A Contrastive Study On English And Chinese Neologisms

Language is the most essential tool in the activities of human beings. Vocabulary is the most active component of language, and neologism is the part of vocabulary reflecting new things, new concepts, new thoughts, new experiences or new problems in written or spoken languages. Neologism not only witnesses the fast development of science and technology, but also testimonies the great changes that have taken place in the area of politics, economy, society and culture around the world. In this way, neologism has aroused the great attention of many contemporary linguists and certainly has become one of the hotspot of their research. On the basis of searching for abundant English and Chinese neologisms during the recent 20 years, the author makes a comprehensive contrastive analysis of English and Chinese neologisms from different perspectives, and expounds the relationship between neologism and culture.The thesis is composed of five chapters:Chapter one serves as an introduction, covering the motivation, the methodology, the organization of the thesis, as well as a brief survey of the existing literature on the subject.Chapter two "A General Survey of Neologism" is concerned with the definition and classification of neologism, importance of neologism in language, some characteristic features of neologism and the main reasons for the creation of neologism.Chapter three "Origins of English and Chinese Neologisms" analyzes the origins of English and Chinese neologisms. There are mainly three types:â‘ creating new words by word-formation;â‘¡borrowing from other languages;â‘¢semantic change (old words taking on new meaning). In Chinese, there is another special type: from dialects. Chapter four "Neologism and Culture" dwells on the relationship among vocabulary, language and culture, and analyzes the similarities and differences of the main cultural features reflected in English and Chinese neologism.Chapter five is a conclusion, bringing the thesis to an end.