A Model For The Translating Process: A Communicative Perspective

This thesis is a study of the translating process from the angle of communication theories in recognition of the fact that, as cross-cultural communication, translating is by nature information transmission. Thus, communication theories can be applied to translating studies to provide a new perspective and yield fresh insights.Representing the knowledge of a process or structure, a model helps people grasp its main elements and gain insights into their relations as well as their functions. Based on the two communication models, and guided by principles of systems theory, information theory, and cybernetics, the thesis evolves a tentative translating model that is a brief visual representation of the process of information transmission in translation.The thesis is divided into two parts.The first part consists of Chapter One, which examines Westley and Maclean's conceptual model and the Riley and Riley model, aiming to show that a translating model, absorbing the merits of the two, will be efficient to explain the translating process. The former of the two emphasizes the communicator's role and the functions of the receiver's feedback. The latter, focusing on the effects of the environment, from a sociological perspective, views communication as one of the social systems. Though both of them have their merits and demerits, they are complementary.The second part consists of chapters two, three, and four. Applying systems theory, information theory, and cybernetics, this part analyzes the translating process and formulates a model for it.Chapter Two first explains what is a system and lists its characteristics. From a systems-theoretic viewpoint, it takes the translating process as an information transmission system composed of the author, the translator, the -audience, and other elements, in which allthe components cooperate to Achieve a specific goal. The suprasystem of the translating system is the culture system. To maintain their stability and development, these two systems depend on and interact with each other.Taking an information theory perspective, Chapter Three views translating as a process in which information is transmitted from the source through the translator to the audience. Based on the basic concepts of information theory, the chapter concentrates on an analysis of such important elements of translating, as information, redundancy, channel capacity, noise, and explains the elements affecting the translator's gatekeeping and the selective tendency of the audiences' reception of messages.Chapter Four is a cybernetic explanation of translating with the focus on the goal-orientedness and the four kinds of feedback of the process.In conclusion the main contents of the above chapters are reviewed; the tentative translating model is elucidated. It is restated that as cross-cultural communication, the translating process, interacting with culture, is a process in which the translator coordinates the various elements to transmit information effectively from the author to the audiences.