TITLE:
On Value Orientation in China and the West as Reflected in Man Creation by Nuwa and by the God
AUTHORS:
Huan Yan, Haiyan Huang
KEYWORDS:
Man Creation Mythology, Value Orientation, Culture
JOURNAL NAME:
Creative Education,
Vol.9 No.15,
November
17,
2018
ABSTRACT: Value orientation refers to value tendency that people have when they take a certain action in a certain way on a certain occasion. It is an important part of culture. Studying value orientation in different cultures can help people understand the differences between cultures so as to facilitate the cross-cultural communication. Mythology is an important part of culture. Man Creation mythology is a category of mythology and it is about human beings’ thinking and interpretation of their origin. Value orientation in different cultures may originate from the Man Creation mythology of the respective cultures. In this paper, a comparative study of the value orientation between China and the west is made through comparing Man Creation by Nuwa in China and Man Creation by the God in the west and with regards to the characteristics of Chinese and western value orientation shown respectively in the two Man Creation mythologies. The study in this paper indicates that the two Man Creation mythologies reflect the differences in value orientation between China and the West on behavioral thinking, marriage relation and man-god relation. On behavioral thinking, Man Creation by Nuwa reflects emotionalism in China and Man Creation by the God reflects intellectualism in the West; on marriage relation, Chinese marriage is based on breeding offspring and western marriage is based on people’s emotional and physical needs; on man-god relation, it is praying for blessing and giving blessing in China, while it is showing repentance and accepting repentance in the West.