A Critical Study Of The Applicability Of Even-Zohar's Polysystem Theory To Interpreting

Translating and interpreting are two separate but closely related formsof "translation". Scholars like Gile, Nord and Newmark believe that thesetwo types of translation have a lot in common; the relatively more maturetranslation theories can be applied to interpreting studies and helpformulate interpreting theories. Polysystem Theory (PT), proposed byItamar Even-Zohar from Tel Aviv University, is thought to be a veryimportant part of the contemporary western translation theories. Howeverit is from 2002 that Fr began to be introduced to and gradually accepted inChina. This theory, due to its unique research approaches and researchperspectives, is attracting more attention than before from both the scholarsand the translation workers at home. Because of the close relationsbetween translating and interpreting and also PT's strong explanatoryability, the author believes that whether PT can be applied to interpretingstudies is of tremendous meaning and worth studying.The author first introduces the main ideas of PT. Then with thepurpose to reveal the relevance of interpreting studies and PT in mind, shemakes a deliberate study and analysis of the collected interpreting literature.In this process the author finds out that interpreting studies can be cardedout under the following 5 categories: (1) "Empirical research ininterpreting"; (2)"Prescriptiveness and descriptiveness in interpreting"; (3) "Source-orientedness and target-orientedness in interpreting"; (4)"Interpreting and culture"; and (5) "Norms in interpreting". The reason theauthor would center all her attention on these 5 aspects is they summarizePT's research approaches (descriptive, targeted-oriented, functional,systematic, and dynamic) on one hand, and highly epitomize PT's attentionto the social and cultural context where the texts are produced.The author's study of the interpreting literature indicates that PT'sterms, concepts, hypotheses are extensively used in interpreting studies;Zohar's PT, initially targeted at explaining translation problems, is a verygood theory that can be used to well explain interpreting phenomena andproblems as well. To give more conviction to this argument, the authormakes a further study of this issue from the theoretical level, which is stillfocused on the very 5 categories for the reasons mentioned above and alsofor logic and coherence. The author's careful study of the interpretingliterature in Chapter 2 and the theoretical support from Chapter 3 provesthat PT, originally a theory for translating, can also be applied tointerpreting studies.The author, in Chapter3, also reflects on the matter of whether PT canbe used as a general theory of translation because this thesis does nottotally ignore the other form of translation, although it takes interpretingstudies as its focus of study. The author believes that although PT can beused to explain a variety of problems in both translating and interpreting, it's not general enough to explain all translation phenomena due to thelimitations of its research paradigms. And this can be supplemented byintroducing some methods from interpreting studies for PT's use likepaying equal attention to the "black box"- the translator's cerebralorganization and their brain activities in the translation process. In the endthe author calls for more conversation, communication and cooperationbetween translating and interpreting, in both research and theory.