Translation Norms For Popular Science Magazines

The beginning of popular science translation can be traced back to the period between the end of the Ming Dynasty(1368–1644)and the beginning of the Qing Dynasty(1644-1912)in China.Historically,popular science translation has played a vital role in building science literacy of the Chinese.A literature review of popular science translation research in China since the 1980 s reveals a number of weaknesses.Firstly,most of the researchers base their research on the principle of traditional popularization,to make scientific information accessible to the public in a simple and easily understandable manner.Science popularization,however,is gradually changing with the advancement of science and technology,from traditional popularization to public understanding of science and science communication.Since 2006,science popularization in China has developed into science communication which aims to arouse public interest in science,to facilitate the public's understanding of science,and to help them to form their scientific opinions.Therefore science communicators have often used the measures such as entertainment,persuasion,humour,storytelling and metaphors to achieve their goals,which should be considered by popular science translators.Secondly,most of the present studies of popular science translation focus on translation methods and translation training,with the translation criteria of simple wording,scientific accuracy,literary grace and sense of humour.Compared with the present prescriptive translation studies,descriptive translation studies based on large quantities of translation examples describe the nature of translation as a necessary social activity,and are invaluable for the field of popular science translation to establish itself as an independent translation field.Thirdly,the present research is mainly focused on the translation of popular science books while popular science is actually presented in many forms,including books,films and television documentaries,magazine articles,and web pages.This study chooses three Chinese versions of Scientific American,an American popular science magazine with more than 170 years' history,as the study objects to deal with the mentioned problems.The Chinese versions are Kexue(1979-2005),Huanqiukexue(2006-)and Kexueren(2002-);the first two are magazines of the mainland while the third one is that of Taiwan.While the feature stories of Scientific American are selected as the source texts,the headlines and leads of the target texts are the subjects of this research for their important role in seizing the interest of the public,which is the main purpose of science communication.Based on Chesterman's(1997:64-70)categorization of norms into expectancy and professional norms,the main body of the research consists of three parts: the first part focuses on the diachronic analysis of headlines and leads of three magazines— Kexue(1979-2000),Kexue(2002-2005)and Huanqiukexue(2006-2007).With the analysis of 195 headlines and 183 leads from Kexue(1979-2000)the study finds that almost all of the source texts are translated by means of literal and free translation,and there are a great deal of similarities between the source and target text,which is the result of the translators' performance to satisfy the Chinese government's requirements for the accuracy of scientific information and the scientific popularization for expert audiences after 1993.With the analysis of 100 headlines and 100 leads from Kexue(2002-2005),the study also finds that translation varieties are used in translating headlines and leads while most of the study objects are still translated by literal and free translation.Therefore both similarity and difference are kept between the source and target text.The study of expectancy norms in this period 2002-2005 reveals that Kexue magazine had become a channel of science popularization for general audiences instead of expert audiences.With the analysis of 120 headlines and 120 leads from Huanqiukexue,the study finds that there is a great deal of difference between the source and the target text,and transediting is the main translation strategy that the translators employ to realize the aims of science communication.Based on the findings,the first part shows that the translation strategies that translators choose are decided by the social role that the society/government and clients hope the magazine to play.The social role is exactly the nature of popular science translation and meanwhile the relation norms and communication norms are decided by the expectancy norms.The second part of the research focuses on the comparison of communication norms between Huanqiukexue(2006-2007)and Kexueren(2002-2005).The two groups of translators employ similar and different transediting methods.The comparison is carried out in four aspects: the comparison of the communicative role the translators play,the comparison of the verbal methods to create the stylistic features such as simplicity and vividness,the comparison of the exclamation mark usage,and the comparison of illustration as a tool to communicate with the public.With the close comparison between the corresponding target texts of Huanqiukexue and Kexueren,the study reveals that the two groups of transeditors both play the roles of social commentator,science teacher,initiator of innovation and product solicitor.Besides,Kexueren transeditors also frequently play the role of literary person and entertainer.The comparison analysis of the transediting strategies to produce simple and easily understandable style shows that both of the two magazines use different types of transediting,such as omission,analogy and explanation to deal with the specialized terms and logic.In addition,the spoken words and rhetorically active words are chosen to be effective tools to achieve required stylistic features.The findings show that different from Huanqiukexue,Kexueren employs more various rhetorical devices and spoken words,even slang in their target texts.As for the comparison of exclamation mark use,the conclusion to be drawn is that comparatively Kexueren more often uses exclamation mark,which serves several purposes: to express happiness and surprise,to emphasize some information and to call on the public to take an action.Finally in this part,the dissertation compares the different use of illustrations by Huanqiukexue and Kexueren,the latter of which likes to start communication with the readers by asking “What can you see in the illustration?”.Evidently the way to realize the aims of science communication is not only the stylistic requirements to translate in relatively simple and easily understandable way,but also multiple requirements,such as to teach and amuse the public,to talk with the public and to take humanistic care of the public.The author proposes that the translating criteria for popular science texts should be reconsidered,for the present model of science popularization has developed into science communication.The study on communication norms of science communication is open ended.The third part of the research contributes to the building of a comprehensive transediting meme pool used for establishing the Chinese system of science communication.In addition,there is a great lack of teaching materials to train transediting competence across China.Based on the analysis of up to 500 headlines and 500 leads from Kexue,Huanqiukexue and Kexueren,the dissertation is intended to build a transediting meme pool,which can be further divided into four subpools,such as function pool,method pool,location pool and active rhetorical-device pool.The meme subpools are open ended,and can be accumulated into larger ones with increasing translation practice of popular science translators,which will be a great support to construct the system for China's science communication.In a word,these three parts respectively focus on the study of the social role that popular science translations play,the comparison of transediting strategies between Huanqiukexue and Kexueren,and building a transediting meme pool for science communication in China.Frankly speaking these studies have not been exhausted yet,and the author hopes that the study will open a new area for the coming research of popular science translation in China.