What are the differences between Chinese and Western cultures?

Slightly on the differences between Chinese and Western food culture

Catering products due to regional characteristics, climate and environment, customs and other factors, there will be in the raw materials, flavors, cooking methods, eating habits of different degrees of difference. It is because of these differences, catering products have a strong regional nature. Differences between Chinese and Western cultures create differences between Chinese and Western food culture, and this difference comes from the different ways of thinking and philosophies of the world. Chinese people focus on the "unity of heaven and mankind", while Westerners focus on "people-oriented".

Here briefly from the following three aspects of the differences between Chinese and Western food culture.

First, two different dietary concepts

Compared to the Chinese diet, which focuses on "taste", the West is a rational dietary concept. Regardless of the color, aroma, taste, and shape of the food, nutrition must be guaranteed, and how many calories, vitamins, proteins, etc. must be consumed in a day. Even if the taste is uniform, it must be eaten - because there is nutrition. This concept of diet is compatible with the entire philosophical system of the West. Metaphysics is the main characteristic of Western philosophy. The object of study in Western philosophy is the theory of things, and the theory of things is often the theory of metaphysics, and the theory of metaphysics is coherent with each other, and then it is formed into the philosophy of metaphysics. This philosophy has brought vitality to Western culture, which has realized a rapid development in natural science, psychology, and methodology. However, in some other aspects, this philosophical proposition has greatly hindered, such as food culture. In the banquet, you can pay attention to tableware, pay attention to materials, pay attention to service, pay attention to the shape of the raw materials of the dish, the color of the collocation; but no matter how luxurious and high-grade, from Los Angeles to New York, steak is only a flavor, no art. As a dish, chicken is chicken, steak is steak, even if there is a match, it is also in the plate, a plate of "French lamb chops", one side of the mashed potatoes, leaning on the side of the lamb chops, the other side of the boiled green beans, with a few slices of tomato will become. Contrasting colors, but in terms of taste, a variety of raw materials are not related to each other, reconcile, each is the taste of each, simple and clear.

The Chinese people are very important to "eat", "people eat for heaven" this proverb shows that we eat as important as heaven. As our nation has been in a low level of productivity for thousands of years, people always have not enough to eat, so there will be a unique food culture that puts food above all else, I think, this is probably out of a need to survive. If a culture to eat as the first thing, then there will be two phenomena: on the one hand, the function of eating will be played to the extreme, not only to maintain survival, but also to use it to maintain health, which is the cultural basis of "medicine is not as good as dietary supplements"; on the other hand, the excessive importance of eating, will make people promote the pursuit of delicious.

In Chinese cooking, the pursuit of flavor is almost so extreme that when Chinese people go overseas to make a living, they open a restaurant as a business, and it has become the foundation of our life in the world! Unfortunately, while we have made the pursuit of deliciousness our first requirement, we have neglected the most fundamental nutritional value of food. Many of our traditional foods are subjected to hot deep-frying and prolonged cooking over a gentle fire, which destroys the nutrients of the dishes, and many of the nutrients are lost in the processing. Thus, when it comes to nutrition, it actually touches on the biggest weakness of Chinese food culture. There is a folk saying: "Food is the sky, food is flavor first". It's this pursuit of flavor that has caused us to overlook the true meaning of eating.

Chinese people in the tasting dishes, often say that this dish "delicious", that dish "is not good"; however, if you want to further ask what is called "delicious", why "good", "good", "good", "good", "good", "good", "good", "good", "good", "good", "good", "good", "good", "good", "good". Why "delicious", "delicious" where, I'm afraid it is not easy to say clearly. This shows that the Chinese people on the pursuit of food is a kind of unspeakable "mood", that is, the use of what is usually called "color, aroma, taste, shape, ware" to the specificity of this "realm"! I'm afraid it's still very difficult to cover.

