Influence Of Translator’s Cultural Identity On Translation

The concept of "cultural identity" was introduced to Chinese scholars at the end of the20th century with the increasing cultural globalization, which has greatly influenced the study of Chinese contemporary culture and literature. In western academic circles, cultural identity involves a wide range of research fields, displaying its significant value in arts and humanities. As to translation studies the issue that a translator’s cultural identity influences his/her translation has aroused heated discussions in the process of cultural turn.The concept of "cultural turn" broke the limitation of dichotomy between the source text and the target text in linguistic correspondence. Translation is no longer regarded as the transformation between languages, but as an issue considered under broader cultural context. The translator’s cultural identity, therefore, plays a dominant part in the studies, drawing relevant studies into the field of cultural turn. In the process of translating, the translator reveals his/her cultural identity intentionally or unintentionally, and his cultural identity is constructed by the selection of texts to be translated and the selection of translation strategies. As a consequence, to analyze the translator’s cultural identity is helpful for readers to have a profound understanding of the translator’s principles of text choice and strategy application, and of his/her intention for cultural exchange as well.The present thesis conducts a case study of four typical English versions of Sheng Sheng Man by translators who have quite different cultural identities. It is aimed to discuss the impact of a translator’s cultural identity on translation. The translators for the case study including the diasporic translator Lin Yutang, the western sinologist Kenneth Rexroth, Yang Xianyi&Gladys Yang who are a perfect couple of western and eastern combination, and the Chinese School translator Xu Yuanchong. The thesis discusses the influence of different cultural identities of these translators on the process of translating Sheng Sheng Man. The comparative analysis and discussion reveal that the translator’s cultural identity has much influence on the selection of texts to be translated and the selection of translation strategies, demonstrating the roles of translators’diverse cultural identities in promoting cultural exchanges between China and the West.The thesis consists of six chapters. The first chapter introduces the background of the research, and then the second chapter is the literature review of studies on Sheng Sheng Man and cultural identity respectively. The following chapter gives a detailed introduction of the theoretical foundation. The fourth chapter offers an analysis of the four translators’cultural identity in general. Chapter five is the major part, which carries out the analysis of the four translators’cultural identity on the translations of Sheng Sheng Man. The last chapter concludes the contribution and limitation of the present study.