On Translator's Subjectivity From The Perspectives Of Translation Norm Theory

In recent years, there is a surfing trend of retranslating well-known foreign literary works in China. How to value this tendency? A number of papers concerning the phenomenon in question always place emphasis on the comparison between different translated versions. The linguistic differences are the concern of their studies, whereas the status of the translator in retranslation has been ignored.Since the 1970s, translator's subjectivity has become one of the hot issues with the "cultural turn" occurring in translation studies. Influenced by this, there also occurs a "translator's subjectivity turn" in retranslation studies. This kind study puts the translation activity into a wider socio-cultural context so that the deficiency of traditional studies can be avoided. But in many cases, this kind study attaches excessive importance to translator's subjectivity. The scientific principles should be: on the one hand, stressing translator's subjectivity, and on the other hand, emphasizing the factors that constrain the translator's subjectivity. This will lead retranslation studies to a more objective way.As far as the comparison between translated versions is concerned, it must be made in accordance with certain translation standards, which are constrained by various factors concerning translation activity. Among so many perspectives of translation standard studies, translation norm theory is one of the most relevant approaches to this kind of study. "Norm" is an important concept to demonstrate the social meaning of an activity. Translation norms are, to some extent, a balance made by the translator between two norm systems of different languages, cultures and textual traditions. Toury distinguishes three kinds of norms: preliminary norms, initial norms and operational norms (Toury, 2001:56-61). The first two guide the translator's behavior at a macro level, mainly involving two aspects: factors concerning thetranslation policy and directness of translation, and factors concerning translation's adequacy and acceptability. Compared with Toury's classification, Chesterman's is more detailed, which places more emphasis on the norms that are closely related to the translator's behavior. In accordance with linguistic and sociological theories, he proposes the classification of expectancy norms and professional norms. Expectancy norms are established by the expectations of readers of a translation (of a given type) concerning what a translation (of this type) should be like (see also Chesterman, 1997:64). They mainly regulate that by what kind of standards a translation can be regarded qualified. As for professional norms, they illustrate the controlling and guiding functions of translation norms in the translation process.On the whole, China's traditional translation studies have been aimed at translation product; the latter-day western translation studies have been targeted at translation process. Some scholars suggest that the integrated translation studies approach should cover at least three fields; process, product and influence (or called function)(Yang Zijian, 2002). Compared with other theories, translation norm theory could provide a relatively systematic reference for investigating the translator's behavior.The overall movement of the thesis goes from theory to practice. The study will be divided into five parts, as follows:Chapter One gives the definition of translation and retranslation first. The cross-language- and -culture nature of translation results in that the information of the original language cannot be completely reflected in the target language. The degree of the realization of the original information depends on the translator. With the development of translator's subjectivity studies, more exemplifications are needed to analyze the factors that influence the translator's behavior. Retranslation phenomenon can provide a more coherent and systematic examples for this kind of study. Lastly, the feasibility of the study is presented.Chapter Two takes a literary review and makes evaluation on translator's subjectivity studies. It sums up the advantage of the theoretical framework of the existing studies with regard to translator's subjectivity. Further analysis is involved inthe role that the translator plays in translation process. There are four kinds of roles: initiator of translation activity; reader; creator; reviewer and researcher. And the combination of them places the translator under the manipulation of corresponding four cognitive worlds.Chapter Three summarizes the development of translation norm theory and analyzes its relevant viewpoints. Translation norms derive from two sources: extra-textual and textual. Through the analysis of the translator's behavior and the translated work, new norms can be established, which in return might be conformed by the translator.Chapter Four presents a case study that is designed to observe the influence of translation norms on translator's subjectivity in a specific translation process. At first, the two versions of A Passage to India translated by Yang Zijian are compared. The translator's conforming to expectancy, accountability, and communication norms is investigated. Through the comparison between the versions translated respectively by Yang Zijian(2001) and Shi Youshan(1989), the translator's conforming to relation norms is studied.Chapter five: Conclusion. (1) Translator's subjectivity is constrained by various translation norms and, on the other hand, leads the translator to break the norms. The conforming and breaking are both the embodiment of translator's subjectivity. (2) The nature of translation norms is descriptive. And their prescriptive functions derive from the descriptive nature. (3) Norm theory can explain the social and individual ideological causes of retranslation well. Through investigating the translator's choice of translation strategies, it can systematically explain the improvement of different translated versions. (4) Methodologically, the translator is both the object and subject. Lastly, the limitations of the present study and suggestions for the future's research are presented.