| Zhongyong is an extremely important classic among all the Confucian works.It is also known as one of “The Four Books” with The Analects of Confucius,The Mencius,and The Great Learning.As a classic masterpiece of Chinese culture,Zhongyong has a history of more than 300 years of translation,having a profound impact on both China and the West.The thoughts contained inspire them to re-exam the European culture and build their own theories.The influence of Zhongyong is not restricted in the past but also at present.As a concentrated expression form of Chinese culture and its national spirit,Chinese philosophical classics have become one of the most important genres in contemporary translation studies under the wave of promoting Chinese culture to “go global”.Moreover,the study of the translation by foreign translators in history provides us with another brand-new perspective today to spot the difference in cultural and philosophical traditions.The development of cognitive science could provide us with effective tools and theories to review these philosophical differences between the lines.Under the cognitive perspective,the study makes a comparison between the original text of Zhongyong and its English translation counterpart The Doctrine of the Mean by James Legge,in hope of exploring the translation deviations in the target text,explaining these differences and discovering how their philosophical traditions cast the influence upon them respectively.Through the comparative study,it is found out that the category view,attentional view and the embodiment view are important components in textual meaning-construction and meaning-conveyance.By detailed analysis of these three factors and how they are constructed in the original text and its translation by James Legge,the cognition structure under these two texts can be revealed respectively,further providing us with a new angle to dig out the potential value in this translation and better knowledge about the philosophical traditions behind these two languages and cultures.Based on the analysis,the difference of philosophical traditions between China and the west could be summarized as follow.To begin with,they hold different attitudes toward the real world.Western philosophers' thinking is based on the separation and confrontation between the ontologicalworld from the reality.Chinese philosophy,on the contrary,emphasizes the "harmony between man and nature",and its spiritual pursuit is also different from that of the west.Secondly,when it comes to the relation between human and the external world,western philosophers always start from analysis of various determinant entities,which results in their atomic and physical habitual mindset.However,Chinese philosophers are more interested in the relation among various entities and human.Their thinking comes from the connection between the subjects,namely,human and the object world.This is a non-atomic,non-physical way of thinking.Thirdly,there are many discussions about the relation between human and nature in western philosophical history,while most Chinese philosophers are more interested in the relations between people and society and of people themselves.They emphasize on the practical implication of philosophy,instead of pure metaphysics studies.Last but not least,Chinese and western philosophers also have a difference in how to express their theories.In the history of Chinese philosophy,the expression of philosophical wisdom is eclectic,while the western one concentrates mostly on logical argumentation.In sum,all these philosophical differences are shown under comparison of these two philosophical systems,which means these differences are more on the sense of relativity instead of being absolute and unchangeable.With the increasing development of globalization and modernization,Chinese philosophy also changes along the process,which results in differences also between the ancient and modern traditions of Chinese philosophy internally. |
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