The Study On The Two Versions Of The Bonesetter’s Daughter From The Perspective Of Catford’s Translation Shifts Theory

The Bonesetter’s Daughter is one of the novels written by Amy Tan, the famous Chinese American Literature(CAL) writer. There are two versions of this novel translated by Shi Qingzhen and Zhang Kun separately in China. In Catford’s opinion, translation is a process of replacing one language material with another equivalent language material, the key point of translation is to find equivalent components of the SL. Then the translators should consider how to achieve translation equivalence and convey the SL loyally to the target readers.In this thesis the author will analyze the two versions from the perspective of Catford’s translation shifts theory: level shifts and category shifts to discuss the translation methods they adopted as well as the effects of their versions among the target readers.Catford divided translation equivalence into textual equivalence and formal correspondence further. Because of the deficiency of culture and languages between two languages, the translators should try to get textual equivalence instead of absolute formal correspondence. Then the departure of form appears in the translation is the translation shifts raised by Catford. But the author believes that because of the specialty of Chinese American Literature, particularly the Chinglish in the novels, translators should try to meet the formal correspondence to reappear the inner activity of the characters.By studying the two versions the author finds that both of the two translators used translation shifts in their translation and took the target readers into consideration to achieve the equivalent of the SL and TL. The author also finds that on the translation of culture-loaded words, especially the Chiglish sentences, there are advantages and insufficient of them and the author will propose her opinions and suggestions which offer guidance and empirical examples for our translation practice.