Approaches To Rendering Chinese Film Titles Into English

Film title translation is a unique field of translation practice. The English version of Chinese film titles, in particular, receives inadequate study. The present thesis attempts to delve into the medium of film along with the characteristics and functions of film title, and to study film title translation from internal and external perspectives. Based on a review of Chesterman's norm theory and other theoretical framework, the present author proposes the principle of optimization to tackle the approaches to rendering Chinese film titles into English.Film, an audio-visual text type, is a medium of mass communication. It is in a constant struggle between art and industry. Film title itself is brief, concise and straight, with three distinctive functions: informative, aesthetic and vocative. The principle of optimization is expected to see how much of the function the TL versions have achieved. In the present thesis, film title translation receives a detailed internal and external study. Internally, the linguistic and rhetorical traits of the SL and TL languages count for much. In addition, there is a gap in subject matter of title. Externally, cultural discrepancies, readers'response and directorship or sponsorship are the crucial ingredients governing the translation process. The present author manages to unveil most of the ingredients under the guidance of Katharina Reiss'text type theory, Peter Newmark's language function and communicative translation theories, Eugene A. Nida's readers'response and functional equivalence theory, Andrew Chesterman's norm theory and Hans J. Vermeer's skopos theory. Audience's response and directorship or sponsorship are of crucial significance in title translation. These two ingredients can find the theoretical background in Chesterman's expectation norms theory and Vermeer's skopos theory. With an attempt to seek a direct sense of readers'responses, the present author has conducted a survey towards native English viewers of Chinese film. Several translation procedures are listed for reference, such as transliteration, literal translation, free translation and creative translation, as well as sub-procedures. Lastly, it's up to the translator to decide on the priority of ingredients and the translation approaches, with a view to optimal effect.