On Translation Of Chinese Culture-loaded Words Into English In Science And Civilisation In China

In recent years,traditional Chinese classics begin to go out of China and into the world.Thus traditional Chinese culture starts to develop across the whole world.This owes much to the effort of translators and enthusiasts of traditional Chinese classics.However,most of their efforts are made in the translation and transmission of Chinese literary works.Against the background that people regard commerce as superior to agriculture,the translation of agricultural classics of science and technology lacks enough momentum.However,the feudal economy for more than two thousand years has bred a unique agricultural civilisation with an immense number of great books containing much ancient and practical agricultural wisdom in this field.This is a big knowledge treasury for Chinese.As the key part of traditional Chinese classics,Chinese culture-loaded words carrying rich cultural connotations constitute a unique and characteristic culture system.The correct translation of culture-loaded words plays an important part in outputting traditional Chinese works and strengthening cultural communication between the West and the East.Similarly,translation theory has also developed in the practice of translation.In order to make up the insufficiency of former scholars on translation theory,Hu Gengshen came up with an approach to Translation as Adaptation and Selection(TAS)by integrating natural sciences with social sciences.He borrowed the conception of “natural selection” or “survival of the fittest” from Darwinism into translation studies.Professor Hu redefined translation as the translator's activity of adaptation and selection in a translational eco-environment.Just like living creatures having to adapt to the natural environment in order to survive,the translator should adapt to the translational eco-environment to realize self-survival.The third part(Civil Engineering)of the fourth volume of Science and Civilisation in China is written by Joseph Needham with Wang Ling and Lu Guizhen as collaborators.This thesis is designed to take Chinese culture-loaded words involved in this part as the research target and classify them into four categories;then it applies the translation theory of adaptation and selection by Hu Gengshen as the theory basis to study in detail how Joseph Needham and his collaborators adapt to the translational eco-environment constituted by the quoted original Chinese materials,Chinese and English languages,target readers,the social environment at that time and other related factors and to systematically probe into the translation strategy used by the translators in translating culture-loaded words in the Civil Engineering part of this monumental work;moreover,this thesis will analyze the translators' adaptive transformation in dimensions of language,culture and communication and obtain the reason why Science and Civilisation in China is widely accepted among Western readers and thus will provide reference for translating Chinese culture-loaded words in agricultural works of science and technology in ancient China.The result shows that at the macro level,the translation strategy used by Joseph Needham and his collaborators is not limited to simple domestication or foreignization,or free translation or literal translation.Instead,it is their “random” but autonomous choice.Or in other words they choose the best translation strategy in order to survive;at the micro level,the translators adapt to the translational eco-environment and achieve a high level of adaptive selection in dimensions of language,culture and communication and especially of culture and communication.The translation of Chinese culture-loaded words has a high degree of holistic adaptation and selection.For these above reasons,Science and Civilisation in China is well recognized in the Western world and this is also corresponding to the objective when Joseph decided to write this monument at first.