428 VINH UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES TRAN THI NHUNG IDIOMS OF COMPARISON IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE RELATED TO ANIMALS GRADUATION THESIS Vinh, May 2015 i VINH UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES IDIOMS OF COMPARISON IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE RELATED TO ANIMALS GRADUATION THESIS FIELD: LINGUISTIC Student : Tran Thi Nhung Class : 52B2 - English Supervisor : Tran Ba Tien, Ph.D Vinh, May 2015 ACKNOWLEDEMENT ii First of all, I would also like to extend my sincere thanks to all teachers at the Foreign Languages Department, Vinh University who had provided the great amount of theoretical and practical knowledge for me during four years and gave me an opportunity and the best conditions to this study It is my honor and good fortune to be one of English major students at Vinh university In addition, I want to take this opportunity to say thank to my supervisor, D.r Tran Ba Tien, Department Chair Professor of English, Vinh University I am grateful to him for transfering his precious experience and sharing his knowledge with me From finding an appropriate subject in the beginning to the process of writing thesis, D.r Tran Ba Tien offers his unreserved help and guidance and lead me to finish my thesis step by step Without his kind and patient instruction, it is impossible for me to finish this thesis Besides, I am deeply indebted to my beloved family for their wholehearted support and encouragement I also would like to dedicate my special thanks to my friends, who have supported, cooperated and provided me with valuable suggestions They are busy with their own thesis and work, but they are willing to give their helping hands as soon as I am in need The simple phrase, “thank you”, cannot present how much their friendship means to me Finally, I cannot fully express my gratitude to all the people whose direct and indirect support assisted me to accomplish my thesis in time For the completid this thesis, I have been fortunate to receive invaluable the help from many people Vinh, May, 2015 Student: Tran Thi Nhung iii TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDEMENT i PART A: INTRODUCTION 1 Rational of the study .1 Aims of the study .2 Objective of the study Scope of the study .2 Methods of the study Orgnanization of the study PART B DEVELOPMENT Chapter I: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 1.1 Review of previous study 1.1.1 Previous studies of English idioms in foreign countries 1.1.2 Previous studies of English and Vietnamese idioms in Vietnam 1.2 Theoretical backgrougd 1.2.1 Definition of idioms 1.2.2 Classification of Idioms 1.2.3 Features of English and Vietnamese Idioms .12 1.2.4 Relation between Idioms and Culture 15 1.3 Idioms and other Language Units 16 1.3.1 Idioms and Phrases 16 1.3.2 Idioms and Collocations 16 1.3.3 Idioms and Proverbs 17 Chapter II : FINDING AND DISCUSSION .18 2.1 Idioms of Comparison in English and Vietnamese: Contrastive Analysis 18 2.2 Idioms with Animals in English .25 2.3 Idioms with Animals in Vietnamese 27 2.4 Contrastive analysis of Idioms with Animals in English and Vietnamese 29 2.5 The cross-culture differences 31 PART C: CONCLUSION 36 REFERENCES 38 APPENDIX 40 ii PART A: INTRODUCTION Rational of the study In the world today, there are many languages, of which English is the most widely used Approximately, 350 million people speak English as their first language and the same number use it as a second language In Vietnam, English has been considered as a tool of international communication, and the need of learning English is becoming and more urgent It can't be denied that all foreign learners in general and Vietnamese learners in particular desire to master English as the native speakers; however, they usually face a lot of difficulties that prevent them from gaining successful conversations One of the reasons for these problems is in the way people perceive and use idioms Idioms are used regularly and naturally in everyday communication, however, the inner meaning of the concept of idioms is still unclear to a lot of people Therefore, I think a study on the subject of idioms in Vietnamese and English is helpful for improving the knowledge of language learners, as well as the students learning English in general The idioms is not only a particular lexical item - an important part of the language but also reflects the cultural characteristics of each ethnic As far as you know, idiomatic expressions make English become colorful and full of vitality, so they are often used very much in the native speakers„ speech and in the writing such as news, songs, movies, etc However, these idioms are sometimes are not easy to understand and study their meanings Both English and Vietnamese languages are rich in images and have a lot of idioms And idioms using the images of animals take a large portion Both cultures share the same capabilities of thought, the same laws of cognition and a common, universal morality Moreover, some animals