A Study Of The C-E Translation Of Public Signs From The Perspective Of Memetics

With the rapid development of globalization, especially the success of Beijing Olympic Games in 2008 and Shanghai World Expo in 2010, the communication between China and foreign countries is greatly increasing. More and more foreigners come to China for the purpose of studying, traveling, business investment and even for long-term settlement, for which reason, public signs play an important role in cross-cultural communication. Under this circumstance, people begin to pay much attention to the cultural communication which is represented by public signs. Therefore successful and idiomatic C-E translation of public signs is necessary to provide a convenient and safe living and working environment for foreigners, which can also reflects China’s inclusive attitude towards different peoples and diverse cultures. However, the fact is that there are many erroneous translations of public signs in China at present, including some major and international cities like Beijing and Shanghai. Some of wrong translations are caused by spelling or grammar mistakes, and some mistranslated public signs result from cultural gaps or non-proficiency of translators. No matter what kind of reasons for inappropriate C-E translation of public signs, all of them will definitely influence China’s nation image and status in international competition, so the whole country has to engage in the campaign against those troublesome translations.The significance of launching comprehensive and normative study on C-E translation of public signs is great. The first aspect is an economic one. Successful and idiomatic translation of public signs will establish a better international image for China and improve China’s competitive power. What’s more, it can also provide a comfortable and convenient living and working environment to attract increasing number of foreigners to set up Sino-foreign cooperative enterprises in China and thus promote the economic development of China. The second one is a tourist perspective. Proper translation of public signs can not only make foreign visitors have a clear understanding about the history and cultural significance of ancient buildings and objects, they can also ensure these foreigners’safety during the process of visiting with their restriction and warning function. The third aspect is a cultural view. Public signs existing in foreigners’daily life and work play a critical role in disseminating Chinese culture and successful and appropriate translation of these public signs is the first step. The last one is an academic perspective. Because the research of C-E translation of public signs started just in recent years both limited in quality and quantity, and systematic and solid principles have not been established, more studies of C-E translation of public signs are of great academic and theoretical significance.Memetics is a new theory created by Richard Dawkins in his famous book The Selfish Gene (1976) explaining the theory of cultural revolution. Besides, some important terminologies in the theory of memetics should be understood, such as, host and vector, memeplex and meme pool, strong meme and weak meme, memotype and memetic phenotype, etc. Language is a kind of meme from the perspective of communication, while meme is also a special kind of language, which can take the form of any part of language, like words, phrases, sentences, paragraphs, texts and so on. According to Dawkins, anything that can be transmitted through imitation and replication in the process of cultural revolution is called meme. It is Andrew Chesterman that brings memetics into translation field and proposes the theory of "translation of memes" for the first time. In Chesterman’s point of view, translation is one of the branches of memetics. He tries to use memetics to explain translation problems and explore the revolution and formation rules of translation theory. It is the transmissions and replications of translating memes that prompt the development and evolution of translation theory. Public signs, as a special kind of language, are also can be regarded as a particular kind of meme pool including various singular memes and memeplex. Therefore, we get the term of public sign meme, which refers to the meme or memeplex that the public sign carries. In this sense, the translation of public sign is actually the conversion of source public sign meme into target language’s public sign meme, as long as appropriate translation principles and strategies are adopted, public sign translation will achieve great success.After reading and concluding large amounts of materials, the author finds out that most of theories studying the C-E translation of public signs are based on Functional Translation Theory, Adaptation Theory, Skopos Theory, Intertextuality Theory, Text Typology, Discourse Analysis Theory, Relevance Theory, Eco-translatology, etc. Therefore, memetics is a brand-new perspective.The thesis starts from a brand-new perspective-memetics to study the C-E translation of public signs. After reading abundant previous literature materials, and collecting writing materials personally, the author taking the method of document research carries out four strategies of public sign translation, namely, equivalence strategy, adapting strategy, creating strategy and omission strategy. Although the paper also has some limitations due to the limited space, time, money and other qualifications, and the feasibility and validity of the proposed theory and strategies need to be proved by practice, the author hopes it can do a little contribution to China’s standardization of public sign translation.