Cultural Differences Reflected In E-C Translations Between The Mainland, Hong Kong And Taiwan

With the rapid development of economy, China and western countries need to know more about each other. In the process of mutual understanding, introducing and translating western culture is a significant part. As China’s reform and opening-up process speed up, the Mainland now communicates with Hong Kong and Taiwan more frequently. Language is undergoing changing and integrating. Although the Mainland, Hong Kong and Taiwan share a similar cultural background, belonging to one macro-culture, they exhibit differences in many aspects,e.g. their respective understanding and interpreting of western cultures. One thing in western culture may be translated into three different things when translators try to understand it against their special cultural backgrounds.Language is a significant communication tool. If language in one region could not be understood by another region, the common development in the three regions would be impossible, and the national unity and harmony would be still on shaky ground. Scholars in the field of culture and communication have made some research on different translations of the western cultures from different perspectives, with some concerning simple analysis of the translation versions and some concerning the comparative study on different translations.Obviously, different interpretations of the western culture are influenced by many factors. Given that movies, as a booming industry, enjoys a wide range of audience and bears plenty of cultural elements, this paper tries to take subtitle translations of western movie trailers as data for analysis with the Adaptation Theory as a guideline, categorize translation differences between the three regions of the Mainland, Hong Kong and Taiwan in words, structures, manners of speaking as a result of the impact from various cultural factors, analyze their cultural differences,and make an endeavor to summarize the reasons behind these differences, mainly from the angles of foreign languages, dialects, classic Chinese and nonverbal elements. Through this attempt, we expect to help readers better understand the cultural differences between the three regions and differences in translation in these regions.