【正文】 Britannica, 2021) 2 Culture has played a crucial role in human evolution, allowing human beings to adapt the environment to their own purposes rather than depend solely on natural selections to achieve adaptive success. Every human society has its own particular culture, or social cultural system. Cultural differences distinguish one society from another. As one of the integrated parts of culture, taboos can distinguish different countries as well. The Definition and Origin of Taboos Taboos, which is also written as tabu or tapu, is of Polynesian origin and was first noted by Capital James Cook during his 1771 visit to Tonga. In his account of visit, Cook wrote, “Not one of them would sit down or eat a bit of anything… On expressing my surprise at this, they were all taboos, as they said.” After he introduced it into English, this word has traveled as widely as Cook himself and is now used throughout the Englishspeaking world, meaning ban or prohibition on something that is regarded for religious or other reasons as not to be done, touched, used, etc. (Wan Jianzhong, 2021) It was said that a taboo could be placed on an object, a person, a place, or a word that was believed to have inherent power above the ordinary. This power was called mana, which could only be approached by special priests. Often the mana of a taboo is so great that the offender will suffer punishment, even death, merely through fear of its power. In fact, taboos derived from fear of mysterious power, from the experience that human beings struggle against the nature and also from the social customs that people develop in their munications in the long run. Characteristics of Taboos Primitiveness In primitive society, low level of social productive forces led to people’s limitations on cognition. With regard to taboos, the theme of primitive culture, people’s cognition upon it was characterized by subjectivity, backwardness and blindness. When facing the great and mysterious nature, people had no choices but plunged into the primitive, blind nature worship. Mystery This characteristic of taboos stemmed from people’s confusion over various natural 3 phenomena. They used their own imaginations to intensify the mystery and sanctity. Actually, there is no need for people to ask what essence of taboo is because talking about taboos has bee a taboo. The mystery of taboo made itself exert great restrictive influence on human society. Restraint Taboos, like laws, have built an insurmountable obstacle in people’s heart and mand people’s behaviors as a silent order. Initially, the breaking of a taboo usually required extermination of the offender or some sorts of ceremonial purification. Later, groups or teams shouldered the responsibility of the punishment. Modern taboos, to some extent, have bee the social psychology to restrict people’ behavior. This restraint is beyond the reach of power from religion, moral and laws. Inheritability Taboos have been passed on from generation to generation. Although being considered as a kind of culture without elegance, they widely exist in social psychology and people’s spirits. The blindness and mystery of taboos provided the premise and foundation for its inheritability. Chapter III Specific Differences of Taboos between Chinese and Western Cultures Taboos on Food and Drinks Taboo food and drinks are food and drinks which people abstain from consuming for religious or cultural reasons. In China, there is hardly taboo food except some special food of minority ethnic groups。 the turtle is just a slowmoving and not very attractive creature. Dragon is the totem of Chinese nation, and occasionally appears in traditional Chinese designs. As an auspicious creature that supposedly brings good luck, the dragon gives rise to the saying that parents“望子成龍” —longing to see one’s son bee a dragon, that is, be successful. To westerners, however, the dragon is often a symbol of evil, a fierce monster that destroys and therefore must be destroyed. Several stories of saints or heroes deal with struggles against the monsters, which in most cases are slain in the end. (Deng Yanchang and Liu Runqing, 2021) It’s obvious that we often connect certain qualities with certain creatures or objects. These qualities often arouse taboos. Realizing the differences of connotations of animals between China and the West will help us lower the tension level in intercultural munications. Taboos on Numbers and Dates In daily life, people prefer some numbers or dates, thinking that they could bring happiness or good fortune, while dislike others which could bring about bad lucks. Thus some numbers and dates gradually bee taboos. Chinese people believe that picking the right number can affect one’s fortune. As a result, most of us deliberately avoid hotel room number or telephone number like “4” because it sound similar to“死” (death) in Chinese. Consequently, Thursday is also disliked as a taboo date. “6”, “8” are lucky numbers to Chinese people for “6” is associated with“順” (advancing smoothly) and “8” with“發(fā)” (prosperity). Numbers such as “3”, “9” are also considered good numbers that, when bined appropriately 10 with “6”, “8” or other numbers can contribute to Chinese people’s fortunes and destiny. A bination of good numbers include “1388” (sounds similar to prosperity in one’s lifetime in Chinese), “168” (sounds similar to prosperity all the way) and “998” (sounds similar to prosperity for a long time). In western countries, most people consider the number “13” unlucky. Therefore, things connected with “13” are too avoided such as the 13th day of the month, especially if it is a Friday, the 13th floor, 13 dinner guests and so on. The negativity of the number “13” is predominantly thought to have been derived from the