A Study Of Humor Translation In The Subtitle Of Modern Family From The Perspectives Of Adaptation Theory

In this work, the author chooses Modern Family, one of the most popular comedies nowadays, as the study object and tries to do research in the field of humor subtitle translation with the help of Verschueren’s adaptation theory. Adaptation theory belongs to the pragmatics. Applying it into the research of humor subtitle translation is not only an attempt to widen the application scope of this theory and more importantly it offers a new perspective of studying subtitle translation.Adaptation theory claims that any kind of language using is a process of making dynamic adaptation to two aspects:context and structure. This is due to the three properties of language:variation, adaptation and negotiation. In this work, through analyzing many humor subtitle examples, the author tries to prove the core of adaptation theory---language using is a continuous adapting process. Those examples selected are from Modern Family which version is presented on www.verycd.com. In the first chapter, the author introduces the research background of this work, what is humor subtitle translation, the significance of the research and research methodology. In the second chapter, relative researches have been reviewed, including the previous study both at home and abroad, and the previous application of Verschueren’s adaptation theory in translation studies. In the third chapter, the author introduces what is adaptation theory, and the feasibility of applying adaptation theory to humor subtitle translation. In the fourth chapter, the research has been done from communicative context and structural objects two aspects. At First, the author divides contextual elements into physical world, mental world, personality traits, and social taboo. Then about structural objects, the author makes analysis at phonological level, lexical level, syntactical level and language style. At each level systematic analysis has been made to show how translator makes adaptation in specific situations and how translator’s degree of salience affects the result of translation. In the last chapter, the author concludes the research result of this work. Proves the effectiveness of using adaptation to guide humor subtitle translation, and lists out some practical translation strategies. At meantime, the author points out the limitations of this work and gives out suggestions for further study in this field.Through the research, we can find that although adaptation theory doesn’t belong to translation field, it can effectively guide humor subtitle translation course. Under its guidance translators would know better about when to make proper choice and adaptation and how to retain the humor in original subtitle. Also this work offers some practical translation strategies. The author hopes this work would be helpful and conductive for the people who committed themselves to humor subtitle translation career and contribute to the improvement of audiovisual translation quality in China.