The reason why Chinese food has its unique charm, the key lies in its flavor. And the production of delicious, lies in the harmonization, to make the original flavor of the food, after heating the cooked flavor, plus the flavor of the ingredients and auxiliary materials and seasonings and flavor, intertwining and fusion and coordination together, so that they complement each other, mutual help penetration, water and milk blending, you have me, I have you. Chinese cooking emphasizes the beauty of harmony, which is the essence of Chinese culinary art. The shape and color of the dishes is something external, but the taste is something internal, heavy internal and not deliberately modify the appearance, heavy dishes taste but not overly show the shape and color of the dishes, which is the most important manifestation of the Chinese beauty of the concept of food.

In China, the pursuit of dietary beauty obviously overrides rationality, and this dietary concept is also consistent with traditional Chinese philosophical thought. As a representative of Eastern philosophy, Chinese philosophy is notable for its macroscopic, intuitive, fuzzy and inscrutable features. Chinese cuisine is prepared in a way that harmonizes and combines, ultimately to produce a beautiful taste. This preoccupation is about proportion, about the overall fit. It contains a rich Chinese philosophy of dialectic thinking, all the taste of the dish is good, harmony for the degree, the degree within the ever-changing decision of the Chinese cuisine is rich and varied, determines the characteristics of the Chinese cuisine cuisine and even the characteristics of each chef.

Second, the difference between Chinese and Western dietary objects

Westerners believe that the dishes are hungry, so specializing in eating large pieces of meat, whole pieces of chicken and other "hard vegetables". Chinese cuisine is "taste", so Chinese cooking in the material also shows a great deal of arbitrariness: many Westerners regarded as abandoned things, in China are excellent raw materials, foreign chefs can not deal with things, a Chinese chef's hands, can be transformed into a miracle. See the Chinese diet in the material of the arbitrariness of the broad.

According to the Western botanist's survey, Chinese people eat more than 600 kinds of vegetables, six times more than the West. In fact, in the Chinese cuisine, vegetarian food is the usual food, meat only in the holidays or a higher standard of living, only into the usual diet structure, so since ancient times, there is a "vegetable food", vegetable food in the usual dietary structure of the dominant position. The Chinese people's preference for plant-based cuisine is inextricably linked to the advocacy of the Buddhists. They regarded animals as "living souls" and plants as "spiritless", so they advocated vegetarianism.

Westerners in the introduction of their own country's dietary characteristics, feel more than China to pay more attention to the rational mix of nutrition, there is a more developed food industry, such as canned food, fast food, etc., although the taste of the same, but to save time, and nutritional good, so their country's people are generally more robust than the Chinese: tall, long legs, broad shoulders, developed muscles; and the Chinese people appear to have a thin body, shoulders, legs, narrow, yellow and weak. The Chinese, on the other hand, appear to be thin, narrow-shouldered, short-legged, and weak in color. Some people according to the obvious difference between Chinese and Western diet object this feature, the Chinese people called plant character, Westerners called animal character.

Third, the different ways of eating

The way of eating in China and the West is very different, and this difference also has an impact on the national character. In China, any feast, no matter what the purpose, there will only be one form, that is, everyone sits around the group, *** enjoy a seat. The fact that the feast is to be served at a round table creates an atmosphere of unity, politeness, and **** interest in the form. Delicious food in the center of a table, it is a table of people to appreciate, taste the object, but also a table of people's feelings exchange medium. People toast each other, let each other dishes, persuade dishes, in front of the beautiful things, reflecting the mutual respect between people, the virtue of courtesy. Although from the point of view of health, this way of eating has obvious shortcomings, but it is in line with our nation's "reunion" of the general mentality, reflecting the classical Chinese philosophy of "and" the scope of the influence of the thought of future generations, to facilitate the collective exchange of emotions, and therefore It is difficult to reform.

