Toward A Scientific Appraisal Of Western Contemporary Translation Theories

With the advance of Translation Studies,more and more translation theories are put forward from different perspectives.To be sure,all the developments have enriched Translation Studies a lot,making us know the nature of translation better than ever before. However,the downside to this is that the variety of translation theories can be confusing as well.On the one hand,during the 1980s in China,it seemed Nida's theories could be used to explain everything.Now with fewer and fewer discussions,criticisms and applications of Nida's theories appearing in Chinese journals,especially the core journals,it seems that Nida's theories are out of date and not in a position to explain anything.The theories that come later appear to have more explanatory power than the earlier ones.On the other hand, the varieties of translation theories plunge people into a multi-choice situation:they are not sure which theory to choose to explain the given translation phenomena.There are quite a lot of debates on the understanding of and application to translation theories.These problems are not to be solved simply by studying some isolated hypotheses or theories or by studying the relationship between theory and practice.Studying merely the isolated hypotheses or theories may plunge people into arguments of unimportant details or linguistic problems,rendering people unable to see clearly whether the macro-theories follow scientific norms or not.Though some specific or minor problems can be solved by studying the relationship between theory and practice,the development of theories can not be known clearly.It is therefore necessary to search for new approach to these problems.As the meta-theory and methodology used for appraising scientific theories,Lakatos's methodology of scientific research programmes(1978) provides an effective way and method.For a long time there have been debates on whether translation is an art or a science. With the traditional translation theorists retiring or passing away gradually,the contemporary translation theorists are playing a leading role in Translation Studies. Accordingly,translation as a science is becoming the commonly held opinion.If so is the case,the theories of translating/translation should be concerned with science.Why are the theories of translating/translation scientific? The fundamental problem has not been probed systematically by now.Lakatos's methodology of scientific research programmes states "universal conditions under which a theory is scientific".Our study,different from any other researches,is concerned with the problem of using these universal conditions and criteria to appraise translation theories.If traditional 'immediate empiric focus' is related to art rather than science,then scientific criteria can not be used to appraise the traditional translation theories.The establishment and rapid development of Translation Studies has occurred in recent decades. The contemporary translation theories are the result of scientific probation into theories of translating/translation by modern theorists,and then become the subject of our study. However,the vast number and variety of translation theories do not allow us to apprise each and every one of them;it is therefore necessary to choose the typical ones.After combing through the contemporary translation theories,we choose three ones,namely,Nida's, Toury's and Gutt's theories,which have the feature of comprehensiveness;that is,the producers of these theories intended to have their theories describe or explain the translation phenomena exhaustively.The usual criticisms for translation theories have the following deficiencies:(1) They mainly center on isolated hypotheses,criticizing the isolated hypotheses linguistically or finding faults in one sentence or even one terminology in a hypothesis.(2) The main criticizing approach is by illustration,that is,by using one or several examples to prove or falsify a theory.(3) Systematic research has rarely or never been conducted on the development of one macro-theory.Theorists' developments of and adjustments to theories can therefore not be seen clearly.(4) There is no scientific criterion for the comparison between theories.The results of comparison are often random and pseudoscientific.In order to overcome the above deficiencies,Lakatos's research programmes is employed as the appraising approach with the following points of distinction:(1) The methodology of scientific research programmes,as Lakatos asserts,is not concerned with an isolated hypothesis or a conjunction of hypotheses;instead,it is the describing and appraising unit of great scientific achievements.The present dissertation then studies the above mentioned three translation theories in terms of research programmes.For instance,we do not merely pay attention to Nida's several isolated hypotheses - formal equivalence,dynamic equivalence and functional equivalence;instead,we regard Nida's whole theories as a research programme to study and appraise them.