A Study On The Audience’s Identication In English Translation Of Political Texts From The Perspecitive Of Translational Rhetoric

With China’s growing comprehensive national strength,its diplomatic policy has switched to going global.However,there is still a distance from going global to being widely accepted by people all over the world.As a political text for foreign publicity,Xi Jinping: The Governance of China serves an important platform for the world to understand China’s governance philosophy and Chinese culture.Since its publication,the book has attracted widespread attention,and has been highly acclaimed by both Chinese and foreign readers.It is indeed of theoretical and practical value to study the translation of the book.From the perspective of translational rhetoric,this thesis adopts Burke’s“identification” theory and Herrick’s classification of “rhetorical resources” to study the speeches delivered on international occasions in Volumes 1 and 2 of Xi Jinping:The Governance of China.It tries to find out how the translators employ rhetorical resources to help the audience establish identification.Specifically,it will explore the following three questions: 1)In what aspects does the audience identify with the discourse? 2)How are rhetorical resources used to help the audience establish identification? 3)What are the means,reasons and significance of violating the principle of identification establishment in translation?The conclusion is drawn as follows: 1)The audience’s identification is reflected in three aspects,including identification by sympathy,identification by antithesis and identification by inaccuracy.2)Four types of rhetorical resources can be employed to help the audience establish identification,namely,Arguments and Arrangement for identification by sympathy and identification by inaccuracy,while Appeals and Aesthetics for identification by sympathy.3)The translated text sometime violates the principle of identification establishment by retaining political neologisms,rhetorical devices and allusions,which is helpful for constructing Chinese diplomatic discourse and exporting Chinese culture.The findings of this study can inspire translators to consider the audience as an essential element in translation,and to think about the reader acceptance from the perspective of rhetoric.Furthermore,the integration of rhetoric and translation studies can also promote the construction of political translation disciplines.