An Analysis Of The Yangs’ Translation Of Selected Plays Of Guan Hanqing From The Perspective Of Socio-Semiotics

Selected Plays of Guan Hanqing is highly respected in the Chinese literary world and have also been translated into many languages around the world.This paper selects its English version as the research text and analyzes it from the perspective of socialsemiotics.The social-semiotics approach in translation believes that translation is to translate meaning,and the meaning and function of language are inseparable.“Correspondence in meaning and similarity in function” has become a new standard of translation theory.Based on Morris’ ideas on semiotic trichotomy,this paper analyzes the Yangs’ translation of Selected Plays of Guan Hanqing from referential meaning,linguistic meaning,and pragmatic meaning under the criterion of “correspondence in meaning and similarity in function”.This paper draws the following conclusions: Firstly,in the process of translation,some of the meanings of the source language are inevitably missing.Translators must use translation methods flexibly.Secondly,linguistic meaning is the most difficult to reproduce,followed by the pragmatic meaning,and the referential meaning is the easiest to translate.Finally,the thesis proves the guiding role and practical significance of social-semiotics approach in translation for the translation practice of Chinese literature with analyses of examples.