摘 要

作为英国在位最长的君主，英国女王（伊丽莎白二世）已经成为英国的象征。每年圣诞节，英国女王都会发布圣诞致辞，和全国人民一同庆祝圣诞，这已成为英国文化中不可或缺的一部分。演讲中，女王除了会向大家分享圣诞的故事外，也回顾当年发生的重大事件并联系相关的历史事件外，引起了全国人民乃至全世界的注意。女王圣诞致辞的魅力体现在其具有历史厚重感和宗教特色，并且反映出了英国的社会价值观念，因而极具英国文化特色。

本文以当代英国女王（伊丽莎白二世）2013年至2015年三年的圣诞致辞为例，从历史、宗教和社会等几个角度对英国女王圣诞致辞进行文化解读，并对英国女王圣诞致辞的影响进行了分析。本文得出的结论是：英国女王圣诞致辞反映出了英国文化具有厚重的历史感、浓烈的宗教色彩和多样的社会价值观，且女王的圣诞致辞对英国有着深远的影响。对英国女王圣诞致辞的文化解读不仅可以促进英语的学习，同时也可以帮助人们了解英国的丰富文化，提高文化涵养并促进文化的多元发展。

关键词：英国女王；圣诞致辞；文化解读

Abstract

As the longest reigning monarch in British history, the British Queen (Elizabeth II) has become the symbol of Britain. On every Christmas day, the British Queen shall deliver a Christmas Speech to celebrate Christmas with the whole nation, which has become an indispensable part of British culture. Besides sharing the Christmas stories, the Queen also reflects the current significant events, associates relevant historical events, catching attention of the whole nation and even the whole world. The charm of the Queen’s Christmas speeches lies in the historical depth and religious features and reflects the social values of Britain. Therefore, the Queen’s Speeches are typical of British culture.

Based on the British Queen’s (Elizabeth II) Christmas Speeches from 2013 to 2015, the paper makes an interpretation of British culture from the perspective of history, religion and society, and analyzes the influences of the Christmas Speeches. This paper shows that the British culture reflected in the Queen’s Christmas Speeches are typical of historical depth, strong religious colors and diverse social values. The Christmas speeches have a profound impact on Britain. The research of British cultural connotation reflected in the Queen’s Christmas Speeches can not only promote people’s English study, but also help people appreciate the endless charm of British culture, improve their cultural deposits and promote the development of multi-cultures.

Key Words: British Queen; Christmas speech; cultural interpretation

Contents

1 Introduction 1

1.1 Background of the Study 1

1.2 Significance of the Study 1

2 Literature Review 3

2.1 Previous Studies on the Related Topic 3

2.2 Definition of Culture 4

3 Cultural Interpretations of Christmas Speeches by British Queen 5

3.1 From the Perspective of History 5

3.2 From the Perspective of Religion 6

3.3 From the Perspective of Society 8

4 Influences of British Queen’s Christmas Speeches 10

5 Conclusions 12

References 13

Appendix A 14

Appendix B 16

Appendix C 18

Acknowledgements 20

Study on the Cultural Interpretations of Christmas Speeches by the British Queen

——A Case Study of the Queen’s Christmas Speeches from 2013-2015

1 Introduction

1.1 Background of the Study

“Language, which can reflect historical and cultural background, lifestyle, social values and traditions of a nation, is the carrier of culture and the reflection of society”（Bao, 2011, p.116）. On every Christmas day, the British Queen shall deliver a Christmas Speech to celebrate Christmas, invigorate the whole nation and strengthen the national sense of unity and pride. The charm of the Speeches lies in the historical depth, religious features and reflection of social values, which catches the attention of the whole world. Due to the solemnity and significance of the Queen, the Christmas Speeches by the British Queen are representative examples to interpret British culture. Against that backdrop, this paper makes a cultural interpretation of the Christmas Speeches by the present British Queen (Elizabeth II) from 2013 to 2015 from the perspective of history, religion and society.

1.2 Significance of the Study

With the development of the economic and social globalization, the world is becoming more and more closely connected, which in turn promotes the exchange of bilateral economy and culture. On one hand, the interpretation of British culture can promote our English study. As is known to all, learning a language does not just refer to the study of basic language knowledge and skills, it also includes the study of its culture. The learners can communicate with others in another language with basic language skills, but cannot engage in deep communication concerning culture. A majority of English learners just achieve a superficial understanding of the speeches when getting access to them but without full understanding of their implications. The Queen cites many historical events and religious expressions, which are the traditional culture of Britain and objectively increasing the difficulty in understanding the Speeches for foreign listeners. Understanding British culture will no doubt accelerate the speed of learning English. On the other hand, it can help people appreciate the endless charm of British culture, improve people’s cultural deposits and promote the multicultural development. The Christmas speeches are the epitome of British culture and reflect the cultural features from various aspects, such as history, religion and society. In the process of accumulating abundant culture, it can broaden people’s horizon and open their mind to allow the combination of different cultures. Discarding the dross and selecting the essence can enrich the native culture and promote the development of Chinese culture.

