How to understand the cultural differences between China and the West through festivals

Traditional national festivals are an extremely complicated social and cultural phenomenon, which includes the personality, psychology, beliefs, concepts, ways of thinking, moral sentiments, aesthetic tastes and many deep structural connotations of national culture. They are the result and important carrier of the national spirit bred for a long time in the soil of a specific society, and they are the most prominent and vivid display of a nation's living form. It is closely associated with people's production activities, cognitive activities and social and historical development. It is dominated by people's different material lives and different historical times, and it also has a negative effect on people's material and cultural development at different levels.

China's traditional festivals were basically formed and handed down during the feudal society, and were inevitably branded with feudalism: hierarchical, closed and family-style, and all festivals were centered on family and family internal activities. On holidays, young people must worship the elderly, and the whole family will have a reunion dinner, and the whole family will celebrate together. Even during the Spring Festival, it is basically between relatives. It is inconceivable that a group of strangers get together. Even the outdoor yangko, which many people take part in, is only a performance activity, not a national carnival. In addition, another notable feature of China Festival is that it embodies the customs of China's food culture. Each festival has different special food requirements to distinguish it from other festivals. For example, eat jiaozi, Yuanxiao, Zongzi, moon cakes and so on. Festivals in China embody the virtues and fashions of China people. Respecting the old and loving the young and loving each other is a fine tradition of our nation and should be carried forward. Therefore, China people have always adhered to the good customs and ethos of these China festivals. Even those who like foreign festivals, no one wants to abandon China festivals.

Western festivals are different. They are more about interaction, participation, carnival, and the catharsis of warm emotions. They are self-centered and advocate individuality, such as Thanksgiving, Christmas and Valentine's Day. This is just the opposite of the closed and familial nature of China Festival. These reflect the needs of social development and the inevitability of social progress, the collectivity of human society and the participation of the whole people, and adapt to the desire of people in modern society to communicate with each other, participate in groups and vent their emotions together. It broke the feudal closed form, and there was no hierarchical bondage between superiors and subordinates, old people and young people, which reflected the characteristics of equality and free self-expression of everyone. In terms of eating, there are no strict requirements, and what festivals are celebrated is not the difference between eating.

Festivals refer to the days in a year that are endowed with special social and cultural significance and interspersed in daily life. They are the concentrated display of people's colorful lives and the summary and extension of politics, economy, culture and religion of various regions, nationalities and countries. Holiday customs are the customs and habits that appear in festivals, which are often different due to the differences in holiday systems and deeper natural and social environments. The reason is mainly caused by people's ideas and values. As an important part of cultural differences, customs differences have a more direct and concrete impact on people.

Through the comparative analysis of the differences between Chinese and Western festivals and customs, this paper reveals its own characteristics, aiming at helping us to understand China culture more objectively, and foreign cultures with positive significance more deeply and comprehensively, so as to improve our cross-cultural communication ability.

Festival customs in China

There are three main traditional festivals of the Chinese nation: production, life and sacrifice; Apart from some individual festivals, sacrifice is also one of the most important activities in most traditional festivals of production and life. In addition, these three kinds of festivals are all based on the festival with China characteristics.

In China, the Spring Festival is an important festival in spring, and the time has gradually changed from the day of beginning of spring in the lunar calendar before the Han and Wei Dynasties to the first day of the first lunar month. Holiday foods range from early spring dishes, spring cakes and Tu Su wine to late rice, rice cakes and jiaozi. The ancients believed that the day of beginning of spring was the beginning of spring and the beginning of a year, so there was a custom of persuading people to farm on this day. "Once"? "Etiquette Chronicle" states: "On the day of beginning of spring, the night leaked less than five minutes, and all the officials in the capital were in Tsing Yi, and all the officials in counties and countries were eating the history of war, and all of them made their green contributions, erected green flags and put the people of Niu Geng outside the door for public display. "Farming requires a strong body, so there is corresponding food in the diet. Five spicy foods, namely spring vegetables and Tu Su wine, first appeared, with the purpose of strengthening the body and facilitating agriculture. With the passage of time, the significance of persuading people to farm in the Spring Festival has gradually faded, while the significance of keeping fit has been strengthened, further hoping that the new year will be happy, auspicious and all the best, so new holiday foods have appeared, such as the rice meal symbolizing happiness and reunion, the rice cake symbolizing developed career, and jiaozi symbolizing abundant financial resources and all the best. All these Spring Festival foods are entrusted with China people's prayers and yearning for a happy life.

