| Language is a semiotic system which is both restrained by the communicationprocess and branded with the psychological prints of communicators. It follows that thementality of a nation can get reflected in the vocabulary as it does in its culture. As aninevitable linguistic phenomenon of a nation, abusive language can, to some extent,reflect the cultural and psychological characteristics of the nation. Studies of thetranslation of abusive terms from one culture to another can facilitate the understandingand communication between the cultures and nations concerned, which thereforenecessitates the present study.Based on Halliday’s register theory, this thesis focuses on the dimensions of fieldand tenor and proposes two contextual variables which may hold sway in the translationof abusive terms, namely the cultural information and swearing function of abusive terms.Starting from this perspective, this study conducts a corpus-based comparative analysisof the various English translations of some of the most frequently used abusive terms inHong Lou Meng (or Dream of the Red Chamber). The objective of the study consists ofan investigation of (1) what are strategies the translators adopted,(2) what are thesimilarities and differences of their translations, and (3) what implications can be drawnfor future translation studies and translation practice. The data of the study come fromHLM, the120-chapter Chinese vernacular classical novel, and its three English completetranslations by Geoffrey Bonsall (unpublished,1950s), David Hawkes and John Minford(1973-86), and Hsien-yi Yang and Gladys Yang (1978-80) respectively.The study finds that the three translators’ English renditions of the Chinese abusiveterms arise more differences with both pros and cons. Hawkes and Minford prefer a freetranslation strategy. While the translators attach more importance to the equivalencebetween the Chinese abusive terms and their English renditions on the dimension of tenor,i.e., the swearing function of the terms, they neglect to convey the full cultural content ofthe Chinese terms in question. Likewise, the Yangs also adopt a free translation strategy,and give priority consideration to the representation of tenor of the abusive terms, i.e., theswearing function. The Yangs’ translation shows a higher degree of success in conveying the cultural content of the Chinese terms in question than Hawkes and Minford, butlower than Bonsall, who, by using a more literal method, achieves a higher equivalencein terms of the cultural content. In other words, while Bonsall succeeds in conveying thefield variable of the Chinese abusive terms, namely the cultural information, he fails torepresent the tenor variable of the terms, that is, the swearing function.This study concludes that to translate Chinese abusive terms requires a two-foldconsideration, that is, to represent in the target language both the situational variables offield and tenor. As far as the general translation strategies are concerned, a more literalmethod can be employed where a similarity in the cultural content can be found betweenthe source terms and their counterparts; where there exists a diametric difference betweenthe two languages in terms of the cultural content of the abusive terms concerned, a moreappropriate approach is to adopt a literal strategy plus free interpretations. Admittedly,the cultural differences between Chinese and English make it very hard to take intoconsideration both the field and tenor variables of Chinese abusive terms. Under suchcircumstances, the decision of what strategy to adopt remains with the translators and isidentical with their purposes of translation. |
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