A Cross-cultural Study: Semantic Orientations of English and Chinese Surnames

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A Cross-cultural Study: Semantic Orientations of English and Chinese Surnames

Journal of Zhejiang University, 2003

SHENG Yue-dong, HUANG Jian-bin

Abstract: The surname acts as a special literal code of one’s family system. In sociolinguists’ opinion, the surname represents its holder’s family and a certain social structure, and helps identify different members in the structure. As far as its occurrence, evolution and development are concerned, the surname has undergone three historic stages: totem, drawing and character, which, in sociologists’ eyes, correspond with three social conformations: clan, tribe and society. The anthroponomastic research discloses to a greater extent that the surname has its special meaning and it not only shows its inventor’s conceptions，ideology, culture, religions, social customs and characteristics, but also contains some implications of social changes and different ways of thinking. It directly or indirectly shows the national history and culture. Historically, the Chinese were the first to adopt surnames to honor their forebears while the English surname, which came into being comparatively later, develops fastest in the modern times. The etymological and sociolinguistic research into English and Chinese surnames of various kinds indicates that, although they belong to different language systems, they share lots of similarities in their surnames’ semantic orientations, which results from their human nature and common-sense knowledge. It is easy to see that plenty of English and Chinese surnames are derived from the names of living areas, housing locations, working places, local places with certain geographic features, occupations, older generations or seniorities, official positions or status, celebrities, tribes, religions, immigrations, animals or plants. Nevertheless, English and Chinese forebears lived in different tribes or areas and they were greatly influenced by various elements, which contributed to their differences in tribes, society, politics, economy, history, culture, ideology, religion, tradition, aesthetic view, values and social customs. Such differences bring on their own nationalized features of surnames’ semantic orientations. Therefore, it could be found that English surnames came from independent stems, compound words, nicknames or bi-surnames that are the blend of husband-wife given names or family names. On the other hand, many Chinese surnames came from the words that stand for the names obliged by Son of Heaven, date of death, dynasty, eldership, position in the family hierarchy, immigration, superstition, religion, numeral, quantifier, age and brother’s or sister’s sequence, etc. There are also bi-surnames in Chinese, which blend the first and second syllabuses of immigrated surnames. In addition, before Zhou Dynasty, some Chinese surnames even had a shi，which showed the person’s social status, political or economical power. In brief, by studying the semantic orientation of English and Chinese surnames, we can get some knowledge of history and cultures and know the origination of our families, ideological and psychological features of forebears and different characteristics of different tribes or nations.

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