Cultural And Pragmatic Approaches To Translating Chinese Idioms Into English

This thesis is designed to analyze the translation of Chinese idioms from cultural and pragmatic perspectives. Idioms are a special component of Chinese language. They embody rich cultural connotations and are widely used in people's daily life. Therefore, Chinese idioms have long been the topic and focus of scholars: lots of studies and researches have been done by them, and many papers even books have been written in this field. But previous studies of Chinese idioms have largely focused on their origins, scope, semantic properties as well as cultural background of such expressions, and rarely on their translation using cultural and pragmatic approaches. Pei Wen, a famous linguist, said in February of 1999 at Harvard University that"what we need most at present, I believe, is not a new theory, but a different angle". The thesis studies the translation of idioms from new perspectives: culture and pragmatics. It is an integrated study paying due and equal attention to cultural and pragmatic approaches. It is a dynamic research on Chinese idioms and their translation. Moreover, the research breaks the current restriction on idiom translation study in which cultural influence plays a dominant role, and introduces a new perspective to this field. A brief introduction to the general plan of the thesis is given in the following paragraph.The thesis first makes a brief introduction to the motive, background, structure and aims of the study. Then, it presents the definition and characteristics of Chinese idioms, which lays a foundation for the translation study of Chinese idioms. Based on that, the thesis elaborates on the cultural connotations embedded in idioms from regional, conventional, historical and religious aspect. Such connotations can never be underestimated in translating idioms, for the soul of most idioms dwells on their cultural connotations. After that, the thesis studies Chinese idioms from another perspective: pragmatics. It discusses in detail the cultural context and functions of Chinese idioms as well as the functions fulfilled by cultural context. Cultural context imposes restrictions on translation work; however, its interpretative function grants the translator more freedom in choosing translation method. Based on the cultural and pragmatic study of Chinese idioms, the thesis expatiates upon the translation of Chinese idioms. In this section, it first expounds two strategies of idiom translation, foreignization and domestication, as well as key variables that exercise impact on choosing translation methods. The five translation methods covered in the thesis are placed according to the order of foreignization of higher grade to domestication of higher grade: literal translation, literal translation with explanation or annotation, omission, free translation, and adaptation. And then, the thesis expatiates upon the application of translation methods with examples, which are all sentences with idioms and chosen from literary works so as to provide the linguistic context of idioms. In the end, the thesis concludes that before rendering a translation, the translator should make a detailed study of the idiom in terms of its cultural connotations, cultural context and functions. Then, he/she chooses an appropriate method to obtain the best effect by taking into consideration those four factors: purpose of translation, intended audience, intension of the author, and the context. The study is carried out with the purpose of making due contributions to translation studies, especially to translation of Chinese idioms. In addition, the author hopes that the thesis might be conducive to people during their understanding and appreciation of Chinese idioms and that the thesis might provide new perspectives for people engaged in this field.