have the same important role in people‟s lives in the two cultures, and have the same attributes and features Therefore, we have a large number of similar idioms related to animals, both in the form and in the message So as a student of the foreign languages department at Vinh University, this urges me to conduct the thesis entitled “Idioms of Comparision in English and Vietnamese related to animals”, to find out the semantic and syntactic features of idioms in English and Vietnamese and find out the similarities and differences between them To some extent, I hope the result of the study can help Vietnamese learners of English use English idioms effectively in communication so that their speech is more adequate, natural, interesting and imaginative Aims of the study The first aim is to identify the similarities and differences between animal related idioms in Vietnamese and English The second aim is to explore their idiomatic meanings in English and Vietnamese Another aim is to gain a deeper understanding about the cultural contrast between the two languages The next aim is to help translating idioms Student will have some certain materials to learn and use them Then we also give some suggestion to teach and translate idioms The last aim is to provide a collection of English and Vietnamese idioms Objective of the study With the aims mentioned above, the study tries to reach the following objectives: - Investigating stylistic and semantic features of English and Vietnamese idioms related to animals - Finding out the similarities and differences between English and Vietnamese related to animals - Making some suggestions for teaching, learning and translating of English and Vietnamese idioms Scope of the study We all know that idioms are extensively used by a large range of speakers in both languages - English and Vienamese However, we have no ambition to cover the idioms as well as all kinds of idioms Because the time as well as ability is limited, this study focuses on analyzing typical idioms with animal which express Vietnamese and English cultures Methods of the study The first step was that I searched English and Vietnamese comparative idioms related to animals as many as possible, a list of which can be found in the appendix Because, the study describes and compare the syntactic, semantic features of idioms related to animals in English versus Vietnamese and then withdraw some implications for the teaching and learning of English and Vietnamese as a foreign language In order to achieve these aims and objectives, the descriptive and comparative methods are utilized The descriptive method is used to describe in details the syntactic and semantic features through the examples of idioms related to animals collected from references, books, stories, novels, dictionaries and Internet websites In addition, the comparative method could be used to identify the similarities and differences in the syntactic and semantic features of idioms related to animals in English versus Vietnamese In short, with the combination of the descriptive and contrastive methods, syntactic and semantic similarities as well as differences of English and Vietnamese idioms related to animals could be discovered Orgnanization of the study The thesis comprises of three main parts: The first part is Introduction This part presents the rationale, the aims, objective, the scope, the methods and the organization of the study The second part is Development This part is divided into two chapters The first chapter is literature review and theoretical back ground of the study The seconds chapter is the finding and discussion of the study The last part is Conclusion and some suggestions for teaching and learning English Idioms This part comprises of the conlusion, the implication the limitation and suggestion for further study PART B DEVELOPMENT Chapter I LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 1.1 Review of previous study 1.1.1 Previous studies of English idioms in foreign countries Idioms are an mportant factor in the speech of English native speakers as well as other foreign language speakers Therefore, they has become an interest of a great number of language researchers In English, we can mentions some writers and linguists since the 1950s such as W.Mc.Mordie (1954), V.II.Collins (1958), Robert J.Dixon(1971), D.A.Cruse (1987) In fact, idiom is not a new subject in lingustic study A traditional view of idioms is homophonous with grammatically well-formed transparent expressions, which is in “Lexical semantics” (1987), Cruse We can also say that, idioms have attracted many language researchers all over the world They are an important factor in native - lilke discourse by Enghlish as well as a foreign language speaker There are some important books such as “Idioms Organization” by Wright “The American Heritage Dictionnary of Idioms” by Ammer or “Oxford Dictionary of Enghlish Idioms” by Jenifer Speake It provides learners with updated idioms including clear explanations in typical contexts What is more, there is