(2) We do not carry on the simple experiment of trial and error;that is,we do not use the example such as discovering one black swan to falsify the statement that 'all swan are white',according to Lakatos,"Such trivial trial and error does not rank as science"(1978:4).We therefore appraise theories by the characteristics of research programmes.All scientific research programmes are characterized by their 'hard core' and 'protective belt'.What we first do is reconstruct the three research programmes rationally,that is,study their 'hard core' and 'protective belt', the connection between 'hard core' and 'protective belt' and the continuity of the hypotheses which constitute 'protective belt' respectively.By such a study,the hypotheses in macro-theories can be judged whether to be isolated and arbitrary or not.If the hypotheses are isolated and arbitrary,they are not genuinely scientific;if "the members of such series of theories are connected by a remarkable continuity which welds them into research programmes"(Lakatos 1978:47),they are scientific in terms of Lakatos's research programmes.(3) We appraise the progress and degeneration of one macro-theory by Lakatos's appraising criteria.(4) Our comparison of theories is based on Lakatos's criterion for one research programme to supersede another one,and it is therefore scientific in Lakatos's sense.The following is the structure and content of the dissertation given in the order of chapters.The first part of the work consists of Chapter One,and is about the rationale of appraising contemporary translation theories.It points out that Holmes's "The Name and Nature of Translation Studies"(1972;1994/2007),which is generally accepted as the founding statement of the field,does not lay out general criticism of translation theories as one branch of Translation Studies;therefore,it is necessary to establish general criticism of translation theories.The dissertation also shows that even though the various theories and schools of translation theories differ vastly from one another,all of these contemporary translation theories have universal features,which provide a basis for the establishment of general translation theories criticism.Chapter One introduces the approach of the research and states the objective,method and procedures of the study.Chapter Two,Three and Four constitute the bulk part of the dissertation and this part is devoted to a rational reconstruction of the three comprehensive translation theories,that is, studying respectively the 'hard core' and 'protective belt' of the three comprehensive translation theories,the connection between the 'hard core' and the 'protective belt' and the continuity of the auxiliary hypotheses which constitute the 'protective belt'.Centering on Nida's three major works Toward a Science of Translating(1964/2004),The Theory and Practice of Translation(1969/2004) and Language and Culture:Contexts in Translation (2001),Chapter Two reconstructs Nida's theories rationally.By such an analysis,we demonstrate the progressive development of Nida's theories.In this process the deficiencies in Nida's theories are demonstrated in terms of research programmes as well.Meanwhile, we analyze how Nida responded to all kinds of refutations and criticisms to his theories by adjusting the 'protective belt' to defend the 'hard core'.These analyses help us to clarify some of the misunderstandings to Nida's theories among Chinese scholars in the light of research programme.Chapter Three is a rational reconstruction of Toury's theories,centering on Toury's two important works:In Search of a Theory of Translation(1980) and Descriptive Translation Studies and Beyond(1995/2001).Chapter Four reconstructs Gutt's theories rationally and is concerned with Gutt's Translation and Relevance:Cognition and Context (2000/2004).The same format will be used in Chapters Three and Four as is employed in Chapter Two in the appraisal of Nida's theories.Part three of the paper consists of Chapter Five and Six.In this part we analyze whether Toury's theories can supersede Nida's,whether Gutt's theories can supersede Nida's and whether Toury's theories can supersede Gutt's by using Lakatos's criterion on one research programme superseding another one.By comparisons the conclusions are drawn that(1) Gutt's research programme can not supersede Nida's research programme, and it is a degenerating research programme in comparison with Nida's(2) Nida's and Toury's research programmes are rival and coexisting research programmes,and so are Gutt's and Toury's research porgrammes.The final part of the dissertation consists of Chapter Seven,the conclusion.In this chapter we summarize the whole work in this dissertation and state the significance of establishing general translation theories criticism by employing Lakatos's methodology of scientific research programme.The author of the dissertation proposes to establish general criticism of translation theories by employing Lakatos's methodology of scientific research programme and makes a tentative attempt at the establishment.Lakatos's methodology is a scientific and systematic appraising approach,which has a lot of methods and principles waiting to be dug out to be used in the establishment of general criticism of translation theories.Although our study is in its preliminary stage,and the scope of the application for the general translation theories criticism is in the need of further tests,we think general translation theories criticism is one important hallmark for the study of translation theories to step on a proper and scientific way and is also one necessary object of study for Translation Studies to become one mature discipline.