The cultural turn
The Cultural Turn
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金晓童An analysis of the causes and influences of "cultural turn" in translation history
浅析翻译研究历史中“文化转向”的原因和影响
金晓童 Jin Xiao, Hunan Normal University, China Cult_Turn_EN_1
Abstract
The Culture Turn theorie of translation studies was initially put forword by Bassnett Susan and Andre Lefevre in 1990 in the book Translation, History and Culture: A Source book in which they affirmed that translation is not the simple transform between two languages, it goses in special cultural environment. Since then, the history of translation as a simple tool for the conversion of languages is fading away and gradually transformed into a carrier of culture. There is no doubt that there are differences among different cultures. As a “bridge”, translation plays an intermediary role in the communication between different cultures. However, in the context of globalization becoming the mainstream, the most important problem for translation in the face of cultural differences is how to deal with different cultures. Therefore, this paper aims to explore the causes of cultural turn, seek the positive and negative effects of cultural turn, and further elaborate on the enlightenment of cultural turn to all countries, especially to China, from the perspective of globalization.
Key Words
Culture Turn, causes, positives and negative effects, enlightenment
摘要
翻译研究的文化转向理论最早是由苏姗·巴斯奈特和安德烈·勒菲弗尔于1990年在《翻译、历史与文化论集》一书中提出的，他们认为翻译不是简单的两种语言之间的转换，而是在特殊的文化环境中进行的。自此，翻译单纯作为语言之间的转换工具的历史正在消逝，逐渐转变成为一种文化的载体。毋庸置疑，不同民族的文化之间具有差异性，翻译作为一座“桥梁”，起着不同文化交流的中介作用。而在全球化成为主流的大环境下，翻译在面对不同文化的差异时，最需要解决的问题就是如何对待不同的文化。因此本文旨在探究文化转向的原因，以寻求文化转向产生的积极影响和消极影响，并进一步阐述在全球化视角下文化转向给各国特别是中国所带来的启示。
关键词
文化转向，原因，积极和消极影响，启示
Title
An analysis of the causes and enlightenments of "cultural turn" in translation history from the perspective of globalization
Introduction
As a messenger of culture communication, translation plays an irreplaceable role in the process of spreading a country's culture. In human history, translation is an activity of exchange and interaction between different cultures, and culture is closely related to translation. Since the second half of the 20th century, contemporary western translation theory has undergone two turns, namely linguistic turn and cultural turn. Cultural turn makes translation studies no longer regard translation as an isolated fragment between language transformations, but examine translation in a grand cultural context. (Xie 2009:223)
"Fidelity" is no longer the only goal translators pursue in translation, and the cultural differences between source language and target language are the focus of translators' attention. In recent years, Cultural Turn in translation studies has gradually become the focus of attention of translation researchers and cultural researchers, and more and more people pay more attention to the role of culture in translation. In the context of globalization, international exchanges are becoming more frequent and cultural exchanges among countries are gradually increasing. Cultural factors are also playing an increasingly important role in the development of translation studies. "Cultural Turn" adds a new dimension to translation studies and provides a research horizon. But at the same time, we should fully recognize the challenges posed by its limitations to the development of translation studies in the future. (Tan 2004:128)
This paper is divided into three chapters: The first chapter briefly introduces what the "Cultural Turn" theory is; The second chapter primarily analyzes the internal and external causes of "Cultural Turn" in translation history from the internal necessity of translation itself and the external thrust of social influence. The third chapter mainly explores the positive and negative influences of the theory of cultural turn, and expounds the enlightenment brought by these influences under the background of globalization, that is, we should dialectically treat the Cultural Turn in translation, not lose the native culture in the mutual learning of cultures, and actively spread the native culture to promote the common progress of culture.
Literature review
Background of Cultural Turn
As a concept, culture first appeared in the Middle Ages of Europe and it becomes an eternal theme in the development of human beings, because culture involves all aspects of human life. However, as a discipline to study and form a systematic "cultural study" began in the 1950s. In fact, the rise and development of post-colonialism, feminism and the emergence and rapid spread of the Internet have made cultural studies necessary. In 1957, Hoggart published The Uses of Literacy, and Williams published Culture and Society 1780 － 1950 in 1958.Moreover, in 1964 The Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies (CCCS) was founded at the University of Birmingham. All these marked the beginning of cultural studies. Since the early 1980s, "cultural studies" has been developed rapidly in many countries, and its research scope has also been expanded, showing a multi-disciplinary development trend. The study of Western culture has gone through more than half a century，Easthope classified the study of Western culture into three stages: (1)in the 1960s，we were devoted to expanding the concept of culture and making it cover mass culture, which was called the "Culturalist Phase"; (2)in the 1970s，we paid attention to the exploration of textualism and hegemonism, which was called the "Structuralist Phase"; (3) the "post-structuralist Phase" was characterized by the establishment of cultural pluralism. It can be seen that "cultural studies" is a kind of interdisciplinary and cross-field research with a very broad content. Therefore, the "cultural turn" proposed by Basnett appeared in the 1990s. In fact, with the rise of "cultural studies", translation as a cultural activity is inevitable and has been combined with cultural studies, the real "cultural turn" in translation studies began much earlier than the 1990s. (Wang 2009:50-51)
With the development of translation studies in China, culture has gradually received attention. There are some translation theories and opinions scattered in Chinese Buddhist scriptures during the Han and Tang dynasties. Later, Lin Yutang, although Yan Fu and Zhao Yuanren have not made a systematic exposition of cultural translation, their views on translation studies are also consistent with cultural translation theory. In the contemporary time, Liu Shan is the first person to study the relationship between translation and culture as the subject. He pointed out that the accuracy and fidelity of translation depends on the reproduction of thoughts and culture reflected in another language, and stated the fact that the society at that time required translators to expand their cultural horizon. Moreover, Wang Zuoliang also realized the mutual influence between translation and culture, he emphasized that translators must understand both their own national culture and foreign culture. In the 1990s, the Cultural Turn theorie was introduced into China, and more domestic scholars stepped into the wave of cultural research. For example, Wang Bingqin's Cultural Translation studies is regarded as the beginning of China's cultural translation research, and this book laid an important foundation for the subsequent research. Liu Miqing's work of the same period, Outline of Cultural Translation, also exerted a profound influence on later studies. Yang Shizhang (2001) demonstrated in detail the interactive relationship between translation and culture from two aspects of the role of translation in cultural development and the promotion and restriction of culture on translation. Xu Jun (2002) pointed out that there were problems in Chinese translation studies, such as stressing technology over meaning, language over culture, etc. So he proposed to promote the establishment of cultural translation view. These scholars' active discussion on the relationship between translation and culture and its extension undoubtedly laid a solid foundation for the subsequent translation studies from the cultural perspective. In recent years, although it has been widely acknowledged that the western cultural turn is of great significance to translation studies, the theory of cultural turn tends to be far away from ontological studies, so that some scholars call for translation studies to return to ontology. The debate on cultural turn in translation studies has aroused the constant thinking and exploration of domestic scholars. (Peng 2016:141-142)
Throughout the western and Chinese translation studies, it can be found that the theories and practices related to cultural translation in foreign countries have a long history, starting from the 1960s to the early 1970s. Until the 1980s, the relevant research theory content gradually enriched. In the 1990s, because of the “Cultural Turn” theorie, western researchers paid more attention to cultural and social contexts in translation studies. Cultural consciousness in western translation studies has been more complete. The research on cultural translation in China began in the 1980s. Although it was a little later than that in western world, it caught up with the pace very fast, so that cultural translation has rapidly become an important part of the field of translation studies in China. Since the 1990s, some researchers did systematical research on cultural translation studies. However, although the theory is not that well developed, the achievements of domestic cultural translation studies are still improving. (Peng 2016:141-142)