also in “Essential Idioms in English”, by Dixon, or “Idioms for Everyday use” by Broukal, M and so on 1.1.2 Previous studies of English and Vietnamese idioms in Vietnam For some recent decades, Vietnam idioms have been recognized, collected and explained systematically In Vietnames, idioms have attracted the intention of many Vietnamese researchers Đỗ Hữu Châu analyzes Vietnamses idioms and show their semantic and syntactic features in “ Từ vựng, ngữ pháp Tiếng Việt” Moreover, in “Thành ngữ, tục ngữ lược giải ”, Nguyễn Trần Thu explains the meanings of the most common idioms and proverbs in such simple, clear ways that learners can see this book for consulting and reference purposes Besides, there have been a great number of collections of Vietnamese idioms such as: “Từ ngữ, tục ngữ Việt Nam ” by Đặng Hồng Chương, “1575 thành ngữ, tục ngữ cần bàn thêm” by Lê Gia In addition,“Thành Ngữ Tục Ngữ Việt Nam Chọn Lọc” by Trần Quang Mân, “Từ Điển Thành Ngữ Anh Việt” by Lã Thành, “Từ Điển Thành Ngữ Tiếng Anh” by Vĩnh Bá, Hoàng Văn Hành with “Thành Ngữ Học Tiếng Việt” However, up to now, there have been no more studies on idioms This is reason why this study come into being investigated in an attempt to focus on semantic and syntatic feature of idioms in Enghlish and Vietnamese 1.2 Theoretical backgrougd 1.2.1 Definition of idioms Idioms is a combination of stable words both in English and Vietnamese such as “Friend in need is a friend in deed, see eye to eye, ngựa đau tàu bỏ cỏ, gần mực đen gần đèn rạng, etc” Up to now, there are many definitions of idioms in English and Vietnamese such as: According to Oxford Dictionary of Enghlish Idioms, “An idiom is a word or phrase which means something different from what is says” According to Jenifer and W.Mc Mordie in English idiom and How to Use, “An indiom is a number of words which, taken together, mean something different from the individual words of the idiom when they stand alone” Besides, In the Oxford Advanced Leanner‟s Dictionary of Current English (Oxford University Press-1995) difines idioms as “An idiom is a phase or sentense whose meaning is not clear from the meaning of its individual words and which must be learnt as a whole unit” Next, in the Cambridge dictionary of America Idioms, “An idiom is a word or phase whose meaning is different from the meanings of each word considered separately These phrases have a fixed form - they usually cannot be changed - and they are often informal, but they can also be slang, or even slightly” To sum up, in English, an idiom is a turn of phrase which may seem incomprehensible to someone who is not familiar with the language in which it is spoken As a general rule, popular sayings are often idioms However, Idioms are also very difficult to translate On the other hand, in Vietnamese, Hồ Lê refers “An idiom is a word combination which has stable structure and figurative meaning and is used to describe an image, a paenomenon, a characteristic, or a state” Furthermore, Đái Xuân Ninh defines “An idiom is a set expression whose constituents lose their independence to some extent and combine into a rather complete and stable unit” Idioms in both English and Vietnamese are structurally and lexically closely combined phrases are whose meanings are completely different from their component parts Besides, we cannot modify, add, extract or replace their components without breaking or distorting the core meaning However, with the aims of syntactic and semantic analysis of idioms in both English and Vietnamese, I mainly base on the definition given by Cruse, idioms are defined as “Fixed phrases, consisting of more than one word, with meanings that cannotbe inferrer from the meanings of individual words” 1.2.2 Classification of Idioms 1.2.2.1 Classification of English Idioms Some authors have classified English idioms into topic groups and countries They have also listed the amount of idioms belonging to each topic or country a Idioms by topic Animals: the birds and the bees Body and bodily functions: at arm’s length Buildings and construction: to drive someone up the wall Character and appearance: as cold as ice Children and babies: like a kid in a candy store Clothes: at the drop of a hat Colours: black and white Death: at death’s door Drinking and pubs: to turn water in to wine Drugs: close but no cigar Food: as cool as a cucumber Furniture and household fittings: to cut a rug Gambling: to go for broke 2.3.9 Monkey When denoting to human, monkey also represents bad qualities It is used for: a grimacer (Nhăn khỉ) a person with bad behaviors (khỉ lại khỉ, mèo hoàn mèo) a cunning person (Khinh khỉ mắc ñộc già) an incompetent person who have high position (Khỉ ngồi bàn ñộc) 2.3.10 Chicken The Vietnamese deal with chickens a lot in their daily life There are mumerous idioms and proverb relating to “Gà” and it is used in many comparisons The connotative meanings are related to: human‟s characters, appearance, state and emotions (Đông đám gà chọi, Nhác nháo gà phải cáo, Rối gà mắt đẻ) 2.3.11 Dog Dogs in Vietnamese culture