Untranslatability To Translatability From The Perspective Of Prototype Theory

As China's national strength continues to increase,people are paying more and more attention to the role of cultural soft power.In order to let our country's excellent traditional culture go abroad,the translation of traditional cultural classics plays a vital role in cultural output.As one of the four famous Chinese classics,Journey to the West contains profound traditional culture and religious culture.One of the tasks of translation is to spread culture.With the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation and the enhancement of cultural self-confidence,Chinese traditional culture will be accepted by more and more people.By that time,Chinese traditional classic literature will gradually become translatable in the process of untranslatability.For a long time,translatability and untranslatability are theoretical issues that have long been debated by various schools on translation issues.At the same time,various schools have also proposed a method of converting untranslatability to translatability.Prototype theory in the 1970 s has been applied to many fields of research.Its basic characteristics are abstraction,integration,dynamics and priority.These characteristics of the prototype make the prototype theory very adaptable and persuasive to many fields of research,including translation studies.Prototype is the best example of any category.This thesis attempts to analyze the translatability and untranslatability of translation from a new perspective,namely,the theory of prototype.The research questions in this thesis are as follows.(1)What is the relationship between translatability and untranslatability from prototype theory?(2)How is untranslatability converted into translatability in the two English translations of Journey to the West from the perspective of prototype theory?(3)Which translated version of Journey to the West is more in line with the prototype theory in the traditional Chinese culture,religious culture and ancient poetry?There are many English translations of Journey to the West.Among them,the English translations of Jenner and Yu Guofan are the only two full translations.In this thesis,these two full translations are used as research texts to analyze the translatability and untranslatability of translation.The research method in this thesis is comparative analysis.The following conclusions are based on this method.The results show that:(1)The marginal members of translatability and untranslatability have the characteristics of unstable position and unclear boundaries,which are consistent with the characteristics of prototype theory.Therefore,translatability and untranslatability can be regarded as prototype.(2)The prototype is defined as the core example of any category,the best example in that category.Prototype theory,when applied to the translation process,refers to the best example of finding the source language in the target language in forms and content.In the face of untranslatable problems,finding the most representative source language examples in the target language not only helps the target language readers understand the meaning of the source language,but also facilitates the spread of the source language culture.It turns out that applying archetypal theory to translation can effectively solve the problem of translatability and untranslatability.(3)In terms of Chinese traditional culture,religious culture and ancient poetry,Yu Guofan's English translation of Journey to the West is more in line with Jenner's English translation.This thesis applies the prototype category theory in cognitive linguistics to translation studies,which not only helps to deepen our understanding of prototype theory and broadens the scope of research on prototype theory,but also enriches and promotes the development of translation studies.