The Spring Festival is usually called "China New Year", because it is at the beginning of the lunar calendar, so it is also called "Year". The ancient "years" and "years" were all related to the calendar and agricultural production. Hanshu? Emperor Wu Ji: "In the first year of Tai Chu (BC 104), ... the first month is the beginning of a year. The Shang dynasty began with December in the summer calendar, and the Zhou dynasty began with October in the summer calendar. " Also, "year" means that the grain is ripe. The word "Nian" in Oracle Bone Inscriptions is the image of a bumper harvest fruit, and the word "Nian" in bronze inscriptions is also the mature appearance of grain ears. Biography of the Spring and Autumn Valley Liang? "Sixteen Years of Gong Xuan" says: "When the grain is ripe, it is the New Year. It can be seen that "Year" was originally a day to wish a bumper harvest and celebrate, and it also meant "the beginning of reunification, the renewal of Vientiane". Specifically, the Spring Festival consists of "New Year's Eve" and "New Year's Day", with New Year's Eve before midnight and New Year's Day after midnight. In ancient times, whenever the New Year came, people would hold La Worship activities to pray for the arrival of the New Year. This is what the Book of the Later Han Dynasty said: "In winter, the moon is bright, the stars return to the end of the year, the yin and yang meet, and the farmers enjoy the wax. "The year of worship with wax is not only to worship ancestors and gods, but also to let farmers have a rest and entertainment after busy farming, to meet the busy farming activities in the coming year, and to pray for a bumper harvest with firecrackers. People's life style will inevitably affect the way and content of social life, which makes the festivals of traditional life types in China mainly focus on the production season.

Dragon Boat Festival is an important festival in summer, which falls on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month. Zongzi is the main holiday food. Many folklore scholars believe that the Dragon Boat Festival originated from the solstice in summer. The summer solstice marks the beginning of summer, usually in May of the lunar calendar. This period is the most vigorous period of crop growth, and it is also the period when weeds, pests and diseases are most likely to grow and spread, so field management must be strengthened. The farmer's proverb says, "The solstice in summer is better than a poisonous snake bite." In order to remind people to pay attention to the summer solstice, manage the fields well, and pray for ancestors to bless the bumper harvest of crops, as early as the Shang and Zhou Dynasties, the Emperor of Heaven specially tasted the main grain millet at that time from the summer solstice to the sun as a sacrifice to his ancestors. Book of rites? "Moon Order" said that in midsummer, "the son of heaven was ashamed of Han Tao because he tasted millet, so he recommended the temple of sleeping first." This activity gradually infiltrated and influenced people, and formed a custom. A special food called "jiaozi", or Zongzi, appeared in summer solstice for people to sacrifice and eat. With the evolution of the Dragon Boat Festival from summer to Sunday, "corn millet" has also become the festival food of the Dragon Boat Festival. "Taiping Yulan" quoted the local custom of the Jin and Zhou Dynasties as saying: "The custom is to wrap millet in leaves and cook it with pure ash juice, and cook it on May 5 and the summer solstice. A jiaozi and a corn millet were covered with images when Yin and Yang were still wrapped. " It can be seen that the appearance of Dragon Boat Festival and Zongzi is closely related to agricultural solar terms. At first, the Dragon Boat Festival seemed to be a festival for Baiyue people in ancient south to worship their totem-dragon. Later, it was associated with the patriotic poet Qu Yuan, which contained the deeper national cultural connotation of the organic combination of totem worship and ancestor worship.

