A Report On English-Chinese Translation Of Mind,Modernity,Madness (Chapter 7)

This paper is an English-Chinese translation project report on Mind,Modernity,Madness,written by Liah Greenfeld,an American sociologist.In the book,she gives a detailed analysis of the phenomenon of madness from the perspectives of culture,philosophy and history,and makes an in-depth study on three major psychiatric disorders — schizophrenia,bipolar disorder,and severe depression—to illustrate their relationship with culture and nationalism.She believes that culture is an important element in human life,and that culture makes humanity a distinct species.Under the guidance of the tutor,the author of this report completes the translation of the first part of chapter 7 of the book,which describes the history of the development of American psychiatry,the great suffering of American mental patients through a large number of cases,and the causes of the rapid increase of mental illness in the United States after the mid-19 th century.According to the content,this text is identified as an academic one of humanities,which has abundant psychiatry-related academic knowledge.The wording of the text is concise and the meaning is expressed clearly,which demonstrates Greenfeld's excellent skill of narration.The case description part includes a great amount of mental patients' self-description,some of which lacks logic,making the translation difficult.Based on the text type and function,through typical examples(mainly of the different types of sentences),and with reference to the translation principles and strategies suggested by cognitive approach to translation,this report discusses the translation skills employed in this text in the hope of making some contribution to the study of culture and translation.