Brief introduction: the schools, viewpoints and development of Cultural Turn in translation studies
The Cultural Turn in translation studies, advocated and developed by the cultural school, began in the late 1980s. It studies the cultural origin of translation and explores the political, economic, social, ideological and other cultural backgrounds of translation, which is closely related to the rise and prosperity of culturology. Looking back on the history, after the 1970s, under the influence of the booming trend of deconstruction, translation studies developed in the direction of diversification. Even Zohar, an Israeli scholor, proposed Polysystem Theory, which places translated literature at the historical and social levels of the target culture and breaks away from the static study of texts. Later, Toury proposed Descriptive Translation Studies and norms of translation behavior, adding cultural Studies to Translation Studies further. The multiple systems school represented by Even Zohar and Toury is regarded as the prelude to the rise of the cultural school, and their theories are regarded as the germination of the cultural turn in Western translation. (Pan 2002:24)
In Description of translation and others (1995), Toury described the function of translation, translation products and the relationship between the translation process, he thinks that function of translation decided the form of translation products, which determines the translation strategies. At the same time, the culture of the target language has an important influence on translation products and activities. In a word, the target language culture itself determines the function, form and strategy of translation. Then came the school of purpose, manipulation and deconstruction. In 1990, two major figures in translation studies: Susan Bassnett, a British scholar in comparative literature and translation studies, and Andre Lefevere, an American scholar in comparative literature and translation studies, explicitly proposed the "Cultural Turn" theorie in translation studies in the book Translation, History and Culture. In the following years, they published some influential papers and books on the "cultural turn" in translation studies. (Pan 2002:24)
In 1992, Lefevere published three books on translation studies: Translation, rewriting and the manipulation of literary fame, Translation, History and Culture: A Source book and, Translating literature: practice and theory in a comparative literature context. Among these books, Translation, rewriting and the manipulation of literary fame can be viewed as the representative work of Lefevere. In this book, he proposed the concept of "manipulation", believing that translation is rewriting, and that the mainstream ideology, poetics, patrons and other factors restrict or control translation activities. Then the cultural or manipulative school of translation studies was born. In 1994, Basnett edited Cross-cultural Communication: The Warrick Papers on Translation Studies. She pointed out that translation is a complex activity which involves questions such as how to choose the text to be translated, role of the translator in the selected text, roles of editors, publishers, or sponsor, what strategies the translator will take according to different criteria, how the text in the target system to be able to accept.。In 1998, after Lefebvre's death, the last book they wrote together, Constructing Cultures: Essays on Literary Translation, was published. These subsequent publications further expanded the influence of the translation cultural school, which gradually replaced the traditional linguistic school and became the mainstream school of translation studies today. (Lefevere 1992:26-27)
Of course, the above is only a review of the viewpoints of the representative figures and literary schools of "Cultural Turn". In fact, since the 1980s, "Cultural Turn" has become a fact, which also includes the development of "post-modern" translation theories such as deconstruction, feminism and post-colonialism. After the "Cultural Turn" theorie of translation was put forward, many scholars believed that translation has stepped out of the limitations of the traditional linguistic school, entered the wave of cultural studies and stepped onto a broader research space. Translation studies increasingly involved more fields such as ideology, ethnicity, race, feminism and so on. For example, Basnett published The theory and practice of Postcolonial Translation in 1999. Nida, the head of the linguistics school, also began to pay attention to cultural issues in his works in the 1990s. Louise von Flotow published Translation and Gender: Translating in the 'Era of Feminism' (1997), and Spivak (G. C. Spivak) has made a discussion on translation, the politics of translation, feminism and post-colonialism. American scholar L. Venuti proposed some such as "foreignization" and "domestication" and so on. Venuti believes that works translated into English since the 17th century are basically "domesticating translation", while most English translations into other languages are "foreignizing translation", which actually reflects the inequality between cultures. As a result, he thinks the "foreignizing translation" should be taken when translating the world affairs into English, it is a wise cultural interference, which contribute to change the language hegemony of English countries and the unequal status of culture in the global exchanges. This is a rejection of ethnocentrism, racism, cultural narcissism and cultural imperialism, and is conducive to the promotion of democracy in global geopolitical relations. The above views can be regarded as either the influence or the continuation of the "Cultural Turn" in translation studies. (Wang 2009:50)
The causes of “Cultural Turn”in translation history
"Cultural Turn" has become a trend, not only because it breaks through the previous theory with its own advantages, but also because of the influence of cultural turn and other external factors. Therefore, it can be said that the trend of "Cultural Turn" is produced under the joint action of internal and external factors.
The internal causes
The internal drive of "Cultural Turn" mainly comes from some positive views of the cultural school. They strongly advocated the transfer of the focus of translation studies from the text itself to the cultural context outside the text, and oppose the view which considered translation as a simple language transformation. Therefore, they tried their best to change the subsidiary status of translation in literature and art, and actively promoted translation to become an independent discipline.(Xie 2014:45)
Self-development of translation studies
Before the 20th century, western translation theory had been regarded as the "subordination" of literature and art. In this context, translation was merely regarded as an art, emphasizing the reproduction of the original text by the target text. Translation was even considered as a branch of comparative literature. In 1921, the German scholar W. Benjamin pointed out in his book The Task of The Translator that "If the ultimate essence of translation is to strive for similarity to the original, then no translation is possible." This view actually shows that the pursuit of linguistic absolute "faith" is not feasible in theory and in practice. In other words, the study of translation should break away from the excessive concern about words and turn to a more far-reaching and broad level, namely the cultural level. In 1971, Holmes put forward his unique views on the Nature, scope and structure of translation as an independent research field in the book The Name and Nature of Translation Studies. Since then, Translation Studies began to transform into an independent discipline, and The Name and Nature of Translation Studies is regarded as the declaration of independence of Translation Studies.(Xie 2014:46)
The importance attached by cultural school to culture
"Cultural school", as its name implies, attaches importance to the role of culture in translation and emphasizes the constraints of culture on translation. The cultural school has played an important role in promoting translation as an independent discipline. From Holmes, the founder of the cultural school, to the leading figures Snell-Hornby, Andre Lefevere and Susan Bassnett, they all mentioned the importance of culture to language and translation in their monographs (Jin , Zhu 2011:31).
Basnett once said, " Translation studies is actually an independent discipline. It is neither a subsidiary discipline of comparative literature studies nor a certain area of linguistic studies, but an extremely rich field of study with numerous sub-disciplines of its own." Later, she emphasized again in her book Comparative Literature published in 1993 that " When comparative literature is debating for itself whether it can become an independent discipline, translation studies has boldly declared itself to be an independent discipline, and the influence and force of translation studies have been affirmed and supported worldwide (Bassnett 1993:160)."
In addition, Basnett's graphic description of culture and language expresses her emphasis on culture. She points out that "culture is like a human body, and language is the heart of the body. Only the interaction between the heart and the body can sustain human vitality. Therefore, when surgeons operate on the heart, they cannot ignore the whole body carrying the heart. This is why it is dangerous for translators to separate text from culture and treat it in isolation." (Bassnett 2004:22).
