Functionalist Approaches And Their Application To Translation Of TCM

Functionalist translation theory is the offspring of the latest development in translation studies and modern linguistics. Functionalist approaches appeared during the 1970s when the functional equivalence was still prevailing, their representatives are Katharina Reiss, Hans Vermeer, Justa Holz-Manttari and Christiane Nord.Up to now, academic studies carried out by scholars and researchers have mostly focused on the introduction of functionalist approaches, the criticisms as well as its contributions to translation studies. Functionalism has rectified the shortcomings of traditional translation theories such as the supreme authority of the original text, fidelity as the highest standard for translation and the translator's invisibility. The advocates of functionalism have put forward their unique explanations of some basic questions in translation studies, which may be summarized as follows: 1) translation philosophy: to break the old binary concepts of translation studies under the Skopos-oriented instruction; 2) translation criteria: to conform to clients' and target addressees' requirements; 3) translation objective: to accomplish translation purposes; 4) translation methods: to use documentary translation and instrumental translation from the functionalists perspective; 5) the status of the translator: to be equal with authors, editors, and clients with much power and responsibility; 6) the relationship between the original text and the translation: the shift from source-text oriented theories to target-text oriented theories. However, it still carries some limitations such as over-emphasis on loyalty principle and the translator's intervention.This thesis consists of four parts. Chapter One is an overall review of its development: in 1970s, Katharina Reiss , the founder of functionalist approaches, illustrated her typology of texts, analyzed their pragmatics, and examined translation process from functional perspectives by giving interesting, full and accurate examples. In 1980s, Vermeer went beyond functional equivalence by giving the famous Skopostheorie. In the framework of Vermeer's Skopostheorie, the target addressees are one of the most important factors that decide the translation purpose, they have their own social background, culture-specificity and communicative situations. The source text is an offer of information for target text. Afterwards, Manttari further developed this theory based on action theory, emphasizing the analysis of participants in the translation action, including initiator, translator, the user of the target text and target addressees. Meanwhile, the situations in which the translation action takes place, such as time, space and the medium need analyzing. Then in Translation as a Purposeful Activity: Functionalist Approaches Explained, Nord introduced the loyalty principle into the functionalist model and hoped to solve the problem in radical functionalism, concerning the relationship between the source text author and the translator. Chapter Two pays close attention to main perspectives of functionalism, such as action theory, Skopos rule, translation brief, intratextual coherence, intertextual coherence, the concept of culture and culture-specificity, translation problems and translation errors. Chapter Three discusses the criticisms leveled at functionalism, explaining and answering them in the perspectives of Skopostheorie and the related functionalist theory. Chapter Four deals with application of functionalism to translation of literature of TCM because functionalist approaches are pragmatic in nature. In translating the literature of TCM, functional approaches provide a reasonable framework of translation theory from a macro perspective. Functionalism also points a way out for the translator, its Skopos rule, fidelity rule and translation brief can all instruct the translator to cope properly with the difficult translation of TCM with confidence.On one hand, the thesis affirms the contributions of functionalism to traditional translation studies; on the other hand, it undertakes a comprehensive exploration of its limitations. Based on analysis of functionalism, thoughts on applying this translation theory to translation of TCM are put forward as well for a better understanding and disseminating of TCM. The discussions in this thesis aim to draw scholars' attention to the system of functional translation theory and its application to TCM and encourage them to come forward with more valuable research, thus pushing forward this theory.