用英语描述一个英式婚礼的程序

Marriage plays a greatly important role in social development .In the three ways of production，it is the only one to produce ourselves, and the only way to create ethic connection. Through marriage the lasting of human being is ensured, forming all kinds of relationship among and various costumes and social culture.

The beginning of marriage is a wedding, as it is known to us all. People think a perfect start makes everything go successfully. A wedding is far more than a ceremony, but a change for a person’s life and divine as a symbol of culture from the view of a country.

What’s the traditional wedding ceremony in China and England?

Pre-existing elements of traditional Chinese wedding ceremony is generally credited to scholars of the Warring States period, 402-221 B.C. The Three Covenants and the Six Rites, which were considered as necessary elements of a marriage. However, the full ritual was too complicated, so even within the span of the Warring States period; the etiquette underwent changes and simplification.” What remained constant were the chief objectives: joining and enhancing the two families and ensuring succession with numerous descendants. Reverence to parents and ancestors, omens to encourage fertility and wealth, financial and social obligations contracted by both families at the betrothal, extensive gift giving etiquette, and the bride’s incorporation into her husband’s family are recurring elements.”

There are six steps to form a completely wedding: The Proposal, The Betrothal, and Preparing for the Wedding Day, Day of the Wedding, Day After the Wedding, and Three Days after the Wedding .Before the wedding ritual, there are a lot to do, including The "Hair Dressing" Ritual which is done at dawn on her wedding day (or the night before). A “good luck woman”, woman with living parents, spouse and children, will come to help dressing up the bride’s hair. The woman should also speak auspicious words while tying up her hair in a bun, a style of married woman. Though this “hair dressing” ceremony, people give their best wishes to the bride so the bride will bring good luck to the groom and his family.（桃之夭夭，灼灼其华，之子于归，宜其室家。）The "Capping" Ritual “ that is performed at the groom’s home, where father of the groom place a hat decorated with cypress leaves on the groom’s head”. The groom will bring the bridal sedan chair, an equivalent of a limousine nowadays, and a group of relatives and friends to go to fetch the bride. This act also wishes the groom to have good luck. The Bride’s Journey to the Groom’s House which is do by the “good luck woman” or a dajin, employed by the bride’s family to look after the bride, carried the bride on her back to the sedan chair. Arriving at the Groom’s House and after stepping over a saddle or a lit stove, the wedding ritual comes to the emphases.

In contrast to the elaborate preparations, the wedding ceremony itself is simple. The bride and groom are conducted to the family altar, where they pay homage to Heaven and Earth, the family ancestors and the Kitchen God, Tsao-Chün. Tea, generally with two lotus seeds or two red dates in the cup, is offered to the groom’s parents.

Then the bride and groom bow to each other. This completes the marriage ceremony, except in some regions, where both also drink wine from the same goblet, eat sugar molded in the form of a rooster, and partake of the wedding dinner together.

Immediately after the ceremony, the couples are led to the bridal chamber, where both sit on the bed. In some areas, honey and wine poured into two goblets linked by a red thread. The bride and groom take a few sips and then exchange cups and drink it up.

And the guests that are usually the relatives of the bride and groom, will enjoy separately rich banquet which is by either the bride’s parents or the groom’s. It is generally considered as public recognition of the union.

英国Let’s see how the wedding in Britain is. Contrast to the Chinese one, the English is much simpler. In the traditional wedding culture of England, the bride will carry a calla in hand being typical of good luck. If the two persons live near to the church, they would get into it together with their guests and sprinkle orange flowers along the whole way. Their weddings are used to being celebrated in the afternoons, and then they would hold a party. The cakes they eat on that day are made of many kinds of fruits, they can decorate hogged nets. The top of the cake which stands for the naissance of bottle will remain until their first child come out.

As we know, there are a lot of differences between these two wedding ceremony, which reflect the different culture of the two countries.

Firstly ,the aims of the wedding are quite different .Chinese take marriage as “joint the two families together for the ancestor and for the offspring”(合二姓之好，上以事宗庙，而下以继后世也。). In order to bring more fame and make the families become larger and larger; marriage is a family affair more than private. So one of the most important steps is to see if the girl and the boy are fit to each other by checking their birthday .Because the wedding is usually connected with wealth, financial and social obligations, there is another thing that does not appear in a British wedding, the betrothal gift. The betrothal gift is the gift that the groom gives to the bride’s family, which often is some property or something like that. The experts say that it contains function below: First, the proposal by talking is a limited in sanction and some property as a keepsake is more powerful. The accepter will not pull back because they don’t want to lose the property, and the giver won’t pull back either. Second, it is a transition of labor force when the girl go .The gift is a compensate in economy. Third, the pay out of the groom is quite a lot for an ordinary family, and that will prevent the man abandoning the wife and getting another, and make the marriage more steadily. Fourth, the gift is usually paid by the parents of the groom, which means the housemaster can be in charge of a marriage.

As mission of procreating, there are lots of details in a wedding having something to do offspring. For example, the Bed Making. Spilling some Chinese dates ,peanuts ,longans ,lotus on the bed, means having a boy as soon as possible(早生贵子)。What about the British wedding? It seems to pay more attention in love. The aim of a wedding is to make the lovers living together forever, so it is a private affair more than the family’s. There is usually a minister asking the groom and the bride if they are willing to marry each other, and ask if there is anyone against. The wedding will go on unless the two lovers say yes and no opposing. Obviously we can not see a similar step in a Chinese wedding, because the mastery is the parents but not the people getting marry .After the wedding is over, there is still an interesting ceremony: throwing the bouquet. It is said that the girl who comes to hand the bouquet will get marry soon .It is a pure-hearted wish to the girls .But in a Chinese wedding, the girls can not even be in charge of their life, their love, or their husbands. They usually have not seen their husbands until the night they marry, and the person can only be counted on is the matchmaker. These are all decided by the differences of the wedding.

. Secondly, the wedding dress is also different .In a Chinese wedding, the common color is red. The color red is considered as good luck, a strong color that which can drive away evil spirits. The traditional Chinese wedding dress in northern China usually is one-piece frock named Qi Pao, embroidered with elaborate gold and silver designs. Brides from southern China usually wear two-piece dress named Qun Gua, Kwa or Cheongsam, also elaborately adorned with golden phoenix and dragon. It is a tradition to wear Cheongsam with red dragon and phoenix design at the wedding day because dragon and phoenix design symbolizes the balance of male and female power.

In the old days, a piece of red veil is part of the bride’s costume to cover her face during the wedding ceremony. Newlyweds would see each other’s face for the first time on their wedding night.

The groom’s costume is a black silk coat worn over an embroidered dragon robe of dark blue. The headgear is a black hat with red tassels. Nowadays, most grooms’ wear has been simplified to a set of traditional outfit without the overcoat.

And as we all know, the west wedding dress is often white. It means chasteness, beauty, loftiness, and civility. White dress, white posy, white veil, and the white cream cake, everything is so romantic.

Thirdly, the woman’s status in a wedding is different. In a Chinese traditional wedding, because of the aim of that wedding, the woman usually has a low status .The man can have more than a wife, but once the wife is just a tool for birthing and sex. So after the wedding, there is a ceremony in which the groom must see her mother-in-law, accept her enlighten, to serve the husband as a master. But in west, we can see it is fairer and more democratic. They will be asked if they would like to be his/her wife /husband no matter rich or poor, health or sick until die. They change their rings to mean possessing

If you are going to marry, which wedding would you choose? A Chinese traditional wedding? A British one? Or both? At first we think there may be a lot of people will choosing the last one, but, it seems that there still a lot of people quite like the Chinese style.