Analysis Of Hu Shi’s Translation From The Perspective Of Power Discourse Theory

Hu Shi (1891-1962), a pioneer of May Fourth Movement, one of the mostinfluential intellectuals in the20th century China, achieved remarkableaccomplishments in the fields of philosophy, education, literature, ethics, history,translation and others. His special bi-lingual educational background made it possibleto translate western literary masterpieces into Chinese, producing great influence onChinese culture and social reform at that time. So a comprehensive study of Hu Shi’stranslation will not only contribute to a better understanding of his own translation, butalso the construction of China’s translation history and theories as well.Up till now a lot of research has been done about Hu Shi’s translation and fruitfulresults have been made. This thesis, based on those achievements, studies Hu Shi’stranslation from a new perspective—power discourse theory. It holds a view thatunder the special social and political environment, Hu Shi’s translation was not onlyinfluenced by the power discourse in and abroad, but also played an important role inconstruction of the power discourse in his time. The author hopes that the study willnot only provide a new perspective for studying Hu Shi’s translation but also helpenrich the translation theory and enhance its explanatory power to translation practice.The thesis consists of five parts. The first part is a brief introduction to theresearch background, objective, methods and the organization of the thesis. Thesecond part presents a literature review of the study. The third part is the theoreticalframework, which elucidates the power discourse theory of Michel Foucault and otherrelated scholars, and its relationship with translation. The fourth part, the centre of thethesis, analyzes Hu Shi’s translation practice from power discourse theory, showingwhat power factors related to and how they interfered with Hu Shi’s translation on theone hand, and how his translation constructed new power discourse on the other. Onthe basis of the analysis the thesis finally draws the conclusion that Hu Shi’stranslation thoughts and practice are closely related to the power discourse then.