Cultural Understanding And Translation Of Nicknames

Shuihuzhuan, as one of four great classics in China, mainly tells the story of 108 Liangshan heroes’ uprising. Its authors, Shi Naian and Luo Guanzhong, innovatively use 108 concise nicknames, which not only shows characters’ different personality traits, but also reveals cultural characteristics of a certain period. Moreover, more research results on nickname translation in Shuihuzhuan have been achieved by domestic scholars than those abroad. But, explorations of nickname translation are few from the perspective of cultural classification.Based on Sima Yunjie’s cultural classification which divides culture into intellectual culture, material culture, prescriptive culture and spiritual culture, this thesis not only interprets cultures contained in nicknames in Shuihuzhuan, but also explores translation techniques of nicknames in Sidney Shapiro’s English version entitled as Outlaws of the Marsh. In this way, the research aims to help readers both at home and abroad have a better understanding about 108 Liangshan heroes’ nicknames,as well as to provide some references for the translation of nicknames.At first, the thesis gives a brief introduction to the research background and research significance etc. And then, domestic and foreign researches on cultural understanding and translation of nicknames in Shuihuzhuan are summarized. After the analysis of Sima Yunjie’s cultural classification, the author explores the classification of 108 nicknames in Shuihuzhuan and carries out the cultural understanding of those nicknames. Finally, this thesis mainly focuses on the translation of nicknames in Shapiro’s Outlaws of the Marsh. Moreover, whether Shapiro’s translation techniques show intellectual culture, material culture, prescriptive culture and spiritual culture contained in nicknames in Shuihuzhuan accurately and properly is checked.In this research, 108 nicknames in Shuihuzhuan are classified into 6 categories which are appearance, ability, morality, braveness, occupation and hobby. Besides, it is concluded that cultures contained in those nicknames are reflected in aspects of talent, skill, identity, weapon, law, morality, religion, national psychology and tattoo.In addition, transliteration, amplification, omission, shift translation, conversion,adaptation, free translation and literal translation are adopted to deal with 108 nicknames in Outlaws of the Marsh. But, the author finds that 7 nicknames are not properly translated.The research demonstrates that, the translator should get a thorough understanding of cultures contained in nicknames first, and then selects suitable translation techniques for them, so as to transmit correct cultural information of nicknames to target readers.