Abstract

China and Britain are main tea drinking countries, but tea cultures have obvious differences. This thesis conducts a cross-cultural comparative study on tea cultures between China and Britain. The thesis firstly shows us the history of Chinese and British tea culture. The key part compares tea cultures from three cultural levels – material level, behavioral level and psychological level to introduce the classification of tea, tea environment, tea customs, tea etiquette, tea ceremony etc. Through the comparison, it summarizes the characteristics of tea ceremony in Chinese and British tea culture. Tea culture has deeply influenced the Chinese and British culture, the article then introduces the influences of tea culture on language usages and literary works. At last, facing the different tea cultures, the paper makes a conclusion to develop our own tea culture under the background of globalization environment.

Keywords: tea culture; China; Britain; cross-cultural

Contents

Abstract

摘要

1. Introduction-1

2. Literature Review-2

2.1 Previous Studies on Tea-2

2.2 The Definition of Tea Culture-3

3. Comparison between Chinese Tea Culture and British Tea Culture-4

3.1 From Material Level-4

3.2 From Behavioral Level-6

3.3 From Psychological Level-7

4. The Influences of Tea Culture on Chinese and English-9

4.1 Tea Culture and Related Idioms-9

4.2 Tea Culture in Literature Works-10

5. Conclusion-12

Works Cited-13