On C-E Translation Strategies For Chinese Featured Vocabulary In News

With the increasingly fast pace of economic globalization and cross-culturalcommunication, translation has never been considered as important as it is today.There is a widely recognized consensus in the academic circle that translation is vitalin the dissemination of national culture and cultural exchanges. In possession of the5,000years-civilization, Chinese culture needs to expand its international influence.Currently, however, the Chinese people know a lot about the western world while thewestern world knows relatively less about China and its people. In other words, underthe context of the21st century and globalization, the country should attach moreattention to translation and the transmission of the Chinese culture to the world. Therewill be an increase in the amount of relevant information and messages to betranslated into English and other foreign languages. It is undeniable that translatingnews concerning about China is playing an essential role in introducing the nation tothe whole world. Many mainstream newspapers are model examples for researchers tolearn about the translation of English news. The native-flavored, accurately-wordedand greatly-measured language of those newspapers is helpful in winning therecognition from Chinese readers and foreign readers as well.Considered as a significant means of cultural communication, language is alwayschanging due to the exposure to different languages. English language is no longerlike what it is in the past, as it is globally used and even localized in some countries.Chinese featured vocabulary can reflect and help transmit the unique Chinese cultureand civilization. However, when dealing with the translation of Chinese featuredvocabulary, due to the lack of cultural equivalents in the target culture, the translatorsmay find it quite difficult to translate and make the foreign readers understand.Because of cultural differences, many of the ideas and concepts cannot be translatedfrom the source language to the target language, and this phenomenon not only affectsthe communication between cultures but also has become a major problem in the Chinese-English translation field.To achieve a satisfactory and accurately-worded translation, it requires a keenunderstanding of both the source culture and the target culture, and the translatorsneed to adopt appropriate translation strategies. Usually, there are mainly twostrategies used when handling the great difference between the source culture and thetarget culture, i.e. domestication and foreignization. The debate on which strategyshould be used in the Chinese-English translation of Chinese featured vocabulary isalways heatedly underway. This thesis maintains that the two translation strategies arenot contradictory, but complementary. The author at first briefly presents the researchobjectives, methodology and relevant studies in translation of Chinese featuredvocabulary by scholars from home and abroad, and then gives an overview of thetheories used in the thesis, from the aspects of translation and culture, news and itsfeatures, Chinese featured vocabulary. The theoretical basis of the entire paper ismainly on the translation theory of Lawrence Venuti. A comprehensive comparison ofdomestication and foreignization strategies is also presented, and is followed by a casestudy in the application of these two translation strategies. In the case study part, theauthor attempts to provide an in-depth analysis in the translation strategies for C-Enews translation of Chinese featured vocabulary. The two strategies are discussedfrom the perspectives of their representative branch methods, such as free translation,literal translation, loan translation, transliteration, etc. When dealing with thetranslation of Chinese featured vocabulary, the author holds the opinion that thisspecific kind of Chinese words should be translated under the guidance ofdomestication and foreignization, and appropriate methods of the two strategiesshould be flexibly adopted. At last, the author reviews the thesis and the researchwork done by the author, and gives the research outlook and suggestions.