Meme-transfer Of Culture-loaded Words

This practice of simulated simultaneous interpretation was guided by memetics,with the interpreting materials selected from Episode 2 and Episode 4 of the TV series Lecture Room:Ma Weidu on Furniture Collection,in which the speaker introduced to the audience the history and cultural origins of the traditional Chinese furniture and also provided valuable experience for people interested in furniture collection.The language of the selected materials is colloquial,concise and clear but with a large number of culture-loaded words,which made the practice and corresponding report valuable and practical.Inspired by Darwin’s theory of evolution,memetics is a theory that draws an analogy between the evolution and dissemination of cultural information and the process of gene replication,by which the explanation of cultural transfer is made possible.Meme is called since cultural information unit is similar to a gene,a concept that was first proposed by Richard Dawkins.It has also been widely used in many fields of research,with Andrew Chesterman being the first scholar to combine memetics with translation theory,while Francis Heylighen proposed that successful memes must go through four cycles:assimilation,retention,expression and transmission.Based on memetics and traditional Chinese cultural interpretation,this paper aims to explore the meme-transfer of culture-loaded words and corresponding coping strategies in the context of Chinese-English simultaneous interpretation,with a view to providing some valuable discoveries for cross-cultural communication between China and the rest of the world.The main body of this report is divided into five parts:the first part is task description,including the background,features,and significance of the task;the second part is task process,including pre-task preparation,simulated interpreting,and quality assessment;the third part is related literature,including introduction to memetics and previous studies;the fourth part is case analysis,including difficulties,classification of culture-loaded words,and coping strategies;the fifth part is conclusion,including major findings and limitations.