On English Translations Of Features From The Perspective Of The Ethics Of Inter-culturality

As a type of cross-language and cross-culture communicative activity,translation is always situated in the complex interrelationships of different subjects that can affect the translation activity,including the translator,readers,original author,the source language/culture,the target language/culture,the patrons,and critics and so on so forth.It is in this complex network of interrelationship which is full of tension that translation process is conducted and translation is produced through translators’mediation and negotiation.As a result,translation is definitely subject to value judgments that normalize interrelationships in communicative activity,which necessitates the involvement of the issue of ethics.In recent decades,translation studies,under the background of cultural turn,have seen the emergence of deconstructionism,post-colonialism and feminism.Under the influence of such schools of thoughts,translation,instead of being considered as a simple language transfer process,has more and more been regarded as a battlefield in which contending forces compete with one another.In this sense,what to translate and how to translate are not just issues concerning choices of text and language,but also ethical issues,since the ethical principle held by a subject of translation activity can influence his or her choices of text and language,and thus the effect of translation.In this context,the ethical issue has begun to show itself in translation studies.Besides,against the background of cultural globalization,which has been featured with the acceleration of the cultural communication between countries and the co-existence of culture hegemony and resistance,translation,as an important channel for cultural collision and confluence,has to deal with the ethical issue as to how to deal with one’s own culture and others’ cultures.Moreover,with the rapid progress of China in terms of economy,science and technology,national defense and military,the cause of promoting Chinese culture to go out and increasing soft power has become a national strategic goal.In this context,translation,especially translation from Chinese into English language,has become a key link in accomplishing this national strategic goal,and the ethical issue as to how to treat Chinese culture and how to treat English culture has also to be addressed for translation activity.Briefly speaking,against the background of cultural globalization and that of promoting Chinese culture to go out,the question as to how to use ethical theories to guide,criticize and normalize practical translation activity is worthwhile to be studied.News communication has always been a crucial channel for China to communicate with other countries in fields of politics,economy and culture.The English translations of Chinese news,which can help present a true picture of China’s culture,Chinese people and Chinese society,can make a positive contribution to the cause of enhancing China’s soft power by promoting Chinese culture to go out.However,researches on news translation have been mainly focused on hard news featured with strong political color and strict timeliness,and translations of features,which is one of the main genres of news and which are less serious,are inadequately explored.In fact,features usually provide rich and interesting cultural elements in quite attractive words,and are certainly more attractive for foreign readers.Thus,it is safe to say that English translations of Chinese features and relevant academic researches on them can play a significant role in helping Chinese culture go out and promoting inter-culture communications.Nevertheless,in comparison with abundant English translations of Chinese features,relevant academic studies are limited to specific translation techniques and methods,without further explorations into more important and essential questions,and thus fail to make real contributions to translating practice.Translation is in essence communicative activity,and thus undoubtedly involves the ethical issue concerning the interactions among different subjects.Specifically,the ethical issue is about how translators should treat their own cultural elements,and how they should treat cultural elements of "others".This is actually an ethical question involving translation principle.Therefore,it is necessary to explore English translations of features from the perspective of translation ethics.This thesis is to apply Pym’s translation ethics of "inter-culturality" to analysis and evaluation of the English translations of features chosen from China Today.The ethics of inter-culturality introduced by Pym proposes that the aim or the value of translation should be improving inter-cultural relationship and promoting inter-cultural cooperation,and that the choice of specific translation strategy or methods should be based on this aim.The ethics of inter-culturality,which focuses on both value and facts,provide a different normative mechanism compared with traditional translation standards,like faithfulness.On the one hand,this translation ethics proposes the value of "cooperation" to prevent translation practice losing direction and trapping into relativism.On the other hand,it does not equate facts with value,or constrain translators by a certain stagnant standard,but instead it provides translators with flexibility and resilience in translation practice.Therefore,the ethics of inter-culturality can become a useful tool for criticizing and guiding translation practices.Furthermore,the principles of "helping the weak" and "involvement"contained in Pym’s ethics of inter-culturality are in excellent conformity with the needs of Chinese culture going out.China Today,as an authoritative publicity magazine in China,has been committed to introducing Chinese history and culture to foreign readers,enhancing their understanding of China and promoting Chinese culture to go out since its establishment.Many features containing rich Chinese culture information are available in China Today,and different translation methods have been used to deal with the culture information in these features.It is believed that an exploration of English translations of features in China Today can not only help highlight the significant role of translations ethics in guiding,criticizing and normalizing translation activities,but also offer some instructive thoughts and suggestions for practices of translating Chinese-written features into English language against the background of promoting Chinese culture to go out.