On Li Jianbo And Lu Chengyi’s Transaltion Of The Women Warrior—From The Perspective Of Nida’s Functional Equivalence

This thesis attempts to make a research on Li Jianbo and Lu Chengyi’s translation of Maxine Hong Kinston’s The Women Warrior in the light of Eugene Nida’s functional equivalence. The Women Warrior is a glittering pearl, a fame-rewarding writing which is very popular in North America. The reason is that it is an archetype of a strong female in legend and literature, who blends autobiography with old Chinese folktales in a tone of "talk story" to her English readers. Hence this book boasts of characteristic of hybridity. The Chinese version translated by Li Jianbo and Lu Chengyi is so popular to all the Chinese readers, it is really a good case to study how this theory works in Chinese version The Women Warrior, and prove the feasibility of the theory of functional equivalence in practical process of literature translation. Functional equivalence is the most important and influential translation theory advanced by Eugene A. Nida. Eugene Nida’s Functional Equivalence theory has attracted the scholars’attention since1980s in China. His theory focuses on readers’response rather than on the original text and translated text, which is different from the traditional theories. It stresses achieving the closest natural equivalence to the source text, first in meaning, secondly in style. However, this theory also emphasizes the importance of form. At the beginning, the author of this thesis attempts to analyze how Li and Lu achieve functional equivalence in terms of semantic level. Later, the author of this thesis studies how Li Jianbo and Lu Chengyi process cultural transplantation in their translation. Finally, the author shows stylistic equivalence in Chinese version citing some examples. The successful translation practice of their translation should be studied by other literary translation researchers and enrich the Chinese American literature in china. This thesis attempts to study on Li Jianbo and Lu Chengyi’s translation of Maxine Hong Kinston’s The Women Warrior in the light of Eugene A. Nida’s functional equivalence at various aspects and to explore strategies adopted in the process of translation.