Transgression In Translation-Means Of Communication Between Texts

This thesis probes into translation study from the perspective of transgression, which concerns translation study from the language, culture and also other necessary aspects. Via the exploration on the all-pervading transgression phenomenon in translation and together with the findings in hermeneutics, the author points out that transgression, which is common in translation and also the means how translation is realized, is a combination of deconstruction and construction (reconstruction), and through this kind of combination, translation functions as the communication between texts, languages and cultures.The exploration borrows the notion of transgression and applies it into translation study with the translating and equating of feudalism in Europe with Chinese Fengjian. Both of them have their specific connotations, origins and backgrounds. Fengjian in history, mostly in the Pre-Qin era, is virtually a kind of political construction, corresponding to the system of prefectures and counties after Qin Dynasty. However, feudalism in Europe is not a (political) system, and it refers to the social form of the society (Qian Mu, 1950). Whereas the distinction between them was neglected in translation and the two terms were equaled. The author points out that this thesis is not intended to fix the disputes with this translation but take it as the prelusion and try to find the underlying significance to translation. How can these two terms of different connotations and backgrounds be equated via translation, and how can the connotation of one transgress to the other via translation? What is translated in this case, the meaning (connotation) or the form? Through the exploration on these questions, especially meaning themselves, the author further develops and elaborates on the notion of"transgression", applying it and also spreading other questions to translation as a whole, so as to try to get some new insights on translation.The author then explains"transgression"and defines it in this paper as the migration of meaning. The thesis makes an in-depth study of translation from the basic elements involved, i.e. language and meaning themselves. At the same time, it combines the latest findings in cognitive linguistics, and regards the translation process as a transgression。The author also stresses that transgression in translation is not aiming at erasing the difference between different texts, but conveying the difference and promoting the communication between different texts via unceasing combination of deconstruction and construction (reconstruction).After the notion of transgression is explored on, the author then illustrates the fulfillment and its significance of transgression in translation from the perspective of conceptual blending. Conceptual blending is the indispensable part in any communication model (Wang Bin, 2004). Since meaning is not definite but in continuous migration, transgression will be inevitable; translation as communication between different languages and cultures, it entails far more complicated conceptual blending both in ranges and depths, and it is common with translation, and becomes the innate characteristics of translation. Then, transgression echoes the dissolving of the authority of the text and confirms the emancipation of translation and grants it as the means of communication between different languages and cultures. Therefore, translation is seen as interpretation of the text, a means for mutual communication between different texts, and it has not only stepped over the boundary of meaning but transgresses the limit of space. In this sense, translation is now piercing the constraint of any discrete theoretical premise and reaching an unprecedented freedom.Meanwhile, translation is becoming more and more an inter-discipline, it also finds the swing of other factors, e.g. cultural study findings. The social, cultural and even mental factors are also taken into linguistics and translation study. Moreover, according to cognitive semanticists'findings,"meaning"is not something definite, it is neither something out there nor something from within, but an continuous construction in which the agent integrates on-going aspects of perceptual and conceptual information with more abstract information framework available from personal experience (Wang Bin, 2004). If meaning is something objective out there, there should not be so many misunderstandings in reality. If meaning is something from within, then any text will be subjective and unreadable to most readers but to its author, and composition of any text will become an totally individual and personal activity. With these bases, the author confirms from the perspective of transgression and conceptual blending that translation entails two independent processes, namely the conceptual blending and linguistic reorganization process, in the source and target languages; and translation works, as a result, become something created in a third space. This process first entails the analysis and interpretation of the text within the source context, then the interpretation and reproduction of the target text within the target context. All these processes are conceptual blending in essence and all bear transgression characteristics in a more general sense. Finally, the author points out that as the means and the form how translation is attained, transgression functions as the means of communication between texts in the combination of deconstruction and construction.This thesis is going to exemplify this process and expound all the significance to translation, and all these efforts will start with the exploration of the transgression between Fengjian and feudal.