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A Study On The Interventionist Feminist Strategies In Eileen Chang's Translations

Posted on:2008-03-27Degree:MasterType:Thesis
Country:ChinaCandidate:L J DengFull Text:PDF
GTID:2155360215466569Subject:English Language and Literature
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Eileen Chang is a legendary female writer in literature of China, who has raised "Chang fever" at home and abroad. She published her works and accompanying critiques. And now, the "Chang fever" becomes more drastic. Eileen Chang, who was born in Chinese mainland, then lived in Tai Wan Province of China and finally died in American. She has subjected to lots of critical discussions after death. Even so, many critiques of her novels, few people have paid attention to her translations. And nobody uses feminist translation theories to analyze her translations, which is the novelty of this essay.Western feminist translation theory is a product of the alliance between feminism and translation studies. As a branch of it, interventionist feminist translation emphasizes on how feminist translators use language as a manipulative tool to intervene in the creation of meaning in the target culture. Feminist translation, in practice, tries its utmost to advocate a kind of interventionist translation, asking for a feminist creation on the translation text. Feminist translators who are already politicized by feminism may take offence at texts that are unpalatable or politically unacceptable and they 'correct' texts in the name of feminist 'truths' to query their source texts from a feminist perspective, to intervene in and make changes when the texts depart from this perspective (Luise von Flotow, 1997:24). Specific strategies are three practices of western feminist translation summarized by Luise von Flotow, i. e. supplementing, prefacing and footnoting, and "hijacking", rewriting and other strategies (Luise von Flotow, 1997:69-70).Four of Eileen Chang's translations, namely The Old Man and the Sea, The Rouge of the North, The Rice-sprout Song and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow will be deeply analyzed in this thesis on the basis of interventionist feminist translation. It tries to find out how and to what extent Eileen Chang intervenes in translations, what interventionist strategies are employed and how her feminist thought appeared in her translation by applying interventionist feminist strategies.In chapter one, there is a brief introduction of feminist translation theories, necessary illustrations of Eileen Chang's translations in China, the assumptions and contributions. In chapter two, the main topic is the relationship between Eileen Chang and her translations. And the brief introduction of Eileen Chang's translations will appear in the same chapter. There are two reasons for discussing the relationship between Eileen Chang and her translations: Firstly, because selecting the ideologically friendly texts provides feminist translators with privilege to apply the interventionist feminist translation strategies overtly. Only in the writing project can the interventionist translation strategies be brought into playing incisively and vividly. Secondly, The Rouge of the North and The Rice-sprout Song are both the works of Eileen Chang, so she can understand the inner intention contained in these works more clearly than other translators. By interventionist feminist strategies in translation, Eileen Chang's feminist thought had been enhanced.In chapters three, four and six Eileen Chang's interventionist strategies and concrete examples will be analyzed from three aspects: prefacing, supplementing and "hi-jacking". This thesis tries to study the interventionist feminist translation strategies in Chang's translations, by contrasting both the English and Chinese versions, illustrating the instances of the translator's intervention, discussing the inner factors resulting in her intervention, and summarizing her feminist writing strategies: male emasculation and fatherless texts that appear in her translation. Chapter six is the creative chapter of this thesis. Eileen Chang's metaphor as an interventionist feminist translation strategy is discussed from three aspects: metaphor in pronoun, metaphor in adjective and using metaphorical words to replace the original words, which is the production of western feminist translation theories and concrete practices. A summary, limitations and questions to be further researched will appear in chapter seven.This thesis can be helpful to the research on Eileen Chang's translation studies. A great deal of textual analysis is carried out based on interventionist feminist translation. There are few essays in China concerning Eileen Chang's feminist interventionism in translation. Besides, it is the first time that the thesis has discussed about Chang's feminist writing strategies in her translation. The same feminist thought both in Chang's writings and translations will be proved. Lastly, Eileen Chang is a legendary writer, to study her translation is a little contribution to the "Chang fever" that has been discussed more and more drastically. This thesis remains many defects, but sill provides a new prospective for the study on Eileen Chang.
Keywords/Search Tags:feminism, interventionist feminist strategies, feminist translator, interventionist strategies, Eileen Chang
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