On The Translation And Transmission Of Tao Te Ching In The English World From The Perspective Of Memetics

Tao Te Ching written by Lao-tzu is the classic works of Taoism, which is notonly rich in meaning, deep in philosophy, but also expressive and concise inlanguage and full of poetic expression. Lao-tzu’s philosophical wisdom is not onlyan important part of Chinese culture, but also has a far-reaching effect on othercountries around the world. The influence of Tao Te Ching in English world can beseen clearly from its publishing frequency and its total number of translationversions. Tao Te Ching is the most frequently translated book in the world with wellover130different renditions in the English world, just next to the Bible and theBhagavad Gita. There is no doubt that Tao Te Ching’s translation facilitates itstransmission in the English world. The study on the successful translation andtransmission of Tao Te Ching can provide some reference for the translation andtransmission of other Chinese Classics, eventually making our Chinese culturesuccessfully transmitted and widely accepted in the English world. This is the reasonwhy the author chooses the topic “the translation and transmission of Tao Te Chingin the English world”.In addition, most of the previous studies on Tao Te Ching focused on thecomparison of several different translations at linguistic level, or analyzed differenttranslation strategies adopted in these translation versions. Seldom did those articlesadopt a cultural transmission perspective to explain the whole process of Tao TeChing’s translation and transmission in English world. This thesis adopts the culturaltransmission theory of memetics, in an attempt to explain the process of Tao TeChing’s translation and transmission in the English World.Memetics is the evolution theory of human culture，which takes Meme as a unitof imitation or a unit of cultural transmission. This thesis attempts to explore thetransmission of Taoist memes through the medium of translation from theperspective of memetics.This thesis is composed of five parts. Part one introduces the researchbackground, the significance of the research, the research methodology and thestructure of the thesis. Part two is literature review, which introduces Lao-tzu andTao Te Ching and collects and summarizes previous researches on Tao Te Ching bothat home and abroad. Part three provides a theoretical framework to introduce thetheory of memetics. And it offers the definition, the features, the stages, the selection criteria of memes and so on. Part four is the core part of this thesis. This partattempts to depict a schema of Tao Te Ching’s transmission in English world throughthe medium of translation from the memetic point of view and present a systematicanalysis of Taoist memes’ transmission. It points out that from the perspective ofmemetics, the transmission of Taoist memes, as the dynamic process of selection,adaptation and variation, complies with the rules of cultural evolution. Its course isthe result of the selection of foreign cultural environments. The meme’s adaptabilitydetermines the evolution of the translation strategy from domestication toforeignization, producing various meme phenotypes such as the types of religionanalogy in the first phase, of wisdom in the second phase and of future philosophy inthe third phase. These variables have increasing copy fidelity. Part five summarizesthis thesis and concludes that because Taoist memes can make variations in order toadapt to the changing cultural environments, they can replicate themselvessuccessfully among different groups of people in different periods. What’s more,such a replication shows a tendency that Taoist memes’ original meaning or intacttraits of Taoist memes are going to be revealed in the English world gradually.Finally, the author hopes that this memetic study on Tao Te Ching can provide somereference for the studies of other Chinese classics with the purpose of making ourChinese culture successfully transmitted and widely accepted in the English world.