According to professor Zeng Wenxiong, the origin of the cultural school can be traced back to the rationalism of Descartes in the 17th century, even to the skepticism of Perot and the materialism and evolution of Darwin, "These skeptical and survival of the fittest concepts subvert god and all the social and ethical structures that people take for granted, and then develop deconstructivism, post-colonialism and feminism that contain rebellion and independence."(Zeng 2006:64)
In short, the cultural school’s emphasis on culture is also reflected in its translation theory, the cultural school believes that "faithful" translation is impossible, so it pursues the cultural equivalence between the source text and the target text, that is, the equivalence of cultural functions. The research question has changed from how to be faithful to the source text to the causes and results of the target text's failure to be faithful to the source text. Translation should not be limited to the description of the source text, but pay attention to the functional equivalence of the text in the target language culture. Translation is to meet the needs of culture and the needs of different groups in a certain culture. Obviously, the development of cultural studies and the establishment of the cultural school have greatly promoted the consideration of cultural factors in various fields. In the field of translation, cultural studies and the cultural school have improved the cultural awareness of scholars, which has become a key factor for the rise of the "Cultural Turn". Thus, translation finally became an independent subject with its own characteristics under the strong advocacy of the cultural school, and laid a foundation for the rise of "Cultural Turn" in translation studies.(Zhu 2017:87)
The external causes
The development of translation studies and the influence of the cultural school promoted the birth of "Cultural Turn" theorie. At the same time, the limitation of linguistic school, the prevalence of cultural studies, the emergence of the theory of multiple systems and of deconstructivisme sped up the process of "Cultural Turn" in translation studies.(Wu 2009:104)
Limitations of the linguistic school
The linguistic school represented by Nida, Newmark and Catford have reached a "dead end" in translation studies at the end of the 20th century. Translation studies under the linguistic paradigm took structuralist linguistics and transformational generative grammar as theoretical frameworks, they paid attention to the correspondence between the original text and the translated words in the process of translation. Although such correspondence seems to be very scientific, it ignored many factors behind the words. Therefore, the study of linguistic school was considered by some scholars to be too standardized. However, for literary texts, the simple study of words and sentences can not reflect the relationship between the original text and the target text well to some extent, because literary texts contain more and more complex cultural factors behind the language. This translation equivalence theory takes the text itself as the object of translation, "it reduces the aesthetic problem to the logical problem, and ignores the descriptive study of the important factors such as the culture of the target language, the purpose and motivation of translation", which is too standardized. Therefore, the disadvantages of translation studies of the linguistic school became increasingly prominent and were gradually criticized by many scholars (Ran , Li 2012:4).
Andre Lefevere and Susan Bassnett criticized the linguistic school in the book Constructing Cultures: Essays on Literary Translation, "The success of machine translation makes people believe that the linguistic method of translation is an effective method... At the same time, they (linguists) said that their translation methods are not applicable to literary translation because literary translation is very special. Isn't literature written in language? Is the language of literature really so different from the language of translators?".It can be seen from the above citation that the theories of the linguistics school have been difficult to explain many problems and phenomena in the process of translation, which has been questioned by some experts and scholars. This provides the possibility for the emergence of a new paradigm in translation studies called "Cultural Turn". (Yang 2010:101).
The prevalence of cultural studies
Cultural studies originated in the United Kingdom in the 1950s, followed by a wave of cultural studies in Canada, Australia, the United States and China. Since the 1970s and 1980s, cultural studies have entered a period of interdisciplinary and diversified development. Sociology, literary theory, media studies, film and anthropology have all become the objects of cultural studies.The gradual rise of cultural studies made many scholars turn their attention to the discussion of cultural issues in translation studies, and analyzed the deeper cultural communication implied by language. Therefore, they no longer focused on the careful choice of words in the process of translation, but from the macro level to explore more profound cultural causes, thus contributing to the upsurge of "Cultural Turn" in translation studies. (Wang, 2005:34).
Inspiration of the Polysystem theory
The Polysystem theory was first proposed by the Israeli scholar Even-Zohar in the 1970s. He borrowed from Russian formalists who worked in literary historiography that literary works were not independent objects but should be regarded as part of the whole literary system. Before that, people's research on translation was static, while the Polysystem theory links translated works with social, historical and cultural factors. He believed that a polysystem system is composed of several subsystems, in which some subsystems are located at the center and others at the edge. Their positions and status are not fixed, but they compete with each other for a central position in the system. In addition, there are also interrelated and interactive relations between them. Therefore, as a member of many subsystems, translatology and other subsystems must be involved and influenced each other. Zohar mentioned that the culture of a country or a place may have advantage or disadvantage when compared to another culture in different periods. In different situation, translators in a country or a place will choose different translation strategies. If this situation changes, the translator's choice of translation strategies will also change, which forms a dynamic translation study. Therefore, Even-Zohar's polysystem theory makes people no longer look at translation and text in isolation, but combine multiple subsystems such as culture, society, politics and economy to look at the translation process from a broader perspective, and promote the emergence of cultural turn in translation. As student of Zohar, Toury offered new ideas as well as inherited his views. Then Toury put forward translation norms to judge the acceptability of texts by placing them within the target cultural system. These norms are certain social and cultural restrictions on culture, society and times, and people need to be educated and socialized to obtain them. It can be seen that Toury's theory is also based on social and cultural aspects. He believed that translation should be examined from the perspective of target language culture, "Translation is always limited by different social and literary background factors, so it has no fixed characteristics, and translation becomes a relative name relying on historical and cultural forces".(Gentzler 1993:129)
It can be said that their views provided the initial inspiration and theoretical basis for the theory of "Cultural Turn". The view of culture in polysystem theory has inspired the scholars of cultural school and finally led the translation studies to the rad of "Cultural Turn". Zhang Nanfeng once discussed in his article the positive effect of the polysystem theory on "Cultural Turn", he pointed out: "The polysystem theory has opened up a new approach to translation studies that is descriptive, systematic-oriented, functionalist and systematic. It has promoted the cultural turn of translation studies and spawned a cross-border school of translation studies." (Feng,Liu 2008:48)
The infiltration of deconstructive thought
Destructuralism, also known as post-structuralism, is a trend of thought established in the process of criticizing structuralism, and its main representative is Jacques Derrida. The philosopher Jacques Derrida, while criticizing structuralism, innovatively proposed the "deconstructive" theory, which has a profound influence on translation theory, cultural theory and literary criticism theory. Deconstructivists represented by Derrida denied the idea that language has ultimate meaning held by the language school, and believed that language words contain multiple meanings, so the meaning of the text formed by language words should be multiple. In addition, he also believed that the author is not the only creator of the text, which undoubtedly played an important role in enhancing the status of the translation and the subjectivity of the translator. Benjamin abandoned the traditional translation studies that only focused on the semantic meaning of the original text and the deconstruction of language. He believed that articles could survive only through translation, and that traditional translation could only be achieved in the environment of "pure language". If the original text needs translation to survive and spread, then the status of the translator and the translation should be higher than the original author and the original text, because to a certain extent, the former determines whether the article can obtain new life in the new language environment. If the original text needs translation to survive and spread, then the status of the translator and the translation should be higher than the original author and the original text, because to a certain extent, the former determines whether the article can obtain new life in the new language environment. In short, many views of deconstructivisme have a strong role in inspiring and promoting "Cultural Turn". In addition, deconstructive translation thought puts more emphasis on many other factors that affect the text, such as ideology. The pluralism of meaning and pluralism of interpretation advocated by deconstructivisme theory enlighten the cultural schools, leading them to think about the relationship between source text and target text from a more macroscopic and completely different perspective, subverting the traditional view of translation. As Professor Wang Ning said, "Deconstructivisme plays an important role in promoting the cultural turn in contemporary translation studies" (Wang 2009:127).
