影作为众多文化载体中的一种，必然折射着不同文化的核心和观念以及社会主流的道德评价标准。而在观看不同文化、国家的电影时，我们经常会受到文化冲击而产生困扰和不适。本文就中西方电影中所展现的对于“同性恋”这一社会现象的态度进行文化差异层次的深度分析，借以了解中西方不同的文化、社会价值观。
将西方电影《费城故事》和中国相同题材的电影《喜宴》的剧情和线索进行论述和对比我们发现西方人在人本主义精神的包容下追求自我，要求全面的表达自我，同时也尊重别人同样的诉求。而中国人注重伦理本位，会选择牺牲自己以维持中国式的家庭伦理。通过探究我们可以将结论应用于日常生活中以适应不同文化的冲击，更好地欣赏艺术作品，在文化方面取其精华，去己糟粕。
英文正文：
As one of the important carriers of human cultures, films must be marked with the native culture essences and moral codes. They can give us a lot of hints about different cultural patterns and life styles. Through the analysis of the films of different nations, we can see clearly the distinction between Chinese culture and western culture. Since homosexuality is a quite hot issue nowadays both in and out of the movie, we will take two typical western and Chinese gay films for example. In the following, we will firstly talk about them separately and then make some comparisons and contrasts between them to find out the reasons of the two opposite endings and the cultural meanings behind them.
Individualism——basic culture core in western films
Different from Chinese ethic standards, western culture puts more stress on the expression and development of individuals. Individualism is deep rooted in westerners’ minds. No matter literary works or screen works are influenced by it to a great extent. In their movies, we can see a lot of stories about the betrayal to one’s family and the pursuit of one’s personal goal. They have many discussions over human nature in the films to fully express their attitudes towards those sensitive topics, such as homosexuality, extramarital love, father complex, Oedipus complex, and so on.
Let’s take homosexuality for example. With the development of human society, most westerners have already recognized homosexuality its legal status. Gay films are quite normal and acceptable. For them, being a gay is nothing strange. There is no need to hide anything. Many gay films are produced not to tease or criticize any one but to praise their pure love. Gay couples will take well care of each other and they possess all the valuable traits in terms of love just as general people do. Those films reflect western majority’s tolerance, understanding, and their attentions and supports to those edge figures.
One typical film we had better pick out is Philadelphia. It tells us a story that an outstanding young lawyer, who is a gay and is affected with AIDS, was fired by his boss. So, with his families and friends, he spends his remaining life fighting bravely against the discrimination, and asks for his legal rights that are equal as straight people have. He sues his boss and makes a great effort during the process while tortured by the horrible illness. In the end, he wins the battle, receives people’s supports and respects but he is also losing his life.
The Philadelphia Story has a simple plot, but it indeed highlights a moral issue. That is, we all agree to treat AIDS patients equally, but what our attitude should be when this illness plus homosexuality? Actually, this key part has already formed into a sub-culture of human society. In the movie, the young lawyer and his life partner are a loving couple. They are faithful, thoughtful to each other. They encourage each other and support each other. They even show extraordinary tolerance and caring that even straight people don’t possess. Obviously, the director of the movie supports gay people with great publicity. This film is uttering the voice of the general western societies’. That is, sexual orientation is just a personal matter. The western values tend to respect others no matter they are gay or straight
This kind of expression is quite common among western films. All these sensitive topics are expressed without any hiding. They are treated as reasonable existences. Chinese traditional ethic is against everything that disobeys its rules. Chinese culture has a complete system of ethic standards, which is also always reflected in its local films.
Ethical principles reflected in Chinese films
Ethical principles go deep into Chinese films as individualism go into western films. Most of the Chinese films are based on violations of family ethic. As for those themes and topics which are unaccepted by society, Chinese directors are afraid to set their feet in them. Chinese culture is originally against those non-mainstream thoughts and behaviors. Given viewers’ thinking stereotype and receptivity, Chinese films always tend to avoid those topics. Even if they involve those topics, they criticize. Even if they don’t show their objection, they will not show their approval, either.
In the movie The Wedding Banquet directed by Li An, everything has reflected Chinese culture essence and family ethic. It tells us a story about a Chinese young man, who works in America and find himself a gay, takes every step he can think of to cheat his father. He chooses to have a fake marriage with a girl while he has already involved in a relationship with a male partner. His father wants to have a grandson to development their family tree. So, he writes to his son frequently to urge him to get married as soon as possible. Later, his father has found out the truth but does not want to reveal it. They hold a very big and traditional Chinese wedding with the presence of a lot of relatives and friends. They feel they are accomplished to some degree, but actually they never stop struggling in their inner hearts. When the father is in the air port and gets examined, he raises his hands. It is just like he surrenders. It is not a surrender to America’s freedom but a surrender to Chinese traditional ethic.
We can see that both the son and the father have given in to the traditional Chinese ethic at the cost of their real happiness. Although this movie ends up in those characters’ laughters and cheers, in fact, we will find out that the movie tells us a tragedy under the certain social ethic atmosphere.
Conclusion
When we make a contrast between The Philadelphia Story and The Wedding Banquet, the cultural differences are pretty obvious. The ending of the two movies are dramatic. The young lawyer in The Philadelphia Story has win the final battle and is recognized by his society, while the young man in The Wedding Banquet still hides his sexual-orientation and has put himself in a strange relationship between his life partner, his father and his wife.
Western people tend to fulfill their potential and to explore their real selves. One of the responsibilities of their society is to guarantee that every individuals’ reasonable development won’ be curbed or hindered by others’ judgement.
In China, people’s real nature has been oppressed for a long time. Everyone should first of all obey the rules of majority and the traditional moral standards.
Enlightenment
As we all know, the so called culture shock is caused by the anxiety that results from losing all our familiar signs and symbols of social contact (Introducing Intercultural Communication). As Chinese people, we are taught our long-history as well as the quite old fashioned social ethic and moral standard. We are used to hide our real emotions and thoughts. We resist and pretend to ignore those non mainstream things. Homosexuality, extramarital love, father complex and Oedipus complex are denied by us and we tend to avoid discussing and talking about those phenomena as much as possible. We think people who have these “problems” should correct their behaviors and feel shameful about it. So, when we enjoy films of other cultures and nations, we are very likely caught in this culture shock. We can not figure out why the characters in the films act like that, and why this kind of film can win so many movie awards when they encourage and support such kind of things we would rather not to face with. It is even reported in a newspaper that a father sold and beat his son just because he watched a gay film at home. The father think those homosexual conducts are disgusting, and is afraid that his son will since become a gay.
With the development of globalization, China must catch up with the most advanced civilizations in the world. Chinese people especially Chinese teenagers have more chance to get in touch with more foreign signs and see more films of some totally different cultures. What can we do and how can we prepare ourselves in order to avoid culture shock and adept ourselves well?
First of all, we need to understand these differences truly exist, and get self warned. Secondly, we should know that culture shock is not always a bad thing. It can broaden our horizon and let us think more about our own culture and traditions. We can take more good parts and abandon those bad parts. Last but not the least, we need to learn more advanced knowledge and ideas. We need to treat those sensitive issues with objective attitude and scientific spirit. We need to build a more friendly, stable and harmonious society without pride and prejudice.

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