are watchdogs, not pets They not bear positive connotation In the following idioms, dog‟s image is used to: - compare with human‟s intellect, emotions, actions and etc (e.g Bẩn chó, Như chó với mèo, Làm chó trốn con) 2.3.12 Pig The Vietnamese people compare their bad characteristics with the pig and usually these comparisons are insults These characteristics include : dirtiness (Ở dơ heo) fatness (Mập heo) stupidness (Ngu heo ) 2.4 Contrastive analysis of Idioms with Animals in English and Vietnamese Like in many other languages, idioms in Vietnamese and English use a lot of simile, metaphor with animals‟ images Most of those animals are familiar to human Among them, domestic animals such as dogs, cats, mice, chicken, ducks, and cows… take a large portion Then comes the typical animals in the wild such as foxes, rabbits, lions, tigers, fish, and birds … Maybe those points are also the common points for idioms in most languages in the world We often foist some characteristics of human beings on animals Lakoff and Turner (1989, p: 193-194) present different metaphorical schemas that show how we 29 conceive animals, and how we apply this folk knowledge to the construction of metaphorical schemas According to them, the domain of animal life is one of the most elaborate ones, which we use to understand the human domain And people from different cultures may have idioms that use the same image of animals and carry the same message The reason for this might be that some animals have the same important role in people‟s lives in these two cultures, and have the same attributes and features We have the same metaphors: Pig person who is dirty, messy and eat too much Fox clever person Dog and cat enemies Cat and mouse the bully and the weaker E.g.1: to pig it (ở dơ heo), to make a pig of oneself (ăn heo) E.g.2: as cunning as a fox (ranh cáo) E.g.3: argue like cat and dog (cải chó với mèo) E.g.4: cat and mouse game (trò mèo vờn chuột) a The same expressions As we all know, human beings have similar capabilities of thought, similar laws of cognition So, looking closer to the idioms in English and Vietnamese we can see there are even more equivalent idioms that have amazing similarities in images, form and implied messages For example: - bookworm: mọt sách - crocodile tears: nước mắt cá sấu - a barking dog seldom bite: chó sủa thường không cắn - a dog is valiant at his own door: chó cậy gần nhà - a cock is valiant on his own dunghill: gà cậy gần chuồng - to fish in trouble water: thừa nước đục thả câu - even a worm will turn: giun xéo quằn - water off a duck’s back: nước đổ đầu vịt b Different expressions having close meaning There are some idioms that carry the same messages but contain different images of animals Although their equivalents are different in expression and show different 30 perspectives, they are similar in meaning Followed are some illustrations from Lê and Trầm (1986): - birds of a feather flock together: ngưu tầm ngưu, mã tầm mã (p 35) - every bird loves to hear himself sing: mèo khen mèo dài đuôi (p 44) - fine feathers make fine birds: gà tốt mã lông (p 49) - a living dog is better than a dead lion: người sống, đống vàng (p 25) - when the cat’s away, the mice will play: vắng chủ nhà gà vọc niêu tôm (p 98) And from some other sources: - eat like a bird: ăn mèo - like a cat on hot bricks: kiến bò chảo nóng - to shut the stable-door when the horse is stolen: bò lo làm chuồng We can see that the differences don‟t cause trouble for understanding those idioms because the cognition of both Vietnamese and English people about those animals is the same 2.5 The cross-culture differences Idioms are always results of social, cultural, historical and political values Despite the universal features, there still be distinct features that differentiate one culture from another Therefore, we can say that there are two types of idioms: those with a common, universal morality, similar in most cultures, if not in the form, at least in the message; and those born from a historical fact, a local custom or a specific event in a particular culture They have their own identity signs which characterize the place or time of origin and are the distinct features of that culture Cultural connotations of some animal words in English and Vietnamese are closely related to the religion, customs and the history of the nation That is why idioms related to animals in these two languages are different in their cultural connotations And it causes a lot of difficulties for people from one country to learn the language of the other 2.5.1 Customs One of the most important elements that differentiate the idioms in English and Vietnamese is the differences in tradition and custom Vietnam - an oriental country has the agricultural culture, while England – a western country - has the nomadic culture They have different concepts about the world, especially the animal world Each culture highly values the animals that have more contribution to their life That is 31 why though both languages have idioms using the images of