Mid-Autumn Festival is an important festival in autumn, which falls on the 15th day of the eighth lunar month. It is named because it is in the middle of Qiu Meng, Mid-Autumn and Qiu Ji. Its main holiday food is moon cakes. However, the formation of Mid-Autumn Festival and its corresponding relationship with moon cakes have gone through a long historical process. Autumn is the harvest season. People have harvested all this with joy, and at the same time they are grateful to nature. The moon is not only an outstanding representative of nature, but also an important basis for China people to calculate solar terms. Therefore, there are activities to worship the moon and Yue Bai in the Zhou Dynasty. In the Sui and Tang Dynasties, when people worshipped the moon and Yue Bai, they gradually found that the moon in the Mid-Autumn Festival was the largest, roundest and brightest, so they began to enjoy and play with the moon, forming the Mid-Autumn Festival with the main customs of enjoying the moon and harvesting the harvest at Qingfeng. Ouyang Zhan, a poet in the Tang Dynasty, said in the Preface to Playing the Moon: "August is in autumn, the season begins in Meng, and the fifteenth day is in the night and the middle of the month. If you are in heaven, you will be hot and cold; Take the number of months, and the toad will be round. ..... Climb to Lindong, enter the West Building, let your bones and muscles cool, and let your air cool. " In this beautiful and pleasing festival, China people who pay attention to "food is the most important thing for the people" will naturally not forget to accompany them with wine and delicacies. According to historical records, Tang Gaozu Li Yuan once hosted a banquet on the night of the Mid-Autumn Festival, enjoyed the moon with ministers, and shared the delicious food presented by Tibetan businessmen-a stuffed round biscuit with patterns of the Goddess Chang'e flying to the moon and Jade Rabbit engraved on its surface. This kind of cake may be the ancestor of "moon cakes" in later generations. In the Song Dynasty, the Mid-Autumn Banquet was very popular. There were also names and varieties of "moon cakes" in Liang Lumeng written by Song and Wu, but it had nothing to do with the Mid-Autumn Festival. Mooncakes became the main festival food of Mid-Autumn Festival in Yuan and Ming Dynasties. According to legend, when Zhu Yuanzhang launched an uprising at the end of the Yuan Dynasty, he hid a note with the time of the uprising in the moon cakes, and sent messages when giving each other moon cakes. This shows that the custom of eating moon cakes on Mid-Autumn Festival was very popular in Yuan Dynasty. Tian Rucheng's Notes on Traveling to the West Lake and Xi Chaole in the Ming Dynasty contain: "August 15th is the Mid-Autumn Festival, and people use moon cakes to get together." Since then, moon cakes have at least two meanings: one is to worship the moon god and express gratitude to nature; Second, the cake is round, symbolizing reunion and pinning people's prayers and wishes for family reunion and happy life. The so-called "I miss my relatives twice during the festive season" and "I wish people a long life", which is difficult to realize in traditional festivals in the West.

The winter solstice festival is an important festival in winter. It is in November of the lunar calendar, and there is no fixed date. There are many holiday foods, mainly wonton, mutton and zongzi. Winter solstice is one of the 24 solar terms of the lunar calendar, and it is also an important period for storing a large number of food raw materials such as crops from winter to the day before and after. "Twenty-four solar terms" said: "In mid-November, the ultimate Tibetan spirit reached its extreme." At this point, the year's busy farming is coming to an end or has ended. Grain Man Cang, cattle and sheep full circle. It's time for people to enjoy the fruits of labor for the first time. Therefore, people attach great importance to this day. Many researchers believe that the winter solstice has become a festival around the Han Dynasty. After Wei and Jin Dynasties, people expanded the scale of celebrating the winter solstice, making it second only to the Spring Festival, and some places called it "Asian New Year". The winter solstice is when yin and yang alternate, and the sun is the soul. Eating wonton means that ancestors created chaos, created heaven and earth, and expressed their memory and gratitude for ancestors and nature. In addition, mutton is also a holiday food from winter to the sun. It is not only an excellent nourishing food in winter, but also implies auspiciousness and expresses hope for a happy life.

