| This study is largely motivated by the imbalance between the growing importance of Chinese films and inadequate research into film subtitling. On the one hand, the trend of globalization has witnessed the enormous impact of Chinese films on its domestic economy and cross-cultural exchanges. On the other hand, however, research into film subtitling has not received due attention from the translation field. In view of this paradox, this thesis attempts to construct an adaptability model for subtitling from a macro-pragmatic perspective. It is hoped to provide a systematic and coherent framework for studies on subtitling. Besides, the model may also shed light on the subtitling practice. It may be conducive to the creation of well-translated subtitles, thus promoting cross-cultural communication and developing the global market for Chinese films.The adaptability model is proposed on the ground of Verschueren's Adaptability Theory. This theory is viewed as a cognitive, social and physical perspective on linguistic phenomena in relation to their functioning. Therefore, it can compensate for the limitations of the previous single research perspective, and may be applicable to the formation of a systematic framework for subtitling. According to this theory, language use is a continuous process of choice-making out of linguistic and extra-linguistic reasons to achieve the communicative purposes. The making of appropriate choices depends on adaptability. Within this theoretical framework, it would be argued that successful subtitling relies on translators' flexible adoption of translation methods, guided by their continuous linguistic and extra-linguistic adaptability under the technical and textual constraints of subtitling.To demonstrate this argument, a qualitative analysis is conducted on the English subtitles of seven internationally acclaimed Chinese films. The analysis focuses on the description and explanation of the translators' adaptability, that is, their ability to flexibly negotiate with the potential translation methods. It is triggered by the Chinese and English dissimilarity in linguistic structures and extra-linguistic contexts. The former involves their differences at phonological, lexical, syntactic and discoursal levels; the latter relates to their differences in mental, socio-cultural and physicalsettings. Influenced by these parameters, the translators have used a range oftarget-oriented methods (e.g. explicitation, generalization, substitution, condensation,deletion, restitution, etc.) with some source-oriented methods (e.g. transliteration andjuxtaposition) on occasion. |