dogs, horses, buffaloes…, the messages carried are varied through cultures In nomadic culture like English culture, dogs help human beings lots of work They watch the houses, keep farm animals like sheep, goats …, and help hunting wild animals In short, the image of a dog sticks to the image of a nomad Therefore, dogs are highly valued and are considered human‟s best friend There are many idioms showing the importance of dogs such as: - a house without either a cat or a dog is the house of a scoundrel - a house is not a home without a dog - old dog for a hard road - love me love my dog - the greater love is a mother's; then comes a dog's; then a sweetheart's - a man's best friend is his dog Because they are human‟s best companion, the image of the dogs is usually associated with human being in idioms dog human being (England) You can find this metaphor in many idioms: - every dog has its day: everyone can be successful at something at some time in their life - to help a lame dog over stile: to help someone who is in difficulty or trouble - you can't teach an old dog new tricks: people who have long been used to doing things in a particular way will not abandon their habits - give a dog a bad name (and hang him): people who lose their reputation have difficulty regaining it because others continue to blame or suspect them While dogs are so important in English culture, they are not so highly valued in Vietnamese culture Let consider the metonymy below: dog faithful, dependable (England) dog stupidity, cruelty, inferior (Vietnam) Though dogs help watching houses, Vietnamese people in general dislike the behavior of dogs So, dog is used to describe the bad guys, those who are cruel and unscrupulous Bellow are some Vietnamese idioms with their meanings: 32 - mõm chó khơng mọc ngà voi: nice words never come out from the bad guy‟s mouth - chơi với chó, chó liếm mặt: be kind to the inferiors, then they will be disrespectful - chó giứt dậu: bad guy at the difficult time may be even fiercer - chó ngáp phải ruồi: stupid person accidentally says or does right things Similar to dogs are horses, they are highly respected in English culture whereas they are not as important in Vietnamese culture In England, horses represent the strength, willing to work and they are the pride of the owners - as strong as a horse - eat like a horse (eat a lot) - a good horse cannot be of bad color - a horse, a wife and a sword may be showed but not lent - choose a horse and a wife to make However, in Vietnam horses represent stubbornness Bellow are some Vietnamese idioms using the horse‟s image and their meanings: - đầu trâu mặt ngựa: bad and cruel guys - mồm chó vó ngựa: dogs‟ mouth and horses‟ hoop are very dangerous - ngựa háu đá: the young are always aggressive - ngựa quen đường cũ: hard to rid of bad habits - ngựa bất kham: as stubborn as a wild horse Beside typical images like dogs and horses, there still be lots of different connotations of animals in the two languages expressed in idioms such as buffalos, cow … If English learners not know about the custom of English culture they will encounter lots of difficulties in communicating, especially with idioms 2.5.2 Religion There is a big difference between the religion in Vietnam and in England The Vietnamese religion can be considered as a complex of Buddhism, Confusion, and some other religions; while most English people believe in Christianity That is why the concepts of people about some animals in both countries are different For instance, the dragon possesses different cultural connotations in Vietnamese and English 33 Dragon power, excellence (Vietnam) Dragon cruelty, fierceness (England) In Vietnamese culture, the dragon symbolizes the high reputation In the past, when someone passed the national exam and became a mandarin, the case was called “cá chép hóa rồng” (the fish turns into a dragon) And when someone having higher social status visits a lower one, then they use the idiom “rồng đến nhà tôm” (the dragon visits the shrimp) The dragon represents power, excellence, and striving for goals, as well as being a benevolent force, which radiates goodwill, good luck, and blessings In the feudal society, “dragon” is associated the kings and royal families Vietnamese people consider themselves “con rồng cháu tiên” which means “sons and daughters of Dragon and Divinity” Whereas in English – a Western culture, it is a kind of evil monster, which can vomit fire and sometimes possess three to nine heads In English, “to chase the dragon” means “to take heroin” (The Free Dictionary), a “dragon lady” is “a woman who is domineering or belligerent” (Your Dictionary) and the Vietnamese equivalent of that idioms is “sư tử Hà Đông” Only when one understands the religion features of both languages can she/he understands those expressions correctly Though there are a lot of religions in Vietnam, most of them are imported from other popular country in the past such as China and India That is why there are very few Vietnamese idioms related to classic references of religions