Imagery Cultural Transmission In English Translation Of Classical Chinese Literature From The Perspective Of Cultural Linguistic

Within the realm of translation,linguistic levels had always been the focus of traditional translation studies for a very long time in history.The quality of translation had always been decided by the level of lexicon and grammar of source languages and the target languages.However,translation is a kind of communication,and the result of translation is decided by the understanding of the target people who receive it.Translations cannot be assessed only by lexicon,grammar and rhetorical devices.The key point is that the extent to which receivers correctly understand and appreciated the translated versionsSince the 1970 s,the emergence of Western cultural turn in translation studies,the role of cultural factors in the process of translating has began to received more and more attention from translators and researches.In 1996,Palmer,an American anthropologist,proposed the concept of cultural linguistics,in which put culture,language and imagery of the three into the core of his research,in order to provide certain theoretical guidance for language phenomenon originated from the cultures.China has a history of more than 5000 years.As one of the most remarkable treasures that Chinese culture has devoted to the world,Confucianism has existed for nearly 2500 years.Many valuable and influential cultural traditions are recorded in LunYu,which later became classics in Chinese culture.Confucianism and its doctrines have not only shed a profound light on Chinese culture and ideology,but also counted for much in the rest of the world.The faith that Confucianism advocates has been taaken as the major source of the Chinese intellectual thinking and civilization.As one of the most remarkable classical works in history,Lun Yu has been highly praised in China,and has had a profound impact abroad.There are many versions of this hard but rewarding work.These different versions of the study have given rise to many researches and disputes.Most of these researches focus on the core Confucius terms including:ren,yi,li,zhi,xin(?????).Indubitably,these core terms all represent the spirit of Confucius.Lun Yu also stands in the treasure house of Chinese cultural image.In this case,the evaluation of the translation of cultural image has become an important perspective to appreciate the translation.Cultural images can be seen everywhere in Lun Yu.These images maybe simple,but are extremely vivid,which make the classic more remarkable.At the same time,these cultural images are loaded with rich cultural connotations,which can stimulate infinite imagination.However,it is clear that the translation of the images is not easy,as there are many controversial issues during translation.For instance,the same imagery in Chinese and English may have different associations and connotations due to different cultural backgrounds.Sometimes even the same imagery may represent different images.Overall,the high-level task of the translator is to transfer the imagery of the surface and hidden cultural information into the target language.Therefore,the author of this thesis hopes to find a theory through which we can discover and analyze these special cultural factors,and Palmer's cultural linguistics is one of the theories that put great emphasis on cultural and linguistic factors.Based on the definition and principle of Palmer's cultural linguistics and its core theory about imagery,this thesis discusses the problem of image reconstruction in the English translation of LunYu,It is found that the four principles of imagery in Palmer's theory of cultural linguistics has a strong explanatory power on the guidance of translation procedures in classical Chinese literature.In short,this thesis attempts to explore the more accurate transmission of rich images in Chinese classical literature from the perspective of Palmer's cultural linguistics,and hopes to provide a beneficial answer for the translation of Chinese classics and to promote the better external spread of Chinese traditional culture.The whole thesis consists of 5 chapters besides chapter one of introduction and chapter five of conclusion.It is organized in accordance to the following arrangement.Chapter1 depicts a general introduction of this thesis,briefly informing about the research background,the purpose and questions of the present study.Chapter2 is the literature review,introducing the theoretical framework of Palmer's Cultural Linguistics,the three traditional approaches and the cognitive linguistics that serve as its basis,its emergence as well as its core concept of imagery,and the elaboration on the relationship among imagery,culture,and language.Besides the author will also depict the applications of Palmer's four principles of images.In chapter3,the author introduces the involvement of imagery theory in Chinese ancient literature,and provides an introduction of the classical Chinese literature Lunyu and its English translated version.Besides,various images in LunYu are fully depicted.Chapter4 is the focus of this thesis,which provides the analysis of image translation in Ku Hung-min's translation The Discourses and Sayings of Confucius under the four principles of images in Palmer's Cultural Linguistics.Chapter5 makes a general conclusion of the whole thesis,which summarizes the major findings and points out the limitations of the study based on the previous parts.Furthermore,some suggestions for the future studies will be considered at last in order to perfect the relevant research in the field of imagery translation.