送礼习俗的变迁

苏州科技大学天平学院 英语1721 李恬静

The Change of Gift-giving Custom

Tianping College of Suzhou University of Science and Technology

English 1721, Li Tianjing

送礼行为其实是一个复杂的社会问题，人们以礼物的形式交往本身就有很丰富的社会含义，如表示友好、联络感情、互利互惠、扩大影响、加强合作等等，表明人的存在方式就是社会性的交往方式、共存方式。

Actually, gift-giving is a complex social issue. That people have association with each other by means of gifts contains abundant social meanings, such as friendliness, connection with one another, mutual benefit and reciprocity, expansion of influence, reinforcement of cooperation and so on, which indicates that the way of human existence is that of social contact and coexistence.

送礼并不是只存在于中国，是存在于所有社会的一个规律，只是中国人尤为重视。纵观中国人的一生，大概人人都送过礼，从出生、上学、参加工作、结婚生子、乔迁、事业升迁直到去世，无一不是以送礼开始与终结。所以，“送礼”本身似乎没有什么可说的，本不该有什么异议。然而，自古是礼仪之邦的中国，其“送礼”行为发展到今天，早已经成为一种市场交换行为而非自愿，已经完全变了味了。

Not only does gift-giving exist in China, but also in a law of all societies, which is, especially, attached great importance to by Chinese. Throughout the whole life of the Chinese, almost each person gives gift from his birth, school attendance, work, marriage, housewarming, promotion to death, beginning and end up with gift-giving with no exception. Henceforth, gift-giving, itself, seems to have nothing to talk about and shouldn’t have any objection. However, China is a nation of etiquette since ancient times and its gift-giving has already become a kind of involuntary market exchange until nowadays and changed entirely.

在中国当前这个转型期送礼涉及的“问题”很多。由于中国社会运转缺乏统一的规定，权力或资源拥有者具有非常灵活的空间。一件事可以这么办，也可以那么办，灵活度很大。由此产生了中国人办事求人、托人找关系的习俗，而送礼则成了实现这一目的的重要方式。想升官要给上级领导送礼，找工作要给老板送礼，学生上学要给老师送礼，商人做生意要给官员送礼，病人看病要给医生送礼，当事人打官司要给法官送礼。在中国，送礼不仅是家庭成员之间的流行传统，也是商业往来的传统，不过也为贿赂提供了理想的借口。谁会质疑节日的送礼呢？有人认为，中国超过八成的腐败事件首先是从节日期间送礼开始的。

Many “problems” are involved in gift-giving during the transformation period in China nowadays. For the lack of uniform rules of social operation in China, the owners of power and resources have a very flexible space. Affairs can be handled in this way or in that way, which is fairly elastic. As a result, such a custom is created that Chinese people turn to others for coping with affairs and connections, giving gifts becoming the vital approach to it. Giving gifts to the superior is for promotion, giving gifts to the boss is for work, giving gifts to the teacher is for students’ school attendance, giving gifts to the officer is for merchants’ business, giving gifts to the doctor is for consultation of patients, giving gifts to the judge is for lawsuit of parties . In China, giving gifts is not only a popular tradition among family members, but also a convention for commercial intercourse, which, however, provides an ideal excuse for bribery. Who will query the gift-giving in festivals? It is believed that more than 80 percent of corruption in China begins with giving gifts during the festivals.

中国人所受的馈赠及给他人的各种礼品，要比世界上任何一个国家的人都多得多，也超过了喜欢送礼出了名的邻国日本人。

The gifts Chinese receive and various gifts given to others are many more than those in any country of the world and more than those in the neighboring Japanese renowned for gift-giving.