In contrast, there are a vast number of English idioms originate from Bible and religious references, especially the idioms related to animals Lyman (2007) stated that: “Animals are often mentioned in the Bible It is widely quoted sayings that briefly and strikingly express some universal truth or shrewd observation about everyday life.” One of the animals mentioned most in the Bible is the sheep Sheep are mentioned in the Bible more than 500 times, more than any other animal The prominence of sheep in the Bible grows out of two realities Sheep were important to the nomads and agricultural life of the Hebrews and similar peoples Secondly, sheep are used throughout the Bible to symbolically refer to God's people 34 Sheep Human Being (England) So, in the Bible sheep symbolizes human being that is both innocent and sinful In English, we can find lots of idioms using sheep‟s image like: - a lamb to the slaughter: in an unconcerned manner / unaware of any impending catastrophe - a wolf in sheep clothing: an enemy disguised as a friend - separate the sheep from the goats: distinguish between good and bad individuals, or superior and inferior ones - black sheep: The odd/least reputable member of a group - lost sheep: person thought to be on a course of self-destruction - there is a black sheep in every flock: there is no perfect group/family In the pages of the Bible, you can also see lions, leopards, bears and hundreds of other animals, insects, and creatures Each of them has a special meaning base on the references to the stories in that book According to Lyman (2007), the followed idioms also originate from the Bible: - a fly in the ointment: a little flaw that ruins what otherwise would be something good - a lion in the path: the obstacle, especially one invented as an excuse for inaction - a little bird told me: to keep secret, or to claim intuition as, a source of information - the Pale Horse: the death - to strain at a gnat and swallow a camel: to fuss about unimportant issues while assenting too readily in important ones Without understanding the religion as a part of culture, we can not understand the idioms originated from them 35 PART C: CONCLUSION Conclusion In short, both English and Vietnamese languages are rich in images and have a lot of idioms And idioms using the images of animals take a large portion Both cultures share the same capabilities of thought, the same laws of cognition and a common, universal morality Moreover, some animals have the same important role in people‟s lives in the two cultures, and have the same attributes and features Therefore, we have a large number of similar idioms related to animals, both in the form and in the message However, England and Vietnam have different history, different customs and different religions They have different connotations of some animals in life Those idioms born from the historical fact, local custom or specific religion convey different messages though they use the same images of animals Definitely, cultural linguistics is considered as a very broad and appealing academic field Through the process of doing this study, although I just focused on a quite small part about the animal-based comparative idioms with the pattern “as…as”, sometimes I found it overwhelming to understand fully this type of idioms multilaterally However, the more I consulted reference materials, the more interesting the issue turned out to be Due to the limited time frame and my modest knowledge of culture and language, that some idioms and linguistic views were not covered is inevitable Anyways, I tried my best as much as possible to convey to readers at least the overview of similarities and differences in English and Vietnamese animal-based idioms of comparison After contrasting and comparing many idioms, analyzing related concerns, I hold on hope that somehow my paper could be a helpful and informative material for teaching, learning and translation Furthermore, through my paper I wish to look for an interesting way to help students take in knowledge instead of learning by heart Importantly, students could utilize what they have learnt as an effective communicative means but not a temporary solution to the school exam Some suggestions for teaching and learning English Idioms In spite of a small study, this paper gave me a good chance to have a closer look at the comparison of idioms generally and idioms with animals particularly Thanks to this study, I could learn about the similarities and differences between English and 36 Vietnamese animal idioms Personally, some useful implications for teaching, communication and translation will be highlighted as follows: Firstly, a deeper understanding in animal idioms is probably beneficial for teaching and learning process As far as I am concerned, in class most language students take in knowledge isolatedly and passively and rich cultural resources are left aside The negligence may partly explain why students often forget previous lessons easily and learn with boredom Imagine the inputs of knowledge