Cultural Connotations Of Chinese Dish Names And Their English Translation

Chinese cuisine culture is reputable for its delicacy and profoundness throughoutthe world. And Chinese dish name is with no doubt an effective means to informforeigners of Chinese cuisine culture. These dish names not only reflect some basicinformation of a certain dish, including the variety of ingredients, cooking methods,color, aroma, taste, appearance, but also contain a lot of cultural elements such as dishinitiators, original places, auspicious words, etc.. Thus, it is of great significance topromote interactions among different nations by accurate translation of dish namesand proper transmission of their cultural information.But cuisine has rarely been considered worthy of serious academic study, and thestudy of dish name translation is not enough. By viewing the current situation of thetranslation of Chinese dish names, it is not difficult to find out that except thelinguistic factors, there are cultural factors overlooked in the translating process.Some Chinese dish names are imbued with rich cultural connotations and can not berightly reflected in their English counterpart. The problem caused by the lack ofknowledge in cultural factors is an neglected researching area. That is the dish namesare always translated improperly, which makes westerners puzzled and causesmisunderstanding. Thus, there’s an urgent need to enlarge such practical research areafor better cultural transmission between different cultures.And this thesis paper will discuss the English translation of Chinese dish namesfrom the cultural perspective, taking the cultural translation theory, foreignization anddomestication strategies as the theoretical foundations. There are two main focuses ofthis thesis paper. One is to give an exploration of the cultural connotations of Chinesedish names, including the cultural background information and cultural mentalityreflected in these dish names. The other is to provide the strategies for their translationso as to maintain the original cultural flavor. Through a sequence of analysis, theauthor suggests that the translators should enhance their cultural awareness so as tobetter convey Chinese culture to the outside world.