On Principles And Strategies Of Metaphor Translation In An Integrated Framework Of Relevance Theory And Conceptual Mapping

Since the 1970s, metaphor has been one of the hottest issues in various disciplines of foreign countries. Metaphor studies have been developing rapidly, especially in the cognitive field. The study of cognitive metaphor has revealed that metaphor is not merely a language phenomenon but a cognitive one as well. On one hand, among those studies, Lakoff and Johnson's Conceptual Metaphor Theory has put forward Conceptual Mapping, which describes the working mechanism of metaphor as a mapping projected from one conceptual domain onto another. On the other hand, Sperber and Wilson's Relevance Theory has realized its functional transference from pragmatics to cognitive linguistics. During the 1990s, Gutt, Wilson's student, has proposed a Relevance-Theoretical Approach and opened a new vista in translation theories.Compared with the promising development of metaphor, the research on metaphor translation has been outshone both in scales and in results. Differences of the cognitive experience, the language characteristics and styles as well as cultural background make metaphor translation a hard nut to crack for translators and scholars.This thesis attempts an interpretative research on metaphor translation with its focus on communicative process, the result and participants and has proposed new principles and strategies for metaphor translation in the theoretical framework of Conceptual Mapping and Relevance Theory. Here are the main contributions of the study:1. Providing two principles for metaphor translation:Principle 1:Establishment of Optimal Cognitive Relevance between Two Cultural ContextsPrinciple 2:Preservation of Cognitive Metaphor in TLPrinciple 1 ensures that the communicative intention of the original author is precisely comprehended by the translator. He or she perceives and absorbs the cultural implicature embodied in the images of the original text, and then by resorting to cognitive reasoning, finds out optimal relevance between Source Language and Target Language. Principle 2 ensures that the translator can seek or create a cognitive metaphor in TL which is functionally equivalent to that in SL. Principle 1 is the precondition of Principle 2 by default and the applications of the two principles are chronological.2. Providing two strategies in case of violation of Principle 2:Strategy 1:Displaying Image of SL Supplemented with GroundingStrategy 2:Displaying Grounding OnlyViolation of Principle 2 is the application condition for the two strategies. In Strategy 1, the cultural image of the original text reappears with target language supplemented by its implied meaning, which in Conceptual Mapping mode is considered as "grounding". Strategy 2 only externalizes the grounding while deliberately avoiding the reappearance of the original cultural image in view of unnecessary speculation on image loss. The translator makes his or her strategy choices after a comprehensive consideration on both the communicative intention from the original author and the expectation and acceptability from the readers. The two strategies and Principle 2 are exclusive and they are applied respectively in metaphor translation.3. Integrating a Framework in the Interest of Metaphor Translation Process:The framework integrates the two rounds of ostensive-inferential processes advocated by Gutt with three Conceptual Mapping modes, involving three communicators, the original author, the translator and the reader. In the first round of the translating process, Principle 1 is applied. The translator establishes the optimal cognitive relevance on the basis of the communicative intention, and the first round of process ends up with the grounding determination. Then grounding realizes its language transfer and when it comes to the second round of translating process, the translator conveys the communicative intention to the reader. At this moment, he or she needs to figure out a vehicle in TL which can be projected onto the grounding. If there's little chance to figure out an appropriate image as the vehicle, the translator is allowed to choose either strategy in accordance with his priority.Five chapters compose the whole thesis:Chapter 1 gives a brief introduction to the motivation, methodology and the structure of the thesis. Chapter 2 reviews and discusses some representative metaphor theories in the West. A combing of Chinese metaphor research results over centuries is also carried out. Some evaluation work on traditional classification of metaphor translation is done in the aspects of systematicness, theories, specificness and standardization. At the end of Chapter 2, Newmark's Seven Procedures are regarded as the most authoritative up to now. Chapter 3 explores the relationship between Conceptual Mapping and translation, reaching a conclusion that translation mechanism is a mapping projected from a cultural domain onto another one. Gutt's views on ostensive-inferential communication are also discussed, followed by the proposal of two principles and two strategies with illustrated examples. In Chapter 4, a case study of metaphor translation in Rapid Transformation:A 90-day Plan for Fast and Effective Change is carried out in the integrated framework of Relevance Theory and Conceptual Mapping, with the aim to testify the validity of the principles and strategies. Chapter 5 serves as a conclusion. It summarizes the thesis and takes a logical review on the main arguments, pointing out the major contributions and the limitations of this paper. At last some suggestions for future studies are discussed.