for students in that case are considered as separate pieces of jigsaw With the help of understanding the English culture and its origin of idioms, language learning could turn out to be a good adhesive connecting new and old pieces of information together Moreover, cultural elements integrated in lessons are likely to increase student‟s interest and contrastive analysis between the two languages Furthermore, sometimes teachers should let students guess the meanings of idioms based on teacher‟s hints or explanations instead of asking students to learn by heart Gradually, students are able to motivate their cognitive views and get more accurate guesses whenever they encounter new items In addition, students can adopt these in not only English conversations but also specially their writings to make it more naturally and lively and limit ambiguities Along with the helpful teaching and learning strategies, this critical comparison in the light of contrastive analysis enhances not only linguistic competence in English and in Vietnamese but, more importantly, better cultural knowledge as well Also, deepening cross-cultural understanding will be taken into consideration, which helps students preclude unexpected misunderstandings with native English speakers and highly evaluate the beauty of our mother tongue as well Last but not least, it is crucial for translators to have profound contrastive analysis related to collocation and idiomatic aspects To convey conceptual metaphor „so-called‟ successfully from the source language to target language and vice versa, translators are supposed to have solid knowledge foundation of both languages Consequently, they could deliberate when semantic equivalence or translation equivalence should be employed 37 REFERENCES Books: [1] Ammer, C (1997), The American Heritage Dictionary, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company [2] Broukai, L (2001), Idioms for Everyday use, published by McGraw-Hill Education Company [3] Chitra, F (1997), Idioms and Idiomaticity, 2nd impression, Oxford University Press, Hong Kong [4] Claire, K (2003), Language and Culture, 4th impression, Oxford University Press, China [5] Cruse, D.A (1987), Lexical Semantic, Cambridge University Press [6] Dixon, R.J (2004), Essential Idioms in English, Longman Publishing Group [7] Fernando, C (1996), Idioms and Idiomaticity, Oxford University Press, Incorporated [8] Heacock, P (2003), Cambridge Dictionary of American Idioms, Cambridge University Press [9] Helen, W (1994), Oxford Learner’s Dictionary of English Idioms [10] Hornby, A.S (2005), Oxford 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as the wind As fresh a rose As green as a leaf As heavy as an elephant As hard as a stone As heavy as lead As hot as fire As keen as a razor As light as down As light as a feather As pretty as a picture As quick as lightning As red as blood As sharp as a razor As sour as vinegar As stink as a polecat As swift as lightning As smooth as velvet As slow as a snail As swift as an arrow As steady as rock As timid as a hare 40 As thick as ants As transparent as glass As yellow as saffron As wet as a drowned mouse As white as snow As white as a sheet To fight like cat and dog To stick like a leech To cry like a baby To stick like glue To swim like a fish dumb as a statue As easy as ABC As easy as pie As easy as anything As smooth as butter As round as a barrel As pale as a ghost As soft as wax As merry as a cricket As cheerful as the birds As glad as a fly As dark as midnight As lazy as a lizard As strong as a horse As red as lipstick As close as herrings As soundly as a log As cold as marble As cold as ice As dry as a bone As silent as the dead 41 As thin as finger As weak as a kitten As black as the ace of spades Like hot cake  Vietnamese: Đen than Đen quạ Sáng ban ngày Ngắn giấc mộng Sáng Lạnh đá/băng Dữ cọp Vững đá Nhanh gió Tươi hoa Xanh tàu Nặng voi Cứng đá Nặng chì Nóng lửa Sắc dao Nhẹ lông hồng Nhẹ lông hồng Đẹp tranh Nhanh chớp Đỏ máu Sắc dao cạo Chua giấm Hôi chồn Nhanh chớp Mượt nhung Nhanh tên bắn 42 Cứng đá Nhát thỏ đế Nhiều/đông kiến Trong suốt thủy tinh Vàng nghệ Ướt chuột lột Trắng tuyết Như tờ giấy trắng Như chó với mèo Bám dai đỉa Khóc đứa trẻ Theo hình với bóng Dính keo Bơi cá-Câm hến Dễ trở bàn tay Dễ trở bàn tay Dễ trở bàn tay Mượt nhung Xanh tàu Mềm bún Vui tết Vui tết Vui tết Tối đêm ba mươi Lười hủi Khỏe trâu Đỏ gấc Chặt nêm Say chết (ngủ) Lạnh tiền Lạnh tiền Khơ ngói 43 ... to conduct the thesis entitled ? ?Idioms of Comparision in English and Vietnamese related to animals? ??, to find out the semantic and syntactic features of idioms in English and Vietnamese and find... - Finding out the similarities and differences between English and Vietnamese related to animals - Making some suggestions for teaching, learning and translating of English and Vietnamese idioms. .. English and Vietnamese: Contrastive Analysis 2.1.1 Similarities of Idioms of Comparison in English and Vietnamese 2.1.1.1 The general features Whether in English and Vietnamese, idioms of comparison