A Corpus-based Study Of The Function And Translation Of Nandao Rhetorical Questions

The thesis, on the basis of the data collected from Cao Xueqin's Hong Lou Meng and its English version, A Dream of Red Mansions by Yang Hsienyi and Gladys Yang, adopts the quantitative approach and the approach of contrastive analysis to explore the semantic and pragmatic function of rhetorical questions and their translations, in an attempt to reveal how the Chinese rhetorical questions are rendered into English. It is hoped that this study sheds some light on the translation and teaching of rhetorical questions. Specifically, the research has the following purposes:(1) Sorting out the translations of "nandao" questions on the basis of previous research and finding out the laws governing their translations from the functional perspective;(2) Analyzing the situation when "nandao" means rhetorical or assumptive and making out the factors influencing identification of rhetorical questions;(3) Exploring factors influencing translation of "nandao" as well as its theoretical and practical value by means of a contrastive study based on "nandao " questions and their translation.Significant findings are obtained from the data-based study, which can be summarized as follows.(1) Not all the "nandao" questions are rhetorical questions. Some can be interroga-tives of assumption.(2) Not all the Chinese rhetorical questions are rendered into English rhetorical questions. Declaratives and imperative sentences can also be adopted.(3) The positive "nandao" questions are usually translated into negative, and the negative ones into positive. Yet the majority of them are rendered into positive ones.(4) Context is crucial to identification of rhetorical questions while pragmatic function plays an important role in deciding which translating strategies to employ. This thesis consists of six Chapters. The first chapter serves as an introduction to the necessity, significance and objectives of the study and the organization of the thesis as well as origin of "nandao"In the second chapter, on the basis of reviewing the previous studies on the Chinese and English rhetorical questions from the perspective of semantic and pragmatic function, a detailed analysis of the function and identification of "nandao" questions as well as the originality of the study are presented.Chapter three briefly narrates the research methodology from two aspects:the research questions and the data collection.Chapter four focuses on the concrete translating strategies of "nandao" questions and narrow them down to several main categories so as to explore the cause for such translation.The fifth chapter is devoted to the discussion of research results from the perspective of context and comparison between Chinese and English rhetorical questions.The last chapter is the conclusion part which states briefly the major findings of the study, its implications, limitations as well as suggestions for further research.