Dogging Around China |
Paul Swift I think the dog is a good place to start a dialogue on differing perceptions in the West and China. We relate to dogs in interesting ways. Thus, when Chinese made dog food results in the deaths of pets in the West, it causes an uproar. And the lingering, perhaps fictitious, tale of a sign in the 1920s outside a park in Shanghai reserved for Westerners which read “no dogs and Chinese allowed,” for the Chinese points to a century of humiliation at the hands of Western imperialism.
Traditionally, Chinese had an opinion of our canine friends that was much different than ours today. To Chinese, a dog’s tendency to bark at coming strangers and bare its sharp teeth was one that was at odds with the more communal nature of Chinese culture. And just as our language reflects the ways in which we view dogs, Chinese does as well. In Chinese we see that dogs could be seen harbingers of the disorderly, perhaps because their position as guard dogs who would bark at times of disturbance. Hence there are saying like 鸡犬不宁.
Of course, in China nowadays raising dogs as a pet like we would in the West is quite common. And Chinese talk of their beloved dog (爱犬), or of the faithfulness like a dog in service: 效犬马之劳. And if you go to Beijing, Shanghai, or any other large city in China today you will see people walking their dogs almost everywhere you go. And so, like so many other things in contemporary China, the image of the dog is one that is in flux. With the coming of Western ideas and lifestyles, the old is mixing with the new, and much of the old is being thrown out. But its vestiges remain in the language that is still used everyday in China.
养狗 yǎng gǒu : to raise a dog 遛狗 liú gǒu: to take a dog for a walk 鸡犬不宁jī quǎn bù níng: pandemonium; general turmoil 嫁狗随狗jià gǒu suí gǒu: if you marry a dog you half to follow him 猪狗不如 zhū gǒu bù rú: worse than pigs and dogs 钻狗洞zuān gǒu dòng: (derogatory) do evil things 爱犬ài quǎn: a beloved dog 效犬马之劳xiào quǎn mǎ zhī láo: serve somebody faithfully |
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In English we say that dogs are “man’s best friend,” exposing not only our conception of friendship as one of loyalty and safekeeping, but also a sexism rooted in our language (“man’s” best friend). We see dogs as loving of those that they know and wary of those they don’t—just the way they ought to be. And yet at the same time we say that a man is “a dog”, meaning uncivilized and selfish. Our conceptions of our canine friends are mixed.
They could also be seen in a similar light as we see dogs when we say that a man is acting “like a dog” (womanizing, drinking, and generally wreaking havoc): 嫁狗随狗, 猪狗不如, 钻狗洞 are all sayings that reflect this conception of the canine. 