Abstract：Food is an indispensable part of human beings’ lives, existence and development, and the diet culture is an essential factor in evaluating a nation’s cultural connotation. Diet culture is closely related to national culture; different nations and countries generate different diet cultures which result from diverse social development, thinking and philosophy of Chinese and Western countries. China’s long history of more than 2000 years has created countless brilliant civilization, under these cultural heritage, making China’s diet culture rich and splendid, broad and profound. While, the western countries have a scientific and sophisticated diet civilization of its own system. Compared to China’s harmonious ideas since ancient times—“the Unity of Man and Nature”, which emphasizes sense impression and intuitive thought — the western countries focus on rational diet concepts on the basis of nutrition, which uphold logic and pay attention to science. This paper will study the feature of harmony and science reflected respectively by the two diet cultures, try to reveal the reasons for these differences and achieve mastery though a comprehensive study of the subject. This will not only promote people to accept western diet cultures actively, mastering the characteristics of their own nation’s culture on the basis of seeking common points while reserving differences, but also efficiently avoid incomprehension and misunderstanding in communication of both sides due to cultural differences, making international communication going on appropriately and promoting the development of the whole human beings’ diet cultures.

Keywords: dietary culture; harmony; science; differences

Contents

摘要

Abstract

Chapter 1 The Different Concepts Between the Chinese Diet and Western Diet-1

1.1 The Harmony Thought of Chinese Food Culture-1

1.2 Food and Health-1

1.3 Rational Diet in the Western Culture-2

1.4 Weight-conscious Food Culture-2

Chapter 2 The Different Content Between the Chinese and Western Diet-3

2.1 The Differences of Staple Food-3

2.1.1The Main Food for Chinese-3

2.1.2The Main Food for Westerners-3

2.2 The Differences of Utensils-4

2.2.1 The Use of Chopsticks-4

2.2.2 The Use of A Couple of Knife and Fork-5

2.3 The Different Cooking Rules between the Chinese and Western Diet-5

2.3.1 The Exquisite Cooking and Arbitrary Rule-5

2.3.2 Standard Operation in the Western Food Culture-6

Chapter 3 The Different Values Reflected in Chinese Food Culture and Western Food Culture-9

3.1 Collectivism-9

3.2 Individualism-9

Chapter 4 Findings and Conclusions-11

4.1 The Integration of Chinese and Western Food Cultures-11

4.2 Implications for the Chinese Diet-11

References-13

Acknowledgments-14