Reconstruction Of The Writer's Cultural Identity In The Process Of Translation From Postcolonial Perspective

The postcolonialism mainly focuses on how the translator, translating and translation are manipulated by power as well as how the translator, translating and translation construct and deconstruct the power. Zhang Jingyuan classifies the postcolonialism into three aspects: Orientalism, cultural identity and the colonized. This thesis takes Snyder's translated version as research object and analyzes the reconstruction of Han-shan's cultural identity from postcolonial perspective.The significance of this thesis is listed as following three aspects. Firstly, the present study employs a new perspective in studies on cultural identity, which researches the writer's cultural identity reconstruction through comparison of the original poems and the translated poems. Secondly, this thesis provides a relatively detailed investigation of Snyder's translation, and gets detailed results. Thirdly, it may contribute a little to the further study of Han-shan's cultural identity and Snyder's translation.Because cultural identity synthesizes the content of both culture and identity, it is hard to be fully analyzed. Considering the definition of cultural identity and this thesis's research object, this study mainly discusses from four aspects: language, geographical location, manners and customs, ethics and professional standards. Through careful study of Snyder's translation of 24 Cold Mountain poems, the author finally concludes that Snyder is manipulated by social, translator and material's ideology when he chooses translation materials. Postcolonial rulers would like to demonstrate their strong voices in the translating process, so as to consolidate their cultural hegemony. Based on postcolonialism, this study probes the relationship between Snyder's translation and the power. After fully study of Snyder's translation, the author finds that Snyder reconstructs Han-shan's cultural identity and changes him into a 1960s'American idol for the sake of the readers'expectation.The present thesis consists of six parts. Chapter One is a brief introduction to research background, purposes, significance and thesis structure. Chapter Two recalls the studies on Han-shan and his poems, the postcolonial theory and definitions of key words. Chapter Three presents theoretical foundation, which firstly introduces Robinson's study and definition of postcolonial theory, then states the three main representatives of the postcolonial theory, at last recommends some other theorists. Chapter Four is research design including research questions, methodology and object. Chapter Five, the core part of the present thesis, is devoted to specific analysis of Han-shan's reconstructed cultural identity. The sixth part makes a conclusion of this thesis.