A Report On The Chinese-English Translation Of Cultural And Geographic Perspective Of Shanxi Folk Songs(excerpt)

With the continuous drive of globalization,more and more foreign cultures have been infused into China;however,our Chinese cultural elements become less and less,such as ethnic culture and Beijing opera culture.Shanxi,as a birthplace of Chinese ancient emperors,has inherited many traditional cultures,such as the bronze culture,operas,gorgeous architectural arts,and so forth.Among them,Shanxi folk songs are the most widely circulated.Under the influence of our Chinese culture “going out” strategy,the translator actively participates in the translation practice of Shanxi folk songs.Furthermore,in order to explore the translatability and untranslatability of Chinese folk songs,the translator reads many reference books to pursue the translation skills of Shanxi folk songs.Within two-month time,the classmate and the translator has jointly translated Chapter 3 and Chapter 4 of the book Cultural and Geographic Perspective of Shanxi Folk Songs.This practical report gives an account of this translation practice in detail,summarizing the translatability and untranslatability of Shanxi folk songs under the theory of “Three Beauties” by Xu Yuanchong,a prominent translation master,and figuring out what the problems boil down to.Through referring to multiple documents and publications,more appropriate translation remedies for untranslatability will be sought.According to the translation practice,the translator explores how to cope with the translatability and untranslatability of cultural and linguistic phenomena existed in folk songs with the Chinese characteristics.Furthermore,the translator hopes to provide references for future translation practice of Chinese folk songs,with respect to how to remedy untranslatability of folk songs.Through this translation practice,this report summarizes the translatability and untranslatability of Shanxi folk songs in ways of textual and case analyses as follows:1.Shanxi dialects are translatable under the theory of Message Beauty;The end rhymes and a single reduplicated word are translatable under the theory of Prosodic Beauty;The forms of folk songs’ lyrics are translatable whatever in long sentences or short ones,under the theory of Image Beauty;2.The function words and cultural-loaded expressions are untranslatable under the theory of Message Beauty;Shanxi dialects are untranslatable under the theory of Prosodic Beauty;Continuous reduplicated words in folk songs are untranslatable under the theory of Image Beauty.As Newmark,a famous translation theorist noted,“It is impossible to reach an absolute equivalence in translation”.Therefore,in the end of this report,the translator offers some remedies for untranslatability of folk songs,such as free translation,simplification,substitution,transliteration.The translator hopes to make a contribution for folk songs’ translation by this project,and also sincerely looks forward to more translators could participate in the translation of Chinese folk songs,making our Chinese folk songs well-known in the world !...