The influences of “Cultural Turn” under the background of globalization
Any kind of theory has its advantages and limitations, so when looking at "Cultural Turn", it is the right choice to maintain rational mind and critical thinking and treat it objectively and dialectically.
The positives effects
The "Cultural Turn" theorie of translation studies raised the paradigm of translation studies from the pure language level to the broader cultural level, made the translation experts and scholars begin to consider power, poetics and the target language culture, the translator and the reader, and many other factors on translation institute, which broadened the field of translation study so that translation was no longer in vacuum environment.(Wu 2009：104)
The influence of cultural school on translation studies is mainly reflected in the political characteristics of its theories, such as post-colonial translation studies, feminist translation studies and cannibalism translation studies derived from historical events. Among them, a scholar of feminist translation Simon expressed her praise for “Cultural Turn”, pointing out that it is the most exciting progress in translation studies, because it means that translation studies have added an important dimension, which enables us to understand the organic connection between translation and other ways of communication. It regards translation as a writing practice that runs through all the strains of cultural expression.(Zeng 2006:92)
Looking at China, there are many experts and scholars who have a positive attitude towards the "Cultural Turn", such as Xie Tianzhen, Ran Shiyang, Feng Yawu and so on. Among them, Feng Yawu and Liu Quanfu clearly expressed their support for "Cultural Turn" in their articles "Cultural Turn" and "Cultural Translation Paradigm": "Cultural turn has awakened the cultural consciousness of translation researchers, greatly broadened their horizons, expanded the scope of translation studies, and added a new dimension of history and culture to the study of translators". Cultural turn has exerted an important influence on translation studies in China, which is enlightening and thought-provoking. Liu Xiaoqian once pointed out in her article that the cultural turn in translation studies has brought unprecedented opportunities to Translation studies in China. However, China is still a "weak country" in the field of translation studies.(Zeng 2006:92)
In terms of translation practice, there are more target works than source works. In translation theory, there are few influential theories and works created, and most of modern and contemporary theories are "taken" from foreign countries. Moreover, the cultural turn is characterized by interdisciplinary research, which warns Chinese translation researchers to have a higher level and constantly improve themselves. Therefore, translators in China should actively promote the "going out" of Chinese culture and contribute to the development of translation studies in China by taking advantage of the wind of "cultural turn" that has not yet disappeared. There is no doubt that the "Cultural Turn" of translation studies is of positive significance to the development of Translation studies in China.It has broken the shackles of translation studies within the linguistic system, shifted its focus from the microscopic linguistic transformation to the macroscopic cultural one, provided a new dimension for translation studies, and promoted the transformation of translation studies from "normative studies" to "descriptive studies" under the linguistic framework. Thus it provides a development platform for translation studies, broadening the horizon of translation studies, and lays the foundation for translation studies as an independent discipline. However, it should be emphasized that "Cultural Turn" is only a research perspective in multiple translation studies, and has its advantages and disadvantages like other paradigms.(Zeng 2005:70)
The negative effects
With the expansion of the research scope and the deepening of the research content, many problems have been exposed in translation studies under the "Cultural Turn", which has aroused the extensive thinking of domestic scholars. Although the cultural school broke through the shackle of the linguistic school and innovatively put forward the "Cultural Turn", the cultural school did not critically inherit and develop the theories and methods of the linguistic school, but blindly negated, subverted, disintegrated and abandoned them completely. In the view of the cultural school, translation studies before cultural translation lack the macroscopic theoretical guidance and cannot see into the functions and effects of translation. Only by combining culture with translation studies can the true meaning of cultural functions be obtained, thus forming a theoretical system guiding translation practice.(Zhang 2008:23)
Therefore, the extreme practice that his focus completely deviates from the text itself and shifts to the macro context has been criticized by later generations. In addition, because the cultural school advocates the study of translation in the context of society, history, language environment and culture, emphasizing the restriction of culture on translation, and attaches importance to the connection and combination between translation and linguistics, translation and literature, translation and poetics. As a result, some experts and scholars have raised doubts about the "cultural turn" at this point. In China, such as Zeng Wenxiong, Zhao Yanchun and so on all hold a negative attitude to the "cultural turn". Zhao Yanchun (2004) once pointed out that "the culture school emphasizes the restrictive function of cultural factors such as power relations, sponsors, ideology, mainstream poetics and others on translation, and try to deny the traditional research on translation within the text. Therefore, they exaggerate the restrictive function of culture, and it is impossible to summarize the rules for predicting translation phenomena and processes".(Hu 2011:7-8)
Its all-embracing openness makes the disciplinary boundaries of translation studies blurred. According to Zeng Wenxiong, the "cultural turn" has limited the scope of translation studies, narrowed the research field, blurred the disciplinary boundaries of translation studies, separated from the fundamental of translation-language, exaggerated the influence of factors other than text, and thus made it difficult to discover the fundamental laws of translation. However, the foundation of translation studies is language and text, and the excessive emphasis on external factors without language studies will undoubtedly push translation studies into a dangerous situation by infinitely amplifying the role of external factors in the translation process. Since its birth, Chinese translation activities have been accompanied by the introduction and absorption of foreign cultures. For example, the large-scale introduction and absorption of Western learning in the late Qing Dynasty, the New Chinese literature constructed under the influence of translated literature in the May Fourth Movement period and so on.(Sun 2008:10-11)
While absorbing foreign cultures, we should not ignore the "localization" of culture. The same is true of the cultural turn in translation studies. Wang Ning, in his book The Cultural Turn of Translation Studies, also put forward such a point of view: it is worth noting that the cultural school of translation studies is based on comparative literature and studies translation phenomena from the perspective of western studies. The great difference between culture and language reminds us that we should not ignore the actual situation of the construction of traditional translation studies and theories in China while drawing lessons from western translation theories and research achievements. In this regard, from the perspective of discipline construction, many domestic scholars have proposed that translation studies under the cultural turn should not ignore the study of translation ontology, and that translation studies should return to the study of translation ontology and adhere to the standard characteristics of translation discipline.(Wang 2003:90)
Conclusion
Due to the development of translation itself, the influence of the polysystem theory, the cultural school, deconstructivisme and other theories, the "Cultural Turn" emerged in the 1990s, breaking the model of translation studies that had lasted for thousands of years, breaking out of the rigid language level and placing translation in the dynamic history, culture and society. It has explained many translation phenomena that cannot be explained by the traditional school of linguistics. It not only adapts to the development of the times, but also is the inevitable way out of translation studies. Cultural turn is not only the inexorable trend of translation activities, but also promotes the diversified development of translation studies. With the development of global integration, translation culture turns to be closely combined with social, political, economic and other factors. Under the influence of this development trend, culture is bound to develop in the exchange and cooperation between countries, which is an inevitable tendency of translation studies.(Hu 2005:10)
Nowadays, translation plays an increasingly prominent role in cross-cultural communication as the field of international communication continues to expand. Translation should take the initiative to maintain the historical mission of linguistic diversity and cultural diversity, balance the subject culture and foreign culture, and keep the two cultures in a relatively reasonable range. But the problem lies in the lack of theoretical guidance in concrete practice, wo can only judge according to experience. The subject of translation is affected by many factors, so it is impossible to completely jump out of the subject culture, and the development of translation study is dynamic, with the development of translation theory and the development of The Times, many factors such as translation view and translation stand are constantly changing. Therefore, with the development of the times, we should study the problem dynamically and sum up the guiding ideology constantly, so as to achieve a balance between the subject culture and foreign culture. In the context of globalization, people should pay attention to the relationship between their own culture and foreign culture, and translators, as communicators of cultural exchange, should balance the relationship between the two. Only by treating the externalization objectively, taking its essence and discarding its dregs, making it mutually available with the national culture, innovating the national culture and enhancing the vitality of the national culture, can the Chinese culture endure long and have a long history.
