On Limitations Of Translatability From Cultural Default's Perspective

In the recent twenty years, an obvious tendency that considers translation to be across-cultural communication activity has emerged in translation study. Nowadays, to studytranslation from the angle of culture is just unfolding. On the basis of the inevitableexistence of cultural differences, there must be losses of cultural information in the courseof translation. One of the most commonly seen phenomena concerned is cultural default,which may cause meaning losses in translation and may make translatability only a relativeone. In other words, translatability has limitations that cannot be avoided. As to theimprovement of translation practice and promotion of culture exchange, it is of theoreticaland practical significance to study the problem of limitations and to look for some propermethods to solve it. Proceeding to the particular cultural phenomenon —cultural default,this thesis attempts to inquire into the problem of how cultural default causes limitations oftranslatability, and more importantly, to put forward several translation strategies so as tominimize the limitations.This thesis consists of four chapters.The first chapter begins with a historical review of limitations of translatability andbriefly recommends and comments on some major viewpoints from modern translationcircles. As the theories on the nature of translation have developed, the issue of limitationsof translatability starts to be considered. On the basis of generality of the theoretical studyon limitations of translatability, the author of this thesis believes that it will be of greatpractical significance to study this theory from a new perspective, which is termed ascultural default.The second chapter mainly analyses the phenomenon of cultural default. Culturaldefault is common in communication, no matter in written text or in speech. What concernsus here is cultural default in written text, especially in literary works. It is defined as theabsence of relevant cultural background knowledge shared by the writer and his intendedreaders. In order to get it across, the author of this thesis expounds this specific andimportant cultural phenomenon from three aspects: the definition, mechanism of formationand communication value, thus revealing the practical significance and study value ofcultural default. Additionally, this chapter points out that cultural default leads to the"vacuum of sense" in translation process, which limits translatability.The third chapter gives a detailed discussion on limitations of translatability fromcultural default's perspective. At first the author states that there is an inseparableconnection between cultural default and limitations of translatability by showing the closerelations between culture and translation, then discusses the theoretical foundations oflimitations from the perspective of cultural default existing in five cultural aspects: mode ofthinking, social historical and cultural factors, culturally-loaded expressions, religiousbeliefs and regional differences. Among them, social historical and cultural factors containfour aspects: custom and tradition, concept of cultural value, colorful meaning of color andnumeral;culturally-loaded expressions include five types: allusion, idiom, proverb,enigmatic folk simile and euphemism. All these factors are cultural-specific and may formcultural default in written works, thus resulting in translation problems. In the last part theauthor lists three common translation problems caused by cultural default: Overtranslationwhich increases much detail that do not exist in source text, Undertranslation which doesnot provide target text with adequate cultural information and Mistranslation whichinterprets the source text in a wrong way. In fact, all these translation problems reflect thatcultural default causes limitations of translatability.The fourth chapter sums up five translation strategies to compensate for "vacuum ofsense" caused by cultural default, thus successfully minimizing limitations of translatability.The five strategies are: literal translation, literal translation with footnotes, literal translationwith additional explanations, free translation and domestication.In the end this thesis summarizes that cultural default is an unavoidable phenomenonthat cannot be neglected in cross-cultural communication. It causes many translationproblems, which makes translatability limited. However, the limitations are not static but ina dynamic change. For the culture of a nation to develop, it should not only depend on itsown power, but also absorb foreign cultures. Translation is such an effective means as toabsorb different cultures and to promote the further development of cross-culturalcommunication. By the way of translation, the degree of translatability is becoming higherand higher, and the limitations are being reduced.