The Mechanism Of TL Cultural Interference Into Translation Practices

The cultural factors in translation studies have attracted more and moreattention since the cultural turn in 1970s, and translation has been regarded asthe exchange not only between languages but also cultures. In the exchange,the influence of translation on target culture has been intensively investigatedwhile that of the target culture on translation has received scant elaboration. Ithas been universally acknowledged that the target language culture does exertinfluence on translation practices. However, what kind of elements areinterfering translation practice and how do they work? With these questions,from the perspective of target language culture, this thesis tries to explore themechanistic construction of target language culture's interference intotranslation practices through the analysis of the factors involved in translationand the ways they influence the translation practices.This thesis consists of six parts. Introduction focuses on the currentstudies on cultural factors in translation within and out of the country, as wellas the contents and significance of this thesis.Chapter one deals with the scope and characteristics of culture andproposes that culture has hierarchy within itself---high layer that includes thesocial norms, conventions, aesthetic values and so on shared by a wholesociety or at least the overwhelming majority of a society, and low layerwhich includes those occupied by individuals or shared by a minor group of members within a society. And the relationship between culture andtranslation will be discussed since the cultural turn in translation studies.Chapter one will also investigate the factors influencing translation practicein the target language culture and explain the reasons why the translator andTT reader will be taken as the key factors for exploration.In chapter two the theories concerning the translator will be dealt with,and then the position and roles of the translator in translation practice will beanalyzed. Generally, we assume there are three roles the translator plays: thereader of the original text, the producer of the target text and the reviewer ofhis production. These roles and the ways in which they work will beelaborated one by one in this chapter.Chapter three focuses on the functions and roles of TT reader. The TTreader's role in traditional translation will be traced back and the theoriesconcerning reader in literary criticism will be borrowed for the analysis of theTT reader. The TT reader plays two prominent roles in translation practice:one is as the intended TT reader and the other is the actual reader ininterpreting and perceiving meaning of target text. And these two roles willbe investigated in detail in this chapter.Chapter four is the most important part of this thesis. On the basis of theanalysis of the three previous chapters, it comes to detect the mechanisticconstruction of target language culture on translation practices. Combiningdifferent layers of target language culture with the roles played by translatorand TT reader, it elaborates the ways and their manifestations of the targetlanguage culture's constraint on translation practices. What's more, suggestions and requirements will be proposed for the translator to follow inorder to better fulfill the obligation of cultural communication of translation.The last part is the conclusion which will sum up what has beeninvestigated in this thesis, the result of this research, and its significance andcontribution to the current translation studies. And the unsatisfactory aspectsof the thesis will also be pointed out in this part.