2 Literature Review

2.1 Previous Studies on the Related Topic

Public speech is a way of communication aiming at communicating with a large number of people and with specific purposes. “Public speech is speech to a group of people in a structured, deliberate manner intended to inform, influence, or entertain the listeners” (Lucas, 2011, p.5). In the process, the speaker can decide to use the topics, structure and expressions. One essential point which needs to pay attention to is that the English native speaker often refers to some historical or contemporary events and cites allusions or Bible to illustrate his or her own view more explicitly and make his or her words more persuasive, thus enhancing the profoundness of speeches.

The recent study on culture of speeches is Xing Yuan’s To Interpret Bush’s Speech in Tsinghua University from the Social and Cultural Level. She finds out the social culture of Americans from Bush’s Speech and interprets it from five aspects: social values, legal knowledge, religious culture, family values and community spirit (Xing, 2014). In the Cultural Interpretation of Obama’s Inaugural Address, Meng Xianyin explores the relationship between inaugural address and sermons and concludes that the inaugural address is the secularization of Bible doctrines, the manifestation of American believes and affirmation of American multicultural movement(Meng, 2011). Xu Ji does an analysis of core values and the American political characteristics from Kennedy’s inaugural address. Xu Ji reaches her conclusion that freedom, human rights and dominating the world are the beliefs and social values of America (Xu, 2010).

As public speeches involve many elements of linguistics such as stylistics, structures, language and rhetorical devices, many studies are carried out from the perspective of linguistics. Qian Hongyang’s Study of Metaphors in Queen’s Christmas Broadcasts analyzes the application and function of metaphors (Qian, 2015). In the Analysis of Cohesive Devices in the Queen’s Christmas Broadcast 2014 from the Perspective of Metafunction, Chen Xiaojing studies the characteristics of cohesive devices and semantic relation (Chen, 2015). Yuan Junhong employs lexical structure and grammar classification to analyze the lexical traits (Yuan, 2014). Li Xiaojuan carries out a quantitative study of the grammatical features of the sixty Christmas Speeches broadcast by Elizabeth II(Li, 2014). Xu Changcui does the research from the application of systemic-functional grammar in the Queen’s Christmas Broadcast 2010 and demonstrates the function of systemic-functional grammar in public speech (Xu, 2011).

In summary, studies on culture of public speeches are not difficult to find and studies on the Queen’s Christmas Speeches are mainly carried out from linguistic perspective such as systemic functional perspective, cohesive devices aspect and conceptual metaphor. However, there are few studies combining the Queen’s Christmas Speeches and British culture. Therefore, this paper is to make a cultural interpretation of the Queen’s Christmas Speeches.

2.2 Definition of Culture

The definition of culture has always been a hot topic for scholars studying culture. Because there are diverse schools of scholars with different opinions and the background of making a definition of culture is also complex, the definitions of culture present a diversified state. Therefore, the paper only introduces several representative definitions.

As the first one defining culture, E.B.Tylor’s definition is quite classic. He defines culture as “culture is that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society.”(Tylor, 2010, p.1). Because culture is abstract, the definition cannot cover all aspects of culture by listing the several aspects as shown in the definition. Dai Weidong also makes a definition of culture:“In a broad sense, it means integrated pattern of human knowledge, belief and behavior that is both a result of and integral to the human capacity for learning and transmitting knowledge to succeeding knowledges”(Dai, 2013, p.125). The two definitions have overlapped parts, but they there are some differences. Eugene Nida divides culture into five parts: “ecological culture, material culture, social culture, religious culture and linguistic culture” (Nida, 1993, p.91).

Those definitions of culture indicate some aspects of culture. The most obvious features of the three speeches are the mention of historical events, expressions of religion, typical social values and royal system, thus culture reflected in the Queen’s Christmas Speeches can be interpreted with the combination of the definitions of Eugene Nida and E.B.Tylor. As historical events carry the memory of past and become an essential part of knowledge, they can be regarded as part of British culture. Therefore, the paper makes an interpretation of British culture from the perspective of history, religion and society.