In Western-style banquets, although food and wine are very important, they are in fact used as an accompaniment. The core of the banquet is the fellowship, through the conversation with the neighboring guests, to achieve the purpose of fellowship. If we compare the fellowship of a banquet with a dance, then it can be said that a Chinese banquet is like a group dance, while a Western banquet is like a social dance for men and women. It can be seen that both Chinese and Western banquets have an obvious purpose of fellowship, except that Chinese banquets reflect more on the fellowship of the whole table, while Western banquets reflect more on the fellowship between neighboring guests. A more obvious difference from the Chinese way of eating is the popular Western buffet. This method is: all the food is displayed one by one, everyone takes what they need, do not have to be fixed in the seat to eat, walk around freely, this way to facilitate the emotional exchange between individuals, do not have to put all the words on the table, but also shows the Westerners on the individuality, respect for the self. But each eat each, do not disturb each other, missing some Chinese chat happy **** happy mood.

So it comes down to the difference between sensibility and rationality. However, this difference seems to be blurring with the development of science. More and more Chinese people are no longer focusing on the color, aroma and taste of food, but more on its hygiene and nutrition. Especially after the SARS outbreak. Also, people are getting busier and busier with their work, and find Chinese food too much trouble to cook, rather than a hamburger. In this way the differences in diet are not so clear.

How the differences between Chinese and Western cultures are reflected in music

This is very simple, in fact, when it comes to the differences between Chinese and Western music. The biggest difference is probably in the use of tuning. The earliest Chinese tuning was pentatonic, which means that there are only five tones, 1, 2, 3, 5, and 6, that make up a complete scale. As long as the songs are composed of these tones, they form the most characteristic folk music of our country. Unlike Europe and the United States, which use the full seven-tone tonal system, the most distinctive feature of European and American music is not the fact that it's in a seven-tone scale. And the biggest characteristic of European and American music is not in the melody, but in the harmony. I remember reading a book that said that before, and I don't know if it's accurate or not. China is the biggest contributor to melody in the world, while Europe and the US are bigger contributors to the harmonic aspect. I don't know if you can get your head around that.

To put it simply, if a song doesn't have a 4 7 in it, it's bound to be a Chinese folk song. He is bound to be a Chinese folk song. Except for Chinese pop nowadays, of course.

In Europe and the US, you can listen to the harmony part of the song, which is very classic. I'm not sure if I'm right, but if I'm wrong, I'll let other experts explain it to you. Let the other masters explain it to you, lol!

What are the cultural differences between China and the West as seen in movies

While the superstitious consciousness of reality has long been defeated in the face of materialism, at least in art and movies, the spiritually rich Eastern culture still shows its advantages from time to time. Surrealist films, at their best, highlight this difference and disparity between Eastern and Western cultures. In Jandrovsky's The Holy Mountain, we can see how the Mexican master is trying to sell fantasy at all costs, while at the same time carefully looking for scientific explanations and justifications for his own "surrealistic packaging". In fact, Western films of this kind are often confined to verifying reality with surrealist phenomena, while Eastern films can freely deconstruct surrealist phenomena with realist principles. Compare this to The Tale of the Rainy Moon, and we see how confidently and rightfully Kenji Gouguchi lets the ghosts come and go as they please. However, it is also his confidence that makes the movie always shrouded with a layer of pleasure of combining reality with reality, and a poignant mood of hazy sorrow.

I . Inland and marine culture

Based on the differences in the geographic environments on which their respective cultures are built, we can attribute Chinese and Western cultures to inland and marine cultures, the so-called "yellow civilization" and "blue civilization," respectively. "

"One side of the soil and water nurtures one side of the people" and "Yan and Zhao are full of generous and sorrowful people", which is the work of creation, but also shows the great influence of the natural environment on the shaping of personality. "Human personality is the product of both innate organization and the environment in which a person lives during his own life, especially during the period of development." [2] The environment here includes not only the social environment but also the natural environment. The natural environment has a subtle effect on people, so that people consciously and unconsciously get some kind of inculcation and influence. Marx pointed out that "different communes find different means of production and different means of life in their respective natural environments. Consequently, they produce in different ways, live in different ways and have different products." [3]

Chinese civilization originated in the Yellow River Basin, and the geographical environment of being surrounded on three sides by land and on one side by the sea put China in a state of virtual isolation, thus keeping its own culture in a very strong state of stability and historical continuity. This unique natural environment has created the unique cultural traditions and social psychology of the Chinese people. Born in the semi-enclosed continental natural environment of Confucian ethics, teaching people to emphasize the importance of the land, peace and poverty, sunrise and sunset, so that people in the long tradition precipitated a closed inert psychological and inertia thinking methods, conservative, lack of openness to the consciousness; attachment to the homeland and native land, the promotion of quiet and inertia; resting on the status quo, the rules and regulations, the old-fashioned, the awareness of risk and the competitive spirit of the spirit of the weak, the concept of time and the sense of progress is indifferent. Indifference to the concept of time and sense of progress. The so-called "mountain nature makes a person blocked, the water nature makes a person through", is this truth. "Oriental people do not have the busyness and competitiveness of Westerners, they are always serious and serious, never in a hurry, and have little sense of time. Just as the word 'efficiency' represents the tone that governs people's thinking in Western society, so the Chinese often use the word 'sloppy' to indicate their attitude toward life." [4] The narrowness and closeness of the circle of life, the fixedness and permanence of contact between people, in order to be able to get along with each other, the Chinese people pay great attention to human feelings, "Insight into the world's affairs is all learning, and the practice of human feelings is both articles", which also cultivates into the Chinese people's traditional virtues of modesty, prudence, forbearance, and subtlety. This natural environment of China and the cultural traditions under the influence of this environment have nurtured the introverted personality of the Chinese people. As the source of Western culture, ancient Greece and Rome were located on peninsulas, facing the sea, with developed sea transportation and prosperous maritime trade, which led to the formation of open societies in these countries, breaking the blood relationship. Intense social unrest, frequent exchanges of people and the turbulent, unpredictable ocean to form its open and changeable cultural character, casting its flexible, open, courageous, enterprising, collaborative spirit of the nation, advocating hard work and self-improvement. Therefore, Westerners like to be new, innovative, adventurous and courageous. In the West, it is also this natural environment formed in the cultural traditions of Westerners to develop the kind of extroverted personality. "In Marx's view, geography influences people through the relations of production that arise in a certain place and on the basis of certain productive forces ......"[5]/p>

Therefore, for the cultural concepts formed with a great influence of the The influence of the natural environment on personality, we should neither add to the exaggerated nor too narrow, neither over-emphasized nor arbitrarily ignored, but should be objective and fair. As Russell said, "The present science cannot give a complete account of the problem of national character. Climate and economic circumstances, though they tell part of it, are not the whole of it." [6]

II . Ethical and Utilitarian Culture

According to the difference in values between China and the West, we can generalize the Chinese and Western cultures into ethical and utilitarian cultures respectively.

The overall orientation of traditional Chinese ethics is to emphasize righteousness rather than profit. The "distinction between right and wrong" has been a fundamental issue throughout the history of Chinese civilization. The Mozi school, which advocates the balance between righteousness and profit, has lost the soil for survival and forgotten the middle way, while the Taoist school, which advocates the abandonment of righteousness, the abandonment of skill and the abandonment of profit, and the abandonment of both righteousness and profit, has completely excluded merit and fame from the standard of personality, and this kind of advocate, though once on a par with the Confucian concept of righteousness and profit, was not used by the ruling class because it did not fit in with the needs of society at that time. Confucianism, as the mainstream ideology that has dominated Chinese feudal society for thousands of years, basically advocates "emphasizing righteousness rather than profit", "thinking of righteousness in the face of profit", "curbing profit with righteousness", and advocating that when there is a conflict between righteousness and profit, one should give up one's life for the benefit of others. The basic idea of Confucianism is to "emphasize righteousness rather than profit", "think of profit as profit", and "control profit with righteousness", advocating that when there is a conflict between righteousness and profit, one should give up one's life for righteousness. The Chinese tradition of pan-moralism, which explains everything in terms of morality, has led to the value orientation of nationals who are happy to talk about righteousness and shameful to talk about profit, and who emphasize moral cultivation and emphasize external achievements, which has led to the loss of the independent personality value and social status of science in ancient China. People focused on their own inner world, lost interest in reason and nature, and lacked the rational tradition of Western culture and enthusiasm for scientific exploration. The separation of morality and rationality led to the emergence of an anti-rational tendency in the Chinese tradition, thus hindering the development of the Chinese scientific spirit. This is the deep-seated reason why empty talk prevailed in ancient China, while science declined and commerce was underdeveloped. Science and technology were regarded as obscene and strange, and merchants were relegated to the bottom of the list of the four peoples, which also led to the serious consequences of the difficulty of applying ancient Chinese science despite its advancement, the slow development of commerce, and the country's accumulation of poverty and weakness, which became the target of Western colonial aggression in the modern era.

In the West, despite the complexity and variety of social values that have developed over a long period of time, Western society is based on the individual, and seeks to realize the individual's rights and interests, which are considered to be sacrosanct, innate, and natural. It is the instinct of the individual to seek profit and avoid suffering, and to seek profit is the purpose of survival. In the process of pursuing one's own rights and interests, one does not have to bear any moral responsibility, and one can do whatever it takes. Therefore, utilitarianism always occupies the mainstream position and plays a dominant role in Western society. Undoubtedly, this utilitarianism plays a catalytic role in giving birth to the germ of capitalism in later times, but it also makes the primitive accumulation of capitalism very cruel and bloody. As Marx said, "Capital comes into the world dripping blood and filth from every pore, from head to foot." [7] This value orientation of Western society, which emphasizes righteousness over profit, mobilizes the enthusiasm of individuals to pursue material interests to a certain extent, thus promoting the development of Western society's economy and science, but the disdain and depreciation of righteousness can easily lead to Western society's lopsided pursuit of material interests at the expense of others and self-interests, but only for profit, which results in the alienation of the relationship between human beings and their deterioration into a naked relationship of money and material interests. In the history of the West, utilitarianism and pragmatism have prevailed and constituted the mainstream value orientation of the West, and the inviolability of private property has become the unchanging creed of society. Driven by the concept of maximizing one's own interests, science and technology are particularly valued in the West, and rationalism and scientism are very developed in the West. In real life, westerners show the spirit of seeking novelty, innovation and utilitarian personality. The concept of science and technology is y rooted in people's hearts, and has become an important factor in the composition of personality. This also leads to the western society emphasize reason and light emotion, long on reasoning and short on talking about feelings, good at logical thinking and detached from intuitive feeling.

Three . Harmonious Culture and Resistant Culture

Based on the differences in the specific forms of Chinese and Western cultures, we can categorize the two as harmonious culture and resistant culture respectively.

In dealing with the relationship between man and nature, the mainstream of traditional Chinese culture focuses on advocating the "unity of man and nature", emphasizing respect for nature, follow the laws of nature, the pursuit of harmony between man and nature, that "sinned against the sky, there is no prayer" [8]. "One characteristic is that Chinese culture not only does not isolate people from human relationships, but also does not put people in opposition to nature ...... There are people in the sky, there is a sky in the people, and the idea of the unity of heaven and man in which the subject and the object are mutually dissolved constitutes a notable feature of Chinese culture." [9] Chinese culture primarily treats nature as an object of worship rather than an object of study and conquest, as an object of imagination rather than as an object of inquiry. With regard to nature, since "the way of heaven is far away and the way of man is far away,"[10] it is not only absurd but also futile to be too obsessed with the search for the illusory way of heaven. We only need to appeal to the heart, the human heart contains the universal law of nature, the heart can know the nature, know the nature of the knowledge of the sky, "all things are ready for me." [11] Therefore, ancient Chinese culture emphasized more on personnel than on heaven, and more on morality than on knowledge. In dealing with human relations, Chinese culture since ancient times has always emphasized groups over individuals, harmony over resistance, and patriarchy and discipline. It exhorts and restrains people, restricts their free will and creative spirit, and disregards the value and dignity of individual life. Chinese culture has always sought harmony and unity between man and nature and society as the main theme of the ideal of life, opposing man's independent will and enterprising, cultivating man's group concept, obedience, sincerity and respect, and so on, and looking for a kind of mediocrity and reconciliation of the way to deal with the situation. The concept of harmony in Chinese culture also embodies and cultivates the spirit of obedience, submission, conservatism and inactivity of the people, who are content with the status quo, with little sense of resistance and courage to rebel. "The Chinese generally believe in the historical concept of 'Heaven remains unchanged, and the Tao remains unchanged,' which has led Europeans and Americans to believe that the China of 1990 is no different from the China of Confucius' time." "All the old things are extremely valuable, and all the new things are meaningless." [12] This in turn has resulted in a soft cultural character that is modest and cautious, subtle and introverted.

In the West, the ancient Greek and Roman philosophers from the very beginning set their sights on nature, exploring the mysteries of nature and the conquest and domination of nature, to be the master of nature. Heraclitus peeped out "harmony from the struggle" [13], Protegra's "man is the measure of all things" is the distinctive portrayal of the separation of man and nature. Although to Socrates, the philosophy from the sky back to earth, but the western culture of nature exploration and conquest has never stopped. Western commercial society maritime shipping adventure career, as well as in which inevitably encountered difficult to grasp the laws of nature so that Westerners always feel the sharp confrontation between man and nature and the intense conflict, it is in the bizarre natural phenomena of surprise and confusion in the beginning of philosophical exploration. Ancient Greek philosophy from the beginning is mainly a kind of natural philosophy, taking nature as the object of people's thinking and exploration. Under the domination of the dichotomous thinking mode of separating heaven and man, the western society has been distinguishing and opposing nature and man since ancient times, and nature is only an object to be recognized, utilized and conquered by man, emphasizing man's independence and positive progress, and pursuing free will and independent spirit. In dealing with human relations, the West is more respect for individual freedom of will and personality independence, emphasizing the value and dignity of individual life, the importance of private property acquisition and protection, overall awareness and collective concept is weak. Westerners are rich in challenges, bold pursuit, Chong Li Shangwu, eager to make quick profits, even at the expense of one-sided digging into the way of thinking and unscrupulous behavior to achieve the goal, to win the spirit of quality and state of mind, so as to form a straightforward, open-minded, with a hard cultural character.

Chinese culture advocates "unity of heaven and man", humane law of heaven, to humane should be heavenly, to heavenly set up humane, to virtue with heaven, heaven and man together, so the sense of existence is exceptionally developed, image thinking is very prominent, focusing on intuitive sensation and poetic imagination, emphasis on the human being and light of the heavenly way, light of the evidence and heavy metaphysical thinking, resulting in the natural sciences is not very developed humanities are exceptionally prosperous. The natural sciences are not very developed, and the humanities are exceptionally prosperous. "If, according to this logic, the development of epistemological consciousness was partly responsible for the emergence of science in Europe, then the underdevelopment of this consciousness should also be partly responsible for the non-emergence of science in China." [14] Western culture advocates the separation of heaven and man, man's victory over heaven, not only recognizing and interpreting nature but also conquering and transforming nature, developed scientific and technological consciousness, prominent abstract thinking, and emphasis on logical inference and empirical research. Therefore, China has a "careful proof" of Chen Jingrun, while the West has a "bold assumptions" of Goldbach.

IV. Conclusion

By comparing the differences between Chinese and Western cultures in the above three aspects, it can be seen that Chinese and Western cultures have their own characteristics. Chinese and Western civilizations are built on their own systematic and very different cultural backgrounds, and these two different cultural backgrounds have resulted in very different values and ethical orientations, which make the Chinese and Western realities of personality characteristics very different from each other.

In addition, the deeper exploration of the cultural differences between China and the West is of great significance, as it will solve the mystery of a series of major issues, such as the differences between the development of science and technology in China and the West, and thus have a far-reaching impact.