References
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Cultural Turn in Film and Television Subtitle Translation：a Case Study of Empresses in the Palace
影视翻译中的文化转向：以《甄嬛传》为例
李爱璇 Li Aixuan, Hunan Normal University, China
Abstract
The Culture Turn is a term in the field of translation studies which means that translation studies should not only focus on language, but also carry out their own discussion in a broader historical and cultural perspective. Film and television have always played an important role in the communication and exchange of national cultures. The audiovisual subtitle translation even plays a more critical role. In the previous studies, there are a few studies on subtitle translation strategies, but few scholars explore Empresses in the Palace, a classic Chinese TV drama, from the perspective of Cultural Turn. In this thesis, the author aims to do some research on the translation strategies in audiovisual subtitle translation based on “Cultural Turn”, in order to explore how cultural turn affects audiovisual subtitle translation, and provide a new perspective for later scholars or subtitle translators.
Key Words
Culture Turn; subtitle translation; Empresses in the Palace; translation strategy
摘要
文化转向是翻译研究领域的一个术语，它意味着翻译研究不仅应该关注语言，而且应该从更广阔的历史和文化视角进行探讨。影视在民族文化的传播和交流中一直发挥着重要作用。影视字幕翻译甚至起着更为关键的作用。在以往的研究中，关于字幕翻译策略的研究并不少，但很少有学者从文化转向的角度来探讨中国经典电视剧《甄嬛传》。本文旨在研究基于“文化转向”的影视字幕翻译中的翻译策略，以探讨文化转向对影视字幕翻译的影响，并为后来的学者或字幕译者提供一个新的视角。
关键词
文化转向；字幕翻译；《甄嬛传》；翻译策略
Title
Cultural Turn in Film and Television Subtitle Translation：a Case Study of Empresses in the Palace
Introduction
Backgroud of the Study
Throughout the translation studies in the 20th century, there are many schools. Each school competes with and affects each other one after another, which makes translation studies flourish in recent decades and establish its status as an independent discipline. As the publication of Translation, History and Cultural written by Susan Bassnett and André Lefevere, Culture Turn appeared in people's vision in 1990. The translation view of Cultural Turn has brought a new vision and breakthrough to the translation studies, which has been bound by linguistics for a long time.(Lefevere 2001:70)
Significance and Objectives of the Study
As an effective mass media in the context of globalization, film and television works, with their unique artistic charm and rich cultural carrier, have promoted the cultural communication and exchange between various countries and cultures, and become a powerful tool to strengthen their own cultural characteristics and cross-cultural communication. With the deepening of cultural exchanges among countries, the study of subtitle translation of film and television works has increasingly highlighted its important significance of the times. In this context of cultural output, how to integrate Chinese culture into the external translation of film and television works has become an important aspect of cultural communication. Cultural differences lead to different understanding of culture, so there are higher requirements for the translation of works. The emergence of “cultural turn” has brought a new wind to the translation circle, provided new ideas for the development of translation methods, and provided a new research field to the translation circle.(Lefevere 2001:70)
Study Methods
This paper takes the subtitles of the famous Chinese costume drama Empresses in the Palace as the research object, and focuses on its translation strategies against the background of “Cultural Turn”. This paper will use the method of theoretical analysis. Based on the widely accepted English version as the corpus source, the author explores the effect of the English version according to the theory of Domestication and Foreignization and the translation strategies of semantic translation and communicative translation.(Lefevere 2001:70)
Literature Review
On Culture Turn
In the 1950s and 1960s, the linguistic view of translation dominated translation studies, and translation was regarded as the transformation between different languages. Those scholars try to use linguistic theories (such as semantics, semiotics, pragmatics, etc.) to construct the discipline theory of translation studies. Their representatives are Jakobson, Catford, Nida and Newmark. However, this linguistic view of translation cannot solve the social, cultural, and historical problems well encountered in translation, and translation is affected by the differences of different cultures in ways of thinking and emotional expression. (Zhang Jing Li Shuchun 2006:83)
Since the 1960s, some scholars in Europe, especially in Britain, have successively published some articles and Monographs on studying the class system and reexamining the cultural connotation, which marks the rise of culturology. In the 1970s, scholars represented by Even-Zohar put forward the polysystem theory. This school believes that "literary works are an integral part of the overall framework of society, culture, literature and history" and "the isolated research of a single text is placed in the multi system of culture and literature". (Munday 2001:109;111)
This view has broken through the traditional view of linguistic translation and can be regarded as the bud of cultural turn, although it still does not completely get rid of the shackles of linguistics. Later, Lambert and robyns thought that translation was "less as an interactive process and more as an internal activity". (Gentzler 1993:186)
Later, the academic conference held in Belgium marked the establishment of translation as an independent discipline. Bassnett and Lefevere inherited and developed the polysystem theory and formally put forward the “cultural turn” in translation studies in their book Translation, History, and Culture in 1990. The Cultural School of translation breaks through the linguistic school, which focuses on the comparison and transformation between different languages, and connects translation with society, history, and culture. The “cultural turn” of the cultural school turns the paradigm of translation studies from the pure language level to the translation activities that explore the interaction and restriction of cultural level and various factors, outlines the framework of translation studies, and provides a new research paradigm for translation studies. The cultural turn in translation studies is neither a theory nor a school, but an ideological trend. It refers to the gradual shift from translation studies to cultural studies, that is, to study how culture affects and manipulates the translator, the translation process, and the translated text, and how translation affects the target language culture.(Lefevere 2001:130)
On Audiovisual Subtitle Translation
The rendering in a different language of verbal message in film media, in the shape of one or more lines of written text, presented on the screen in sync with the original verbal message. (cited in orero 2004:86). Firstly, from the perspective of linguistics, subtitle translation can be divided into intralingual subtitles and interlingual subtitles. The former is mainly responsible for transforming discourse into text. At this time, the language itself has not changed. From the perspective of time, subtitles can be divided into pre-prepared subtitles and live or real time subtitles. Interlingual subtitle translation is the process of translating the source language into the target language while retaining the original sound, and synchronously displaying the target language at the bottom of the screen or picture. The audience can not only feast their eyes on foreign works, but also get as much subtitle information as possible. What we usually call subtitle translation is interlingual subtitle translation. The characteristics of audio-visual language lie in its listening, comprehensiveness, instantaneity, popularity, and non-attention. (Wang 2014:107)
The foreign films introduced in China in the early stage are generally translated by the professional film and television translation department of TV stations or film studios. This translation model has many disadvantages, such as too pursuing commercial value, ignoring artistry and the cultural communication function of subtitles. Today, with the development of network technology, the monopoly of subtitle translation by professional film and television translation departments has been broken, and a large number of voluntary film and television subtitle translation teams have emerged, commonly known as online subtitle groups. In just a few hours after broadcasting abroad, the subtitle group can release subtitles in China, which undoubtedly meets the audience's timeliness needs for film and television works. But at the same time, it should be noted that there are still some problems in the online subtitle group, such as the proliferation of online words, excessive translation cavity, excessive pursuit of translation speed, fuzzy translation standards and so on.(Wang 2014:107)
Theoritical Foundation
