A Study Of English Translation Of Culture-loaded Words In The Version Of Lunyu By William E.Soothill

As the representative of Confucianism,Lunyu,as well as the key concepts involved,such as“Ren”“Yi”“Li”“Zhi”“Xin”and so on has demonstrated their practical values not only on the establishment of a harmonious society in China,but also on the relief of social conflicts in the western world.Since the 19~thh century,various English versions of Lunyu have been translated by western missionaries,which promotes the spreading of Chinese culture,and brings effective solutions for social constructions to some extent.As a missionary of English Protestantism,William Edward Soothill had been assiduously preaching Christian thoughts in Wenchou,China for almost twenty-six years.On the basis of enlightenment of former missionary translators,Soothill devoted himself to the academic studies of Chinese classics and his work The Analects of Confucius was honored as the most acceptable English version of Lunyu by Oxford University.American famous translation theorist Eugene Nida systematically classified culture into five categories:linguistic culture,material culture,social culture,ecological culture and religious culture.So culture-loaded words in Lunyu are correspondingly divided into five types:linguistic culture-loaded words,material culture-loaded words,social culture-loaded words,ecological culture-loaded words and religious culture-loaded words.The thesis is going to analyze culture-loaded words in The Analects of Confucius by William Edward Soothill from the perspective of the Manipulation Theory.In the 1980s,Belgian theorist AndréLefevere put forward the famous Manipulation Theory,which turned the focus of translation studies from the linguistic aspect to the cultural aspect.The main opinion held by Lefevere is that translation is a kind of rewriting of the source text,and the rewriting is also a form of manipulation of the source text under the influence of various factors.The process of rewriting or translation will definitely be affected by ideology,poetics and patronage,the three key factors of the Manipulation Theory.The cultural attitude of a translator or a translation is largely determined by ideology and patronage,while translation strategies of a translator are profoundly affected by poetics.The thesis analyzes translation strategies of five types of culture-loaded words in The Analects of Confucius by William Edward Soothill as well as his cultural attitude with the descriptive method.Main findings are as follows:Firstly,Soothill loved Chinese and the Chinese culture,and he tried every means to represent the traditional Chinese culture for western readers with more comprehensible words and expressions.Therefore,there is no doubt that linguistic and ecological culture-loaded words in the source text are interpreted with translation method of literal translation or transliteration plus annotations.Secondly,in terms of social culture-loaded words,Soothill combined two translation strategies,domestication and foreignization,which not only make his English version readable,but also provided readers with the unique foreign culture.Thirdly,from the perspective of the translator himself,no matter how appreciative toward Confucianism,under the influence from both various factors and the special identity of himself,William Edward Soothill could not keep a relatively fair balance between Chinese and western culture.When dealing with material culture-loaded words with unique cultural connotations or images,translation methods,such as substitution and omission are frequently utilized,which reveals an obvious western cultural attitude of Soothill.Finally,because of the synthetic effect of ideology,poetics and patronage,Soothill was more likely to adopt the translation method of domestication,which is especially conspicuous in the translation of religious culture-loaded words,The thesis analyzes culture-loaded words in The Analects of Confucius by William Edward Soothill from the perspective of“three key factors”in the Manipulation Theory.Five categories of culture-loaded words,their corresponding translation strategies in Soothill’s version,and the cultural attitude of the translator are further dissected.The thesis will provide a new direction for studies on English translation of Lunyu.