On The Translation Of Kinship Terms In Shui Hu Zhuan: A Pragmatic Approach

Address forms are the words speakers use to designate the person they are talkingto, which are featured with strong national characteristics and reveal the cultures ofdifferent countries and languages. Chinese kinship system is detailed and complex,while the corresponding English system is simpler. Hence, it is quite difficult fortranslators to find equivalent terms in the translation between these two languages.Another feature of Chinese kinship terms is that they are often used to addressnon-relatives. Therefore, it is of great value to further study the translations thereof.As a colloquial novel of Chinese classical literature, Shui Hu Zhuan tells thestories of the heroes on Mt. Liang, which includes people from the highest ranking tothe lowest. For this reason, the addressing terms therein are quite rich and haveattracted attention from both domestic and foreign researchers. Besides, thetranslations of this great novel also enjoy a great popularity. Among all the translatedversions, the translations of Shapiro and Pearl Buck are the ones that are both highlypraised and criticized. Based on Shapiro’ and Pearl Buck’s translated versions of ShuiHu Zhuan, this thesis analyzes the translation of kinship terms.This thesis collects the kinship terms in Shui Hu Zhuan, classifies them into twobig categories, picks out34typical examples, and analyzes their pragmatic meaningsin the source text and also the corresponding translations of Shapiro and Pearl Buck onthe basis of politeness principle which was put forward by Leech and also Gu Yueguo.Based on the descriptions and analyses, this thesis draws conclusions to the features ofShapiro’ and Pearl Buck’s translations of kinship terms in Shui Hu Zhuan, and pointsout the factors that translators need to pay attention during the translation process.Hopefully, this study could shed light on the future research and studies in this field.