“Translation strategy” is “on the macro level, it mostly refers to the overall assumption, main ways and cultural attitude of conveying the content and form of the original work, such as domestication and alienation; on the micro level, it refers to specific transformation methods or skills, such as substitution, addition, ellipsis, word by word translation, literal translation and annotation, transliteration, as well as sub translation and combined translation. The macro strategy mainly reflects the culture of translation Value orientation; specific methods and techniques are extensive, including both the means of transforming cultural information and the language transformation methods of non-cultural information.” Peter Newmark, a British translation theorist, is a famous and important figure in the field of translation. He deeply studies the translation thoughts and theories of various schools, has his own unique views on translation, and his discussion on translation theory is incisive and unique. semantic translation and communicative translation are not only the core of Newmark's translation theory, but also the most important part of Newmark’s translation theory.(Jiang 2009:180)
Semantic translation refers to expressing the overall meaning of the original text as accurately as possible within the scope allowed by the semantics and language structure of the target language. Semantic translation is more considered by the original author, trying to ensure that the original author’s unique language expression will not be changed. Semantic translation strives to be accurate and objective, and pays attention to the original author and source language. Therefore, in the process of semantic translation, the text will be interpreted only when there is an objection to the understanding of the original text. However, semantic translation will not ignore readers’reading feelings and understand that the main purpose of the translation is to convey information to readers. Although semantic translation is closer to the language form of the source language, it will still strive to make the translation closer to the reader. Therefore, semantic translation pays more attention to reproducing the thinking process of the original author’s writing.(Zhou 2020:76)
While communicative translation pays more attention to language effect, and strives to make the language effect of the target language on the target readers equal to that of the source language on the original readers as far as possible. Compared with semantic translation, communicative translation is more subjective. Because communicative translation pays more attention to the transmission of language information and the production of language effect, it only pays attention to the reading feeling of the target readers. Communicative translation strives not to cause any reading obstacles and questions to the target readers. Therefore, the translator can also modify the source text appropriately when considering the target language environment and respecting the source text.(Zhou 2020:76)
The domestication“requires the translator to approach the target language readers and adopt the target language expression used by the target language readers to convey the content of the original text.” Sun Zhili believes that the domestication is mainly manifested at the pure language level and can be used as a compromise means to solve the language barrier. However, in translation, language can be transformed or even domesticated, but cultural characteristics should not be changed. If it is not a last resort, it is particularly inappropriate to domesticate, but to convey it as much as possible. Excessive domestication may not play the role of translation in disseminating foreign cultures and customs.(Sun 2003:34)
Compared with the domestication, the foreignization translation method “requires the translator to approach the author and adopt the source language expression corresponding to the author to convey the content of the original text.” Therefore, Sun Zhili pointed out that the core of the foreignization is to convey the “heterogeneous factors” of the original text as much as possible, is to try to convey the exotic cultural characteristics, foreign language forms and the author's abnormal writing techniques of the original work.(Sun 2003:40)
Translation Strategies used in the Subtitle Translation of Empresses in the Palace
Domestication and Foreignization
Subtitle translation of film and television plays is a balanced art, which accurately and appropriately conveys the wonderful plot and language and cultural information to the target audience, so that the audience can obtain the aesthetic experience, but also avoid the obstacles and deficiencies of cultural exchange. The translation of Empresses in the Palace, which has attracted much attention and many difficulties, should achieve a perfect balance between the huge language and cultural differences between China and the United States, and should also combine the two translation strategies of "domestication" and "alienation". Domestication is to use the expression and cultural image of the target language to convey the original meaning and respect the language habits of the target language audience. Foreignization is to use the expression and cultural image of the source language to convey the content of the original text and highlight the “exotic style” of the source language in the translation. (Liu 2017:67)
In the subtitle translation of Empresses in the Palace, the translation strategy of "domestication" is adopted for the cultural factors that are difficult to convert, so as to avoid the obstacles to understanding caused by the translation. For the cultural factors with unique national characteristics that can be transformed, the “alienation” translation strategy can be adopted. It is worth noting that excessive foreignization translation will make the audience of film and television dramas feel obscure and difficult to understand due to the intervention of many foreign cultures, and finally lose their interest in watching. Although excessive domestication translation makes the translation easy to understand, it will lose the text characteristics and exotic flavor of the source language, and make the target audience lose the opportunity and fun to understand foreign culture. For example, the translation of Chinese network catchwords in British costume dramas, or the street speaking of the United States in Chinese court dramas, will destroy the harmonious beauty of the original film and television works.(Liu 2017:67)
In view of the large number of cultural images rich in cultural connotation in Empresses in the Palace, the proper use of foreignization translation can maintain the cultural connotation and artistic characteristics of the original film and television works. (Liu 2017:67)
SL: 袅楚宫腰
TL: the slim waist of the containers of the Chu Palace
For example, the protagonist’s name “Huan Huan” is interpreted to “袅楚宫腰” which is translated into “the slim waist of the containers of the Chu Palace” in the American version. The cultural background of the state of Chu is added here, which reflects the profound cultural connotation of its name and the hero's love for the heroine. However, it may be slightly obscure for the audience of American TV dramas who do not understand the ancient cultural history of China. (Liu 2017:67)
SL:一片冰心在玉壶
TL: a jade vessel is the symbol of a pure heart.
In the play, Wen Shichu quoted this ancient poems to express his confession to Zhen Huan. This interpretative translation explains the symbolic meaning of ice heart and jade vessel, which makes the target audience understand easily. The use of the two translation strategies is not independent. The two strategies can achieve effective combination and appropriate re-creation of the source language content, to transform cultural images, make up for cultural gaps and achieve the purpose of cultural transmission. (Liu 2017:67)
The focus of foreignization translation strategy coincides with the cultural turn to examine translation from a cultural perspective. Through foreignization translation, the translator can try to convey the source language culture to the target language readers, to retain the different cultural characteristics of the source language. Instead of just considering the acceptability and cultural context of the target language readers in order to better achieve the smoothness of the translation. Finally, readers can also examine the gains and losses of the translation by feeling the culture in the original, and gain a new understanding of the culture of other countries to a certain extent. (Liu 2017:67)
The reason why we gradually tend to foreignization translation strategy in the continuous practice of domestication and foreignization is that under the influence of the tension of foreignization translation method, we deeply feel the cultural interaction brought by foreignization translation in the current era of cultural diversity brought about by globalization, and retain and consolidate their own cultural characteristics through foreignization translation, It has also promoted global cultural exchanges. Nevertheless, in the specific translation practice, when facing the choice of translation strategies, it should still be measured and balance the harmony between domestication and foreignization. No translation method can be viewed in isolation, and domestication must also be properly considered when viewing alienation. There is neither complete domestication nor complete alienation. In translation practice, the assistance and cooperation of domestication and foreignization should be considered. Only in this way can there be no farfetched and unreasonable translation in some places. Therefore, properly incorporated domestication translation method can make the translation more in line with the reading habits of target language readers and more acceptable to them.(Liu 2017:67)
Semantic Translation and Communicative Translation
SL：那就赏夏常在一丈红吧。
TL：Then I will award Attendant Xia the Scarlet Red.
