A Study Of C-E Metaphor Translation Principles

Since 1970s in the 20^th century, western metaphor researchers of Relevance Theory and Conceptual Metaphor Theory have been focusing their research basis on the concept that metaphor is a way of thinking, bringing out a lot of new ideas of metaphors. In recent years, many scholars of linguistics in China have paid more attention to introducing or studying western metaphor theories, but little attention to applying these theories to the comparison of Chinese metaphors with English ones. As a result, the potential value of those introduced metaphor theories have not been greatly exploited. This dissertation attempts to apply the idea of metaphor as a way of thinking and the cultural relevance theory of metaphor to the analysis of Chinese and English metaphors, to explore the possibility of establishing C-E Metaphor Translation Principles by extending the relevance of metaphor to thinking to the relationship between C-E metaphor translation and thinking, so as to enhance the study of C-E metaphor translation theories.Comparing the mutual culture relevance and culture losses, and analyzing the main difficulties, problems and some translating efforts by early translators in C-E metaphor translation, this dissertation proposes that metaphor as a way of thinking can be extended to the translation of metaphors from Chinese into English also as a way of thinking and that metaphor arises from people's thinking which determines metaphor's implication; no thinking, no metaphor, nor correct understanding of metaphor. Similarly, without a careful thinking, nobody can possibly do proper C-E metaphor translation.After analyzing some typical defects in C-E metaphor translation with new ways of thinking acquired from new ideas in western metaphor study theories, this dissertation has made a study of C-E Metaphor Translation Principles, relevant translation methods, and necessary standards for judging the acceptability of English versions of Chinese metaphors' vehicles, which is highlighted by such four research fruits as:1. Three C-E Metaphor Translation Principles are established with their implications: (1) maintaining metaphor's features; (2) integrating the relevant cultural implication of a Chinese metaphor with that of its English version; (3) making up any loss of a cultural vehicle in translation according to its context. The overall requirement of the principles is: After a metaphor is translated from Chinese into English, the vehicle's image in the Chinese speakers' thinking can have a "mapping" in the English speakers' thinking if they read the English version;2. Two judging standards have been put forward to check whether the translated version of a Chinese metaphor is still maintaining its vehicle's feature to realize the image transfer: (1) the mapping image in a target language domain is the same as that in its source language domain, (2) the vehicle in the translated version has the same "common recognition" as that in the source language. These standards can help to judge whether the translated metaphor has a vehicle equivalence in connotation to that in Chinese, and whether the C-E cultural image transfer is proper.3. Three translation methods with their descriptions have been given for integrating the relevant cultural implication of a Chinese metaphor with that of its English version: (1) Transferring vehicles, (2) Extending metaphors by making up implied meanings, (3) Translating vehicles literally and adding explanations. They serve as methods for maintaining any English translated vehicle "in line with" its Chinese source in connotation;4. A new translation method has been designed as such: Literal translationof a cultural vehicle + "reference" translation of its implication, for carrying outthe principle of "making up any loss of a cultural vehicle in translation according to its context". This new method is out of the author's creative thinking of the structure of Chinese enigmatic folk similes, adequate to have a Chinese cultural vehicle with its implied meaning well expressed in its English version.This dissertation consists of the following 6 chapters:Chapter 1 IntroductionAfter pointing out that western metaphor theories and metaphor translation theories can bring us four new ways of thinking in C-E metaphor translation research, this chapter has touched upon such problems as metaphor nature and its research value, C-E metaphor's translatability and the necessity of metaphor translation research, the status quo of metaphor study and translation research both at home and abroad, the significance, objective and methodology of C-E metaphor translation research.Chapter 2 Review of Western Metaphor Study and Its Revelations to C-E Metaphor TranslationWith a brief review and explanation of the achievements of western metaphor study before and after Lakoff, this chapter has illustrated the thinking revelations of new concepts from western metaphor study to C-E metaphor translation research in China according to Chinese metaphor's performance. The thinking revelations are: Language users with normal intelligence can have a strong competence in using metaphors. Accordingly, a well-qualified translator must be a competent translator of metaphors first. The author gives his ideas of constructing relevant judging standards for checking vehicle transfer in C-E metaphor translation, and his understanding of the theoretical value of metaphor as a way of thinking and recognition, and concludes that the conceptual metaphors in Chinese and English enable us to have a comparative study of them on a solid base, and the differences of C-E metaphors originate from the language users' thinking differences and their cultural differences.Chapter 3 Cognition of Metaphor and Exploration of Metaphor TranslationThis chapter holds that the concept of western "metaphor" is so broad that it can cover many Chinese figures of speech except "simile", but "metaphor" in Chinese is quite pure as one kind of figures of speech, named "Yinyu" or "Anyu". The author proposes to see "common recognition of vehicles" as one of the two standards for judging vehicles' transfer in C-E metaphor translation, whose applicability has been verified with critical comments of some examples of C-E translated metaphors. This chapter points out that C-E metaphor translation principles should aim to guarantee a Chinese metaphor's English version brings what to English readers as what the Chinese metaphor brings to Chinese readers, but traditional translation theories and methods are quite limited in this goal.Chapter 4 C-E Metaphor Translation PrinciplesAfter a study of the theoretical basis, the author puts forward that following three C-E metaphor translation principles: (1) maintaining metaphor's features; (2) integrating the relevant cultural implication of a Chinese metaphor with that of its English version; (3) making up any loss of a cultural vehicle in translation according to its context, whose function and practical value have been verified by a lot of metaphor examples translated from Chinese metaphors, expecting to enhance the current metaphor research and C-E metaphor translation theory to a higher level.Chapter 5 Application of the C-E Metaphor Translation PrinciplesThis chapter covers the answers to such questions as "how to maintain metaphors' features"; "how to integrate the relevant cultural implication of a Chinese metaphor with that of its English version"; "how to make up any loss of a cultural vehicle in translation according to its context", the consideration of the two standards for judging the realization of the first two principles. The author has also arranged three translation methods for carrying out the first two principles, and invented a new translation method for carrying out the third principle, hopefully to tackle the "loss of a cultural vehicle in translation", a problem long existing in C-E metaphor translation.Chapter 6 Conclusion: Main AchievementsThis chapter summarizes such main achievements of the C-E metaphor translation research in this dissertation as "Four new ways of thinking", "Three C-E metaphor translation principles", "Two judging standards", "Three learned translation methods" and "One invented translation method", followed by a list of limitations of the dissertation and some points for further research.