Domestication And Foreignization In The Translation Of The Thirty-six Strategies

Language and culture are closely related. There are a lot of cultural words and culturally-loaded words in each language, which often carry the meaning of a cultural trait particular to a certain socio-cultural community. Domestication and foreignization are two major translating strategies, which are often applied in the translation of cultural words and culturally-loaded words. This thesis, Domestication and Foreignization in the Translation of The Thirty-six Strategies, aims to find some useful translating skills and reveal some factors that may influence translators’ translating strategies, by analyzing the different choices of domestication and foreignization in the two versions of The Thirty-six Strategies. The case study is focused on four aspects: Translating cultural words in the Thirty-six Strategies; Translating culturally-loaded words in the Thirty-six Strategies; Culture differences and their influence on translators; Balance of the two translating strategies in the Thirty-six Strategies.In my view, domestication and foreignization are just two different strategies of translation. And we should not bring them to extremes.Therefore, there is really no point to say that one strategy is better than the other, as long as they can serve the intended function of the text in the target language. Actually, each of them play their own unique roles in translation.Hopefully, the thesis can be helpful for those who are to translate Chinese classics into English.