The Interference Of Social-Cultural Factors With The Process Of Translation And Its Impacts

This dissertation discusses the interference of social-cultural factors with the process of translation.The traditional study of translation has mainly been approached from the perspective of comparative literature. At this stage, translation is regarded as a kind of linguistic transcoding. However, due to its self-imposed limitations, it is unable to account for the complexities of translation, especially literary translation. Starting from the 1970s, translation studies have gradually taken a "cultural turn", and a new paradigm for the study of translation has been established. According to Bassnett (Liao Qiyi, 2001: 358), the purpose of the translation theory is to enable people to understand the process of translation, not to produce perfect translations.The polysystem theory as outlined by Itamar Even-Zohar and Gideon Toury has considerably widened the horizon of translation studies and is particularly helpful for the analysis of the influence of extra-literary factors on the poetic decisions of the translator. For one thing, translation is evaluated in the contexts of both culture and history. For another, all disciplines and phenomena relating to translation have become objects of study. Inspired by the macro-perspective of the polysystem theory, I intend to investigate the relationship between translation and the social-cultural environment of the late Qing and the early Republican period.The specific period under study in this dissertation is from 1896 to 1919. A climax of translation activities appeared during this period, but translations of this period are often accused of being inadequate, with deletions, additions and mistranslations. While it is true that a large part of the translations of the late Qing Dynasty are not faithful reproductions of the original, we should distinguish between obvious errors from the deliberate manipulations due to the conscious or unconscious cultural intervention. Therefore, the present dissertation mainly explores the interference of social cultural factors with the process of translation -the reasons why the translator adapts the source text and what mechanism works behind themanipulation of the translator.The whole dissertation is divided into six parts:The introduction briefly introduces the basic objective and the scope of the research.The first chapter is a review of Even Zohar's polysystem theory as well as some related theories, which form the theoretical basis of the dissertation.The second chapter is a survey of the social background, the reasons and reality for the booming of translated literature from 1896 to 1919. Conditioned by the social-cultural background and with the decline of the traditional literature, large-scale translation activities were called for to facilitate the introduction of new ideas.The third and fourth chapters discuss in detail how various social and cultural factors interfered with the translation activities during the late Qing and early Republican period. The third chapter analyses how translation activities as a cross-cultural communication and social event against the certain social and cultural background, are inevitably governed by social norms that reflect the values dominant in the social and cultural background.The fourth chapter expounds how the then social factors, such as politics, expectations of the readership, the patronage and the target poetics influenced the translation process. To make his translation integrate into the target culture, the translator had to make modifications accordingly.The fifth chapter elaborates on the effects of the interference of social-cultural factors on the translation activities. Due to the interference of the social-cultural factors, translators performing under different conditions often adopt different strategies, and ultimately come up with markedly different products. This is significant for contemporary Translation Studies. We need to reconsider the traditional criticism, which has taken the original as the ultimate criteria.The sixth chapter is the conclusion...