Engels pointed out: "The initial religious expression is a celebration that reflects natural phenomena, seasonal changes and so on. The specific natural conditions and natural products of a tribe or nation's life have been transplanted into its religion. " The formation and development of these sacrificial festivals are closely related to the Chinese nation, which has a long and profound concept of consanguineous patriarchal clan system, and China's long-term maintenance of an agricultural society based on natural economic forms. Such as sacrificial activities (such as the birthdays of many Buddhist bodhisattvas and Taoist immortals). ) It is only a festival that people with certain religious beliefs will pay attention to, so ancestor worship activities are generally recognized and valued by most people in China.

Western holiday customs

There are three kinds of traditional festivals in western countries and nations: production, life and religion. However, due to the great historical changes in social and economic forms, the first two kinds of traditional festivals either faded out or gradually disappeared, giving way to religious festivals. In addition, due to the diversity of western culture, the existing traditional festivals of agriculture and animal husbandry are mostly regional rather than universal, and are limited to rural towns in various regions or production places of certain agricultural and animal husbandry products. Respecting the land and praying for a bumper harvest are the common characteristics and traditional customs of all ethnic groups engaged in agricultural production in ancient times, especially in the natural economic and social era when agricultural productivity is underdeveloped. As a year-round festival, it should be a festival of universal concern to human society, but in the west, the importance and influence of this festival has given way to Christian Christmas. Although most western countries are still celebrating the New Year, it is not a worldwide festival in a strict sense or even in a general sense, but an annual festival with local and national characteristics celebrated all over the world at the same time. Based on the socio-economic forms and historical and cultural characteristics of different countries, nationalities and regions, festivals show different production, life or religious and cultural characteristics. There is also the "Thanksgiving Day" popular in northern China, which has some similar connotations to the traditional festivals in the United States. And these festivals with specific regional and historical and cultural connotations will undoubtedly not have cross-cultural and cross-regional universality, nor can they be transplanted in different places. Because the European continent is influenced by Christian civilization, almost all the most influential traditional festivals in the west are related to Christianity, and with the popularization of Christianity among civilizations and the spread of European immigrants to all continents in the world, they have become world-wide festivals.

In western countries, carnival is the secular name of Christian "meat festival", which usually begins in February of the solar calendar and lasts for three days. Its custom is mainly to hold various feasts and entertainment activities and enjoy festivals. At first, the church banned eating meat and entertainment during fasting, and believers spontaneously held various banquets and entertainment activities before fasting, so as to announce that they were about to bid farewell to meat temporarily, which was called "thanking meat". "Xie" means farewell, farewell. Because people can party, it is also called "carnival" activity. In the15th century, Pope Paul II ordered that it be celebrated three days before Lent. Since then, Carnival has been officially recognized as a festival, and gradually spread in the West and other countries. Nowadays, Carnival has become an indispensable grand festival for many countries and nations in the world. Because the origin of carnival is closely related to the prohibition of meat and entertainment when the church fasted, and February is the season when winter goes and spring comes, which is worth celebrating, so its custom cannot be separated from the prohibition of meat and entertainment. But for most countries, their customs are mainly entertainment, supplemented by diet, and with the passage of time, the religious color is fading and the secular celebration color is increasing. For example, in Venice, Italy, people not only hold banquets and sing songs at home, but also wear strange clothes, masks or colors on their faces and enjoy festivals on stilts. Many snack bars specialize in making some mask cakes for customers; Some restaurants and bars will also make all kinds of mask cookies to hang on the wall, symbolizing a new starting point in life. It is Brazil that pushes carnival entertainment to the peak, but its reputation as "the hometown of carnival" is not derived from food, but from a grand and wonderful samba performance.

Easter is a Christian festival to commemorate the "resurrection" of Jesus, and it is the second largest festival in western countries after Christmas, mostly in April of the solar calendar. In its customs, there are both religious ceremonies and special holiday food-eggs. According to the Bible, Jesus was crucified on Friday when he went to Jerusalem to attend the Jewish Passover, and ascended to heaven on the third day, Sunday. For this reason, the Christian church established Easter, which was clearly stipulated by the Nicaean Priests' Meeting of the Roman Empire in 325 AD, and its time was the first Sunday after the full moon at the vernal equinox every year, that is, the middle of April in the solar calendar. Since Easter is established by the church to commemorate Jesus, there will be religious commemoration activities on the eve or day of the festival, not only mass in the church, but also grand religious parades in some cities. Corresponding to this is the activity of eating eggs and getting rid of them. Eggs are regarded as a symbol of rebirth and prosperity in western countries, and dyeing eggs red symbolizes that Christ atoned for mankind with his own blood, so many families have eggs for Easter breakfast. Sometimes, parents will hide them and let their children find them. The original egg was dyed after the real egg was cooked, and later it was made of chocolate, which was big and empty with chocolate or other candy in the middle. There are two ways to eat eggs. One is to eat them directly and commemorate Christ with reverence. But it is more popular to eat through the game, combining food with pleasure and commemoration. For example, in northern England, Scotland and other places, people mark colored boiled eggs and roll down the slope. Whoever breaks the egg first will be eaten by others, and whoever gives up. If the egg is intact, it indicates that the owner will have good luck. In this activity, winning or losing is not important, what matters is people's spirit.

In its holiday customs, besides religious ceremonies, there are Christmas parties, Christmas trees and Santa Claus. The date of birth of Jesus is not clearly recorded in the Bible, but in 354 AD, the Roman church set 65438+February 25th as the date of birth of Jesus and held celebrations to commemorate it. It is said that this day is chosen to keep in line with the secular Saturnalia, which is a sacrifice to the sun, to show that the birth of Jesus is the rebirth of the sun. After a certain period of development, Christmas has gradually evolved into a major national festival in western countries. It pays attention to family reunion and is as lively as the Spring Festival in China. There are grand celebrations on Christmas Day, especially on the eve of Christmas Day on February 24th, 65438. Christians go to church to have mass, sing Christmas songs and recite hymns to celebrate the birth of Jesus and the arrival of Christmas Day. Children expect Santa Claus to send gifts such as candy and toys, and they will prepare some supper for Santa Claus. In addition to celebrations, the Christmas party is an essential family reunion for Christmas, but the time is not necessarily the same as holiday food. For example, Italians and French people hold a family dinner on Christmas Eve, which is similar to "New Year's Eve" in China. Italians eat "New Year's Eve" first. The main food is tuna, clams, cuttlefish and nut cakes, and then go to church for mass. The French didn't go home to enjoy Christmas dinner until after mass. The main foods are foie gras, chestnut turkey, truffles, cakes and champagne. In Britain, the Christmas party is held at Christmas noon. The common foods are roast turkey, Christmas pudding and hundred fruit pies. After Columbus discovered the New World and was brought back from Mexico by navigators, roast turkey became the Christmas food in Britain. Before that, it was wild boar heads and roasted peacocks for a long time. Christmas pudding is steamed or baked with raisins, apples, candied skin, spices and a little brandy as raw materials. Usually a holly branch is inserted at the top of the pudding as decoration. Baiguo pie is a kind of cake baked with all kinds of dried fruits as stuffing. It is worth noting that at Christmas parties in most countries, when the whole family sits around the dining table, they must put an extra chair and make room for a seat, because this is for Jesus, the "messenger of the Lord". After the banquet, people sang and danced around the Christmas tree symbolizing good luck, happiness and eternal life.

Besides, Thanksgiving Day is also worth mentioning. Thanksgiving Day is the oldest holiday unique to the United States, which was created by the first British Puritans who immigrated to the North American continent. The time is 165438+ the last Thursday of October, and the main holiday foods are turkey and pumpkin pie. As a holiday food for Thanksgiving, these foods are innate and always indispensable. Because they can not only remind people of the hardships of their ancestors' entrepreneurship and thank God for their grace, but also inspire people to create a happier and better life. As can be seen from the above, festivals and dietary customs in festivals are the highlights of human life. Although the differences between China and the West in geography, history, culture and concepts have caused certain differences in their respective holiday eating customs, it is this that makes human life rich and colorful, and also makes them have their own unique charm of mutual attraction and mutual respect. In this sense, blindly seeking common ground will not only lose the truth, but also make human life tend to be monotonous.

The Blending of Chinese and Western Festival Cultures

Human society has gradually entered the information age, and the economic and cultural exchanges between countries, regions and ethnic groups have become increasingly frequent and infiltrated each other. In the real life of multicultural communication and infiltration, western civilization undoubtedly shows a strong export advantage. Some people think that the influence and infiltration of this strong cultural posture is realized by western economic hegemony as a supporting force, that is to say, economic hegemony supports cultural hegemony and leads to cultural invasion and infiltration; However, due to the backwardness of social and economic development, eastern countries and nations have to be in a passive situation of being controlled and infiltrated. In fact, this is to confuse the superficial material culture with the deep spiritual culture, which is a superficial view that lacks a deep understanding of the essence and characteristics of culture. In fact, there is no distinction between different cultures, and the mutual influence, infiltration and integration between heterogeneous cultures are far from simple. The interaction, infiltration and integration between heterogeneous cultures, the most important thing is whether a culture is universal and inclusive, which is closely related to the living form of the culture and the social soil on which it depends.

The most important cultural characteristics of traditional festivals in China are strong secularity and pan-divinity, which are actually non-religious. This is because China's early social structure was based on the customary force of combining nature worship with humanistic spirit, and it was a kind of "humanism" different from ancient western deism and modern humanism. Its basic philosophical concept and ideal hope value advocate the coordination and balance between God and man, that is, the so-called "harmony between man and nature". The modern festival culture in China is becoming more and more secularized, even vulgarized, instead of emotional sustenance and spiritual sublimation. In the west, people pay more attention to emotional friendship in social communication, and the gifts exchanged pay more attention to their emotional value than material value, which is really like China's saying that "a friendship between gentlemen is as light as water" and "courtesy is lighter than benevolence".

"Festival" originally refers to the place where the leaves and branches of plants meet in Chinese characters. As the saying goes in China, "A strong festival in wood." Animal bones are also called joints: joints. The annual festival derived from this means that it has a key and specific significance. "If there are no festivals on the calendar, our life will suddenly become without expectations and the days will be monotonous." Festivals can also be said to be a concentration of culture. It is precisely because of the colorful festivals that they have been painted into beautiful and moving "New Year pictures" in human history. We walk through spring, summer, autumn and winter year after year, and feel the happiness brought by every festival. Western festival culture has a long history as China. As an important part of western culture, it reflects the historical and cultural origins of western countries and nations to a great extent, and festivals have formed their own different customs and habits in the historical process of the development of various nations. Therefore, through western festival culture and its customs, we can fully understand the history and culture of western nations, which will help us to strengthen communication and understanding with western countries and nations and provide a window for better international exchanges. From the origin and historical development of festivals to the influence today; From the celebration of festivals, the inheritance of etiquette to the spread of customs, this paper comprehensively, vividly and intuitively introduces the rich and colorful culture contained in western traditional festivals and their ancient, simple, infectious and attractive customs. In today's "globalization", it will contribute to the dialogue between Chinese and Western cultures and actively participate in the construction of modern human culture.

To sum up, we can see that there are huge social, historical and festival cultural differences between China and the West. It is this difference that has become the biggest obstacle to the cross-cultural intersection and transplantation of Chinese and Western traditional festivals, especially the cross-cultural transplantation of China traditional festivals to the West. Chinese and western festival cultures have different characteristics, and the differences between them are far more than those mentioned above. In fact, these two festival cultures have their own strengths, and there is no difference. Today, with the acceleration of economic globalization, we can't close our doors. While carrying forward our traditional festival culture, we should also absorb the essence of western festival culture for our use. At present, with the rapid development of China's economy and society and the increasingly frequent economic and cultural exchanges between China and the West, China's traditional festival culture has begun to go abroad and show its unique charm to the world, and China people have begun to understand the charm of western festival culture. The mutual infiltration and integration of Chinese and western festival cultures is a great gospel for the two cultures to keep up with the trend of the times and keep their vitality forever.