On Domestication In English Film Title Translation

The film, an important part of modern life, a special kind of art, functions not only in education and entertainment but also in commerce. Because of China's large-scale English film importation in recent years and the significance of film title in film, it is necessary to attach importance to English-Chinese (E-C) film title translation. Therefore, film translation is regarded as an important means of bringing in the foreign culture as well as spreading the native one. Film title translation is an important part of film translation. Many researchers have made explorations on the study of film title translation.In fact, film title translation is innately related to cross-cultural study. Compared with other kinds of literature works, films function more efficiently in broadcasting information and spreading culture. Translating a text from one culture to another usually requires that a choice first be made between two basic translation strategies: domestication and foreignization. The former refers to the translation strategy in which a transparent, fluent style is adopted in order to minimize the strangeness of the foreign text for target language readers. The latter designates the type of translation in which a target text "deliberately breaks target conventions by retaining something of the foreignness of the original". (Shuttleworth & Cowie, 1997:59) At present, the film title translation in China meet one big problem that is one film title has different versions in the Mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. The main reason for this status is the attitude to the inclination towards domesticating translation in Mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. Therefore, this thesis selected Hollywood films as examples to proof, in the current, domesticating translation is in a dominant position, although it can not solve all the problems in translation.This thesis consists of five parts. Chapter One gives a general introduction. Chapter Two addresses literature review that introduces the theoretical framework, including types of translation strategies on English film title, the functions and features of English film title, and study of title translation which sheds light on translation and its influence upon film title translation. Chapter Three analyses the English-Chinese film title translation strategies adopted in China by indicating the different periods and illustrating the temporal characteristics of film title translation, examining carefully the different versions of English film title in the Mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan and discussing the disunity state of film title translation and the corresponding strategies. Chapter Four offers a detailed analysis of the relationship between influencing factors and the translation stratedies. The following one, Chapter Five, serves as a conclusion, summarizing the whole paper.