A Report On The E-C Translation Of Asperger Syndrome (Excerpts) From The Perspective Of Approach To Translation As Adaptation And Selection

In recent years,a large number of works on the diagnostic methods and tools for Asperger syndrome have been translated into China,enriching the understanding of the Chinese on this mental condition.However,little is known about the problematic behaviors of individuals with Asperger syndrome and related forensic issues.By chance,the translator read an article entitled "Out of Control:Internet Addicted Teenager and His Family" in Sanlian LifeWeek.The article focuses on how a boy with Asperger’s syndrome developed a series of delinquent behaviors under the influence of a circumscribed interest(in this case,that is Internet addiction).Inspired by this article,the translator decided to take on an E-C translation task concerning AS and relevant forensic issues.Then,Chapters 12 and 14 from the book Asperger Syndrome:Assessing and Treating High-Functioning Autism Spectrum Disorder,a collection of papers,were selected as the translation material.Those two chapters examine the forensic and genetic issues of Asperger syndrome,which can provide some valuable information for the Chinese.As an important part of Eco-translatology,the Approach to Translation as Adaptation and Selection accentuates that translators should make selective adaptation to the translational eco-environment of translation tasks in the course of translating practice.Then,adaptive selection should be made to decide the form of the target text by adopting the method of three-dimensional transformation.From the perspective of the Approach to Translation as Adaptation and Selection,this report analyzes the translational eco-environment of this translation task and sorts out solutions to translation difficulties in three dimensions:linguistic dimension,cultural dimension and communicative dimension.During the translation practice,difficulties can be classifiable as follows:common words in the psychological and law setting,sentences with "It" as a formal subject;names of people and institutions,judicial and psychological terms;meta-discourses and expressions with quotation marks denoting"not literally".These linguistic phenomena bring about difficulties in achieving the accuracy and readability of the target text,satisfying the reader’s acceptability of heterogeneous cultural elements,and realizing the communicative intents of the authors.The report observes that multiple and diversified translation skills and strategies can be employed in EST translation to convey the information of the source text,meet the target reader’s reading needs and reproduce the intents of the authors.For example,semantic transformation and amplification can be used to express the meanings of common words in the context;division,conversion and amplification can be used in rendering sentences with "it" as a formal subject to highlight the information conveyed by the "real subjects";transliteration,annotation and free translation can be employed to reveal the social,psychological and judicial background information of names and terms.In addition,when it comes to the processing of meta-discourses and expressions marked by quotation marks,the translator should determine whether they should be maintained in accordance with their communicative functions,and then adopt literal translation and explicitation to render expressions marked by quotation marks.The report is expected to shed light on the future EST translation by studying the handling of these elements of this translation task.