The Transparent Eye: A Study Of Literary Translation Subjectivity From The Cultural Perspective

With the "Cultural Turn" of Translation Studies as the background and from a cultural perspective, the present dissertation employs the subjectivity theory, culture theory and dialogics theory specified in the theory of cultural poetics and other related theories to study the reason, process and effect of the transformation of literary translation subjectivity from writer to translator. It also studies the writer subjectivity, translator subjectivity and reader subjectivity and the relationship among them. Finally it studies the structure, texture and function of the translator subjectivity.Besides the preface and concluding remarks, the dissertation consists of four chapters respectively entitled as Theory and Interpretation: A Study of Literary Translation Subjectivity in the Cultural Turn of Translation Studies; A Study of Literary Translation Subjectivity from the Perspective of Cultural Studies; A Study of Literary Translation Subjectivity from the Perspective of Cultural Anthropology and A Re-Thinking of Translator Subjectivity from the Perspective of the "Philosophy in Flesh" and Cognitive Linguistics. The four chapters form an interrelated and interdependent integrality. The basic structure of the dissertation is made up by background, theories and perspectives, which also form a research model characterized by internal logical relation among the components. Translation Studies belongs to humanity and social science; any research field of which is cultivated to meet its own need of development and respond to much larger social and cultural requirements. The prosperity of the study of the literary translation subjectivity is motivated by the influence of the post-modern philosophies in Translation Studies and is also propelled by the need of development in Translation Studies after its cultural turn. To clarify the definition of the literary translation subjectivity and understand the multi-relations in it is the prerequisite for a further and deeper study of it. At the same time, it is necessary to form a theoretical framework for the study and the dissertation uses the subjectivity theory, culture theory and dialogics theory specified in the theory of the cultural theory as the basis and studies the literary translation subjectivity from the perspectives of post-modernism, cross-cultural communication and cognitive linguistics. The dissertation structure is an open and dynamic one for the new theories and perspectives to be added to.The preface discusses the origin of the academic significance of the present study. It also discusses the present research situation both at home and abroad, the theories and methodology used in the dissertation, the original points and difficult points in the dissertation. The study of the literary translation subjectivity is caused by the cultural turn of Translation Studies. The literary translation subjectivity is the research subject for both the Cultural Approach and Cultural Studies Approach in Translation Studies and one of the heated fields in the translation studies both at home and abroad. At present, the study of the literary translation studies is mainly conducted in two fields: the first one is the study of the relationship of the writer subjectivity, translator subjectivity and reader subjectivity in the literary translation subjectivity; the second one is the outward study and inward study of the translator subjectivity, the former refers to the descriptive study of the cultural function of the translator subjectivity and the latter the study of the structure and texture of the translator subjectivity. The dissertation makes clear the difference and relation between the cultural concept in the anthropological sense and the cultural concept in the sense of cultural studies. It introduces in the present study the theory of cultural poetics and methodology of Cultural Anthropology and finally it analyzes the composition and function of the literary translation subjectivity using the theory of Cognitive Linguistics.The first chapter is divided into three sections: Reconstructing in the Dialogues: Setting out from the Cultural Poetics; Literary Translation Subject, Subjectivity and Inter-Subjectivity; and The Translator's Invisibility and Visibility. It first describes the cultural turn of Translation Studies as the background and motivation for the study of the literary translation subjectivity and indicates that culture is the overall research perspective for the study and it is also the starting point for the present study. At the same time, the study of the literary translation subjectivity is the main component of the cultural turn of Translation Studies, which makes the literary translation subjectivity visible and also makes it its own destination. The study of literary translation subjectivity exerts important academic significance to the translation studies. The first chapter also discusses the basic theories of the cultural poetics of New Historicism, cultural poetic in the Chinese context and Bakhtin's cultural poetics and from their theories the dissertation draws out such features as subjectivity, culture and dialogics to guide the whole study. In the first chapter, the dissertation analyzes the definition of the literary translation subject, subjectivity and inter-subjectivity and proposes that in the translation activities, the concepts of subject, subjectivity and inter-subjectivity have different objects to refer to. The translator is the subject of the translation activities and the agent to manipulate the source text. The factors affecting the process and product of the translation activities include not only the translator subjectivity, but also the writer subjectivity and the reader subjectivity. To be exact, the writer and reader are not the specific subjects of the translation activities, but they have the function of the subjects, in other words, they have subjectivity. The translator subjectivity is decided by the fact the translation is the recreation based on the source text. It stands for the norms and constraints of the target culture on the translation activities. Translation activity is the activity in which the above three kinds of subjectivity negotiate with each other and this inter-subjectivity becomes the main issue in the study of the literary translation subjectivity. Finally, the first chapter discusses the translator's invisibility and the translator's visibility. The traditional literary approach to translation studies sacredizes and authorizes the writer while the linguistic approach sacredizes and authorizes the source text. The former belittles the status and function of the translator and the latter ignores the existence of the translator. The cultural turn of Translation Studies visualizes the translator , emphasizes the active function of the translator and makes it an important issue in Translation Studies.From the second chapter, the dissertation shifts its focus on the translator subjectivity. The chapter is divided into three sections with the titles respectively as: The Translator's Subjectivity and Translation Ethics; "Diaspora" Translator and Fofeignized Translation; The Cultural Significance of the Subjectivity Awareness of the Women Translators. The literary translation subjectivity is to some extent bounded by translation aims, translation norms and translation ethics. The translation norms are the moral rules the translators observe. The return to the translation ethics is regarded as the reflection on the theories and methodologies in the translation studies after the cultural turn. Translator is a bridge lying between the heterogeneous cultures. In the Diaspora state of the post-colonialism, everything is unstable and moving, featured by hybrid state. The heterogeneity is reconstructed in the Diaspora culture, which belongs to neither the source culture nor the target culture. Translation displays the heterogeneity and overcomes the heterogeneity at the same time. The rediscovery of the historical role and function of women translators, the awakening of the awareness of the women translators' subjectivity and its political implication are closely related to the feminist movement in the West. The value of the feminist translation lies mainly in its political and cultural significance rather than its academic significance.The third chapter consists of the following three sections: Cultural Anthropology and Translation as the Cross-Cultural Communication Activity; Literary Translation and Transmission of the Cultural Heterogeneity, Thick Translation: The Translator's Discourse. Literary translation is a special form of the cultural translation and it has all the features of the cross-cultural communication. The cultural universality is the condition for the cross-cultural communication and it is also the condition for the translatability. The cultural heterogeneity has special significance for it forms the cultural other, which reflects the cultural self. Literary translation as a cross-cultural communication activity is to display the heterogeneity as well as to overcome the heterogeneity. Translation as a cross-cultural communication activity requires the translator to be fully capable in cultural cognition. It also requires the translator play well the role of cultural mediator in the cross-cultural communication which is featured by the transmission of the cultural heterogeneity. Thick Translation as the translator's discourse is a method of re-interpretation for the translator. By adding footnotes to the translated text, the thick translation method builds up the historical situation in which the translated text is produced. The readers are given the chance to read, understand and interpret the translated text in the interaction between the text and history.The fourth chapter contains three sections: The Cultural Cognition of the Literary Translation; Translator's Turn and Somatics of Translation and Cognitive Linguistics and Somatics of Translation. The cultural psychology of the source text includes the cultural psychology of the writer and the translator needs to probe into the cultural psychology of both the source text and the writer. The cognitive method of the translator is also the way for psychological activity of the translator and the Gestalt theory is an effective cognitive method for the translator to study the cultural psychology.But at the same time, language cognition is not a transcendental activity but is developed on the bodily experience of people in the world. Douglass Robinson, an American scholar in translation studies, proposes the theory of Somatics of Translation, stressing the importance of the sub-consciousness in the translator subjectivity, which is the integral combination of both the emotion and cognition of the translator.The concluding remarks of the dissertation suggests the listening and making dialogue are two important characteristics in the study of the literary translation subjectivity. Listening to others is the proper attitude in the study and it initiates the dialogue, which paves the way for the study of the literary translation subjectivity.