文档介绍：parative Study of “Death” Euphemism between Chinese and English
1 Introduction
Death is the most terrible event to most human beings, which means the end of existence. As a consequence, it is a forbidden area in almost every culture. However, people must face it no matter whether they like it or not. To avoid mentioning directly the word "death", which probably will arouse unhappy feeling and frighten people, lots of euphemisms are created to substitute for it. This thesis uses "death euphemism" to stand for this category of euphemism for convenience.
John Gross (Enright, 1985:203) concluded, "Death, we are frequently told, has replaced sex as the great forbidden subject." Some death euphemisms mendatory meaning, such as to be in heaven, to be with God; some neutral, such as to go, to decease; still some derogatory, such as to crock, to kick the bucket. People are reluctant to accept the fact that the dead persons have left this world forever, and they employ various strategies to achieve their goal. Death is just like a rest or some other forms of non-consciousness, so the dead just close their eyes and fall asleep; death is a journey or a leaving from life to some specified or unspecified places, so the dead pass away and go to a better place or even are in the arms of Jesus; death is an imperative invitation from the authorities in the afterlife, so the dead receive the final summons and have to answer the call; death is a loss for those who know the dead, so the dead are no longer with us and are sadly missed; death is also an end, so the dead breathe their last and are no more.
Chinese death euphemisms are plicated due to the deep cultural connotations, for instance, death euphemisms can indicate not only people's attitude towards the dead, but also the identities of the dead.
Euphemism, for a long time, has been discussed by scholars as Fromkin (1988), Rawson (1981), Leech (1985),张拱贵(1996) etc. in their respective fields of research. Their study has been