Translating On Purpose--Translating Documents Of Traditional Chinese Medicine Into English Guided By Skopostheorie

Translation of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) significantly makes three contributions: firstly, it contributes to the integration of TCM and Western medicine; secondly, to the modernization of TCM; thirdly, to the intercultural communication between Chinese and Western cultures. Difficulties in TCM translation are mainly posed by the cultural and linguistic barriers as well as the differences between TCM and Western medicine. Poor translated and misinterpreted information, especially the westernized terminology, is common seen in the present English literature of TCM. TCM translation needs a theoretical guide. The present study presents the application of Skopostheorie from the German functionalist group into the translation of Traditional Chinese Medicine with special reference to the basic concepts of the approach: Skopos, textual function, translation expert, intratextual and intertextual coherence, and translation adequacy. The author puts forward that Skopostheorie encourages the TCM translators, as experts at both Chinese and English languages and experts at knowledge of TCM and Western medicine, to produce a functional translatum (i.e. a translated text) by selecting certain information from source text and reconstruct the information in the light of the pre-determined Skopos.