In Empresses in the Palace, this sentence was said by imperial concubine Hua, which meant that Xia Changzai, a women in the emperor's harem who violated the palace rules, would be punished in the palace. It was to take a two inch thick and five foot long wooden board to beat the prisoner below the waist, regardless of the number, until her muscles and bones were broken and her flesh and blood were blurred. It looked bright red from a distance. Therefore, “一丈” in the original text does not represent accurate measurement, and there is no need to translate “一丈红” into “3.33-meter red” in the translation. “Scarlett” in the translation means “sinful, unforgivable and licentious”, while Xia Chang was punished for violating palace rules in the play, so the translation of “the Scarlett Red” is not in line with the plot setting. Although the meaning of “the Scarlett Red” can be better understood by the target language audience, it will cause ambiguity. The derogatory meaning of this word can reflect the irony of the word “award”. Overall, it is feasible, but there is still room for improvement.(Zhou 2020:76)
SL：奴才如此，必然是上梁不正才下梁歪。
TL：They have surely been influenced by the improper behavior of their mistresses．
In Empresses in the Palace, this is imperial concubine Hua’s evaluation of the tyranny of slaves in the imperial palace. She thinks that this is because their masters’ virtue is notorious and is imitated by their subordinates. “The upper beam is not straight and the lower beam is crooked” is a daily saying. In ancient China, most residents lived in houses with civil structures, which were basically composed of buildings, columns, beams, purlins, rafters and so on. “Beam” is a long wood that is erected on the columns along the front and rear directions. Generally, two houses with wooden structure should have three beams and six columns, and the construction process should also be based on precise calculation. Therefore, once the upper beam is misplaced and affects the whole house structure, the lower beam will naturally be crooked. Later, “the upper beam is not right and the lower beam is crooked” was used to compare the main people, such as leaders or elders, who do things against the law and moral standards, and the rest will learn to do so. This idiom in the original text is related to Chinese architectural structure, which may be difficult for the target language readers to understand. Moreover, for the translation of proverbs, we don't need to translate words by words, just translate its connotation. Although the translation of these two sentences has nothing to do with the source language, considering the cultural environment of the target language, the translation will be more in line with the development of the plot.(Zhou 2020:76)
SL：先敬罗衣后敬人。
TL：The clothing completes the person．
In the plot of Empresses in the Palace, Xia Dongchun was accidentally splashed with tea by An Lingrong and humiliated An by virtue of her own background. This line is what Zhen Huan said to An after the event. Its extended meaning is to satirize people by their appearance and judge a person’s character according to their appearance and dress. In the original text, “Luoyi” refers to silk clothes, which is another name for ancient clothes. The Chinese audience knows that it generally refers to clothes, but the target language audience can't understand the ancient Chinese language and culture. Therefore, the translator did not translate the word literally according to the source language, but followed the principle of communicative translation. In order to highlight the language effect, he translated it freely to avoid causing reading difficulties to the target language audience.(Zhou 2020:76)
SL：嬛嬛，你给了朕一对龙凤呈祥。
TL ：Huan Huan，you have given me a dragon and a phoenix of good fortune.
In the plot of Empresses in the Palace, the emperor said this to Zhen Huan, who had just given birth to a pair of twins. “龙凤呈祥” means auspicious events, that is, giving birth to both boy and girl in the play. “Dragon and Phoenix fetus” means twins of a man and a woman, “dragon” describes men and “phoenix” describes women. Therefore, the English translation is “pigeon pair”. However, in translation, the translator did not translate “dragon and phoenix” into “pigeon pair”, but faithfully translated it into “a dragon and a phoenix of good fortune”. This is because in ancient China, “dragon” and “phoenix” were used to refer to emperors, noble people, or people with excellent talents. The emperor's descendants are people of noble status, and the birth of “dragon and Phoenix fetus” in China is a great auspicious thing, so the literal translation of “a dragon and a phoenix of good fortune” can not only express the substantive meaning of the original text, but also correspond to the translation.(Zhou 2020:76)
The Influence of Culture Turn on Chinese Subtitle Translation
With the development of “cultural turn”, feminist translation theory, postcolonial translation theory and post-imperialist translation theory came into being. Their characteristics are more concerned about politics, race and other political elements. At the same time, people gradually realize that the changes of any element in the cultural system are not independent, but exist and develop in coordination with each other. Under the influence of “cultural turn”, translation is regarded as a rewriting of the original text under specific conditions. The rewriting is produced under the action of history, society, culture and context. The translator puts various factors together to form a new text, in order to solve the untranslatable problem caused by cultural conflict in Translation.(Wang 2014:109)
Language is the carrier of culture, and the presentation of meaning is inevitably affected by cultural factors. In subtitle translation, cultural factors in both the source language and the target language play a key role. As a popular academic topic, cultural research has overwhelmed the general international academic research in the field of social science and art, especially translation research. Translation studies and cultural studies may be two different disciplines. They have a lot in common. They are interdisciplinary sciences and new disciplines in social sciences. Therefore, the development of cultural studies provides experience for the development of translation studies and plays a great role in promoting translation studies.(Wang 2014:109)
During the globalization of economic, cultural and information, the rapid development of mass media has a profound impact on our social life and ideology. As the most intuitive and vivid cultural product and carrier, film and television works are more and more welcomed by the public. Different from ordinary written translation, culture can only be conveyed by symbols. The audio-visual information synchronized with subtitles in film and television works can effectively interpret and convey culture. The multimedia nature of film and television works provides many favorable conditions for overcoming cultural differences.(Wang 2014:109)
The distinctive national cultural characteristics in Empresses in the Palace reflect the cultural and aesthetic value of national film and television works, which is the greatest advantage of Chinese film and television art. In the process of subtitle translation, the appropriate use of translation strategies can avoid the lack and fracture of cultural expression. While respecting the audience’s viewing feelings, it spreads Chinese traditional culture, and combines the mass characteristics of film and television works with the task of cultural communication. Only by showing the traditional oriental culture in modern western language can Chinese film and television works.(Wang 2014:109)
With the development of the film industry and the advent of the information age, the domestic audience’s demand for authentic films is growing. Therefore, subtitles for imported foreign films, especially British and American films, meet the audience's demand to a certain extent. This kind of film after subtitle translation can not only preserve the auditory enjoyment brought by the original language to the audience, but also promote the cultural transmission of film as a media. Subtitle translation is not only the transformation between two languages, but also a cultural transformation and the implantation of the target culture.(Wang 2014:109)
For a long time, film and television subtitle translation has attached great importance to the translation of cultural factors. However, many translators are vulnerable to the influence of conservative mentality such as cultural superiority, ethnocentrism, and cultural stereotypes. They cannot face up to his national culture in the process of translation with an equal attitude, so as to psychologically refuse the infiltration of other cultures, blindly use the way of domestication, and even use words with strong national color. The cultural transmission of translation does not just mean being faithful to the source culture, which will fall into another extreme position. The films produced by various countries have more or less the special brand of their own culture, which is inevitable. The plot, content or characters in the film are derived from life, but higher than life, which itself has cultural uniqueness. (Wang 2014:109)
When dealing with culture related subtitle translation, the translator should first investigate whether the cultural nature of the subtitle must be translated or can be omitted. Secondly, one should pay attention to the continuity and communication of culture, try to select the cultural characteristics that are easy for the target audience to accept, and omit some relevant information that has no great impact on the film. According to different types of films, the requirements for subtitle translation are also different. Comedies require subtitle translators to maximize the laughter of the original language, so that the target language audience can feel it and achieve the purpose of entertaining the public. Tragic films require subtitle translators to use the text of the original language to stimulate the inner resonance of the audience and follow the emotional life and death of the film characters. The requirements of subtitle translators will be different for films with different themes. Therefore, subtitle translation is by no means easy. How to make film and television subtitle translation equal to the original film not only in language, but also in culture is a new challenge for the translation community.(Wang 2014:109)
Conclusion
This paper mainly analyses the cultural turn in film and television subtitle translation and illustrates it with an example of Empresses in the Palace. The writer tried to find some proper strategies to deal with culture transmission problems in visual-audio subtitle translation especially the translation from Chinese to English, which are the combination of literal translation and free translation and the combination of domestication and foreignization. Translator’s task is to make a full use of those kind of translation strategies to transmit national culture, especially in such a condition of globalization and cultural communication. Moreover, the translation of the subtitle of Empresses in the Palace can be a good example for other translators. (Jiang 2009:14)
However, one case cannot be enough to illustrate the phenomenon of culture turn and there are few good film or television plays in Chinese, let alone the transmission our Chinese culture. Moreover, there must be more translation strategies could be used in subtitle translation, waiting us to explore.(Jiang 2009:14)
References
[1]Zhang Jing, Li Shuliang张静, 李树春.“文化转向”及其在翻译中的重要性"Cultural Turn" and Its Importance in Translation[J] . 沧州师范专科学校学报Journal of Cangzhou Teachers'College, 2006, (4).
[2]Bassnett, Susan & Andre Lefevere. Constructing Cultures [C].Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press, 1998/2001
[3]Munday, Jeremy. Introducing Translation Studies: Theories and applications [M]. London: Routledge, 2001.
[4]Gentzler, Edwin. Contemporary Translation Theories [M]. London and NewYork: Routledge, 1993.
[5]Liu Xiaohui, Zhang Liang 刘晓辉,张亮.影视剧字幕翻译及跨文化传播——以美版《甄嬛传》为例 Subtitle Translation and Cross-cultural Communication of Film and Television Dramas -- Taking the American version of Empresses in the Palaceas an Example[J].出版广角 View on Publishing,2017(06):64-66.
[6]Jiang Qiuxia 姜秋霞.文学翻译与社会文化的相互作用关系研究 A Study on the Interaction Between Literary Translation and Social Culture[M].北京: 外语教育与研究出版社 Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press,2009.
[7]Sun Zhili 孙致礼.中国文学翻译：从归化趋向异化 Chinese Literary Translation: from Domestication to Foreignization[J].中国翻译 Chinese Translation,2002(1).
[8]Sun Zhili 孙致礼.新编汉英翻译教程 A New Coursebook on Chinese-English Translation[M].上海:上海外语教育出版社 Shanghai Forengn Language Education Press, 2003.
[9]Wang Ning 王宁.翻译研究的文化转向Cultural Turn in Translation Studies[M].北京:清华大学出版社 Tsinghua University Press,2009
[10]Zhou Tiantian 周甜甜.纽马克翻译理论视角下美版《甄嬛传》的字幕翻译浅析 On the Subtitle Translation of the American Version of Empresses in the Palaceas from the Perspective of Newmark's Translation Theory[J].今古文创 Modern and Ancient Cultural Creation,2020(42):76-77.
[11]Wang Sisi 王思思.从文化转向看中国文化在电影字幕中的翻译 On the Translation of Chinese Culture in Film Subtitles from the Perspective of Cultural Turn[J].山西师大学报(社会科学版) Journal of Shanxi Normal University(Social Science Edition),2014,41(S1):107-109.
李文璇 Research on Translation of Expressions with Chinese Characteristics from the Perspective of Cultural Turn Theory --Based on the Case Study of Xi Jinping: The Governance of China Ⅲ
文化转向视角下中国特色用语英译研究 ——以《习近平谈治国理政》（第三卷）为例
李文璇 Li Wenxuan, Hunan Normal University, China
Abstract
Based on the cultural turn theory, this article studied the C-E translation of expressions with Chinese characteristics from Xi Jinping: The Governance of China Ⅲ. Therefore, the author wanted to analyze some effective ways for translating the expressions with Chinese characteristics, exploring the translation trend in the future, thus spreading Chinese culture and enlarging the influence of China.
Key Words：Cultural turn theory; Expressions with Chinese characteristics; Translation.
摘要
本文在文化转向的视角下，分析《习近平谈治国理政》（第三卷）中国特色用语的英译处理方式，期望从中能总结出英译中国特色用语的有效方法，探讨中国特色用语的翻译方法及注意事项，从译本、从而更好传播中国文化、扩大中国影响力。
关键词：文化转向；中国特色用语；翻译
Title
Research on Translation of Expressions with Chinese Characteristics from the Perspective of Cultural Turn Theory --Based on the Case Study of Xi Jinping: The Governance of China Ⅲ
Introduction
With the Reform and Opening-up and the enhancement of China’s strength, the international status of China has been improving significantly. In recent years, with going-global strategy and bringing-in strategy, China has been opening up widely and cooperated with other countries towards a shared future. Under this background, Chinese culture is an important part for China to communicate and cooperate with other countries. What’s more, Chinese Socialism in the New Era has attracted worldwide attention, as the academic circles are paying attention to the translation of expressions with Chinese characteristics in foreign publicity translation, especially for those political articles.
Expressions with Chinese characteristics refer to terms and expressions that have the characteristics of Chinese language and culture and that embody the unique things and phenomena in China. In recent years, more and more scholars have studied the English translation of expressions with Chinese characteristics, most of them use German Functionalist Translation Theory, especially Katharina Reiss’s text typology and Vermeer’s Skopos theory. I choose culture turn theory, for the reason that translating these expressions not only should pay attention to the current situation, but also should study in the broad history scope. So, I choose communicative translation theory and I will explore and analyze texts under the guidance of this theory, hoping to provide a new direction for the study of English translation of expressions with Chinese characteristics.
Xi Jinping: The Governance of China Ⅲ contains a complication of 92 of Xi Jinping’s spoken and written works from October 18, 2017 to January 13, 2020. It is a series of articles put forward by Xi Jinping with many original ideas drawn from his experiences in the governance of China in the new era. In this book, there are many expressions with Chinese Characteristics, whose C-E translations are vital for the transmission of Chinese culture. Additionally, the third volume, published in 2020, is one of the latest materials for studying Chinese Socialism in the new era.
By learning the English version of some political writings and watching some videos on the Internet, I’m interested in the translation of expressions with Chinese characteristics. Also, I have learned a lot about Xi Jinping’s thought, which contains useful knowledge for the governance of China. As an English major, by studying the translation of expressions with Chinese characteristics, I can consolidate and deepen my understanding of professional theories and knowledge. Moreover, by studying and practicing different cultural corpora, my intercultural communication ability can get progress.
Literature Overview
Domestic scholars have made a lot of explorations on the English translation of terms with Chinese characteristics. There are two characteristics as a whole: first, some scholars summarized the appropriate translation strategies and methods by studying the English translation of current political terms and legal terms with Chinese characteristics, which are selected from the English versions of newspapers, political papers and other texts.(Yang, 2006:73-74; Wang, 2020:87-93; Tang, 2013:157-158) Second, under the guidance of particular translation theory, scholars analyzed and studied the English translation of Chinese vocabulary and current political terms selected from the speeches of Chinese leaders and other text in various aspects. For example, most scholars studied the English translation of terms with Chinese characteristics from the perspective of Skopos Theory and explored appropriate English translation strategies. (Lai, 2019; Chen, 2019:55-58)
As far as the domestