中西方数字文化对比研究

A Comparative Study of Numbers in China and Western Countries

By Mou Kaixuan

In partial fulfillment of the requirement

For the B. A. degree

Department of English

School of Language and Culture

Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology

May, 2017

A Comparative Study of Numbers in China and Western Countries

Mou Kaixuan

Department of English

School of Language and Culture

Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology

Abstract: This paper mainly focuses on the comparison of digital culture between China and western countries. First of all, the paper analyses the origin of numbers. Secondly, it explores favorite numbers and taboo numbers in China and western countries. Moreover, it concentrates on the reasons, for which the different concepts are associated with the same numbers. With the contrast of numbers in China and western countries, the paper reveals how to get along well with western people.

Key words: digital origin；cultural difference；forming reason；Cross --cultural communication

摘要：本文主要研究中西方国家数字文化差异。首先，本文分析了数字的起源。其次，探讨了中国和西方国家最喜爱的数字和禁忌数字。而且，它集中在对同一数字造成不同观念的原因。通过中国与西方国家的数字文化对比，揭示了如何更好地与西方人民跨文化交际。

关键词：数字起源；文化差异；形成原因；跨文化交际

1. Introduction

1.1 Introduction to Numbers

Numbers have various forms, including Arabic numerals, roman numerals Chinese numerals, etc. The one commonly used by people is Arabian numerals. But numbers were invented by Indian rather than Arabic. Numbers are created by the ancient Indian in the production and practice gradually. Numbers are originally the signs for calculating, but they have profound connotations under the different culture. Thus, comparing Chinese and western digital culture can help us communicate with the English-speaker well.

1.2 Introduction to the Origin of Numbers

The number is a mysterious field where the human beings have no concept. However, it is because of the needs of life that the human’s mind gradually has the “quantity”of the shadow .When the number comes into being? Because of its age, we have no way to research. But it is certain that the number of concepts and the number of methods in the written record has been developed before. According to the evidence provided by archaeologists, humans have already adopted some sort of counting method as early as 5,000 years ago.

1.2.1 The Number Concept of in History

The primitive stage of mankind, in order to sustain life, they must go out hunting and harvesting fruit every day. Sometimes they are rewarded, and sometimes they have nothing; the food that comes back is sometimes rich, sometimes less than enough. This changes in the number of life and the amount of life, so that people gradually produced a number awareness. At that time, they began to understand the difference of no, more and less, and then know the difference between one and more. And then from more to single number of the concept such as two, three and four, which is a small leap. With the further progress and development of society, a simple count is necessary. A tribal collective must know how many members or enemies, a person must know how many sheep in the sheepfold. In this way, due to the notes, the distribution of daily necessities and other needs, the ancestors of the human race gradually produced a number of concepts in the difficult struggle with nature and long life practice.

The earliest inventions are natural numbers. But they confined to distinguish increasing one or two. When people couldn’t count by using their own ten fingers, they began to use "stone count", "knot rope count" and "notch" and other counting method.

1.2.2 Counting Method

Archaeological evidence suggests that, although there are differences between regions and nations, the“one-to-one correspondence”approach is used in the use of counting methods. There are many other examples of this one-to-one correspondence, such as some American Indians who count the number of their enemies by collecting the scalp of each hunter; some African hunters accumulate the teeth of the wild boar to count the number of wild boars they catch; nomadic tribe girls who live in the slopes of Kilimanjaro used to wear copper rings in the neck, its quantity equals to their age. Almost all people seldom use fingers to count. In 1937, people found a thirty thousand in Czechoslovakia.

Many years ago, there were many crossovers engraved above the wolf bones. In the outskirts of Beijing’s outskirts, the archaeologists unearthed four bone traces with honed marks and found that they had a history of more than 10,000 years. The method of knotting (or note) is also used by many nations. For example, the South American Indiana knot rope approach is in a thick rope, tied to a lot of different colors of the string, and then hit the knot on the different knots, according to the rope color, knot the size and location Represents the number of different things. In the history of the journal, following the rope and characterization, people began to use language to express a certain number. Initially, these numbers are associated with certain specific objects, without a certain order. In the Malayan and Aztec languages, the numbers 1, 2 and 3 refer literally to a stone, two stones, three stones; in the language of the southern Pacific island of New York, the three Numbers literally mean a fruit, two fruit, three fruit; and the words of the three words in the Javanese is a grain, two grains, three grains. Perhaps because people both have five fingers and five toes, people often link hands and feet with “5”. In the Brazil tribe, people said four people died, two hands were abandoned, one foot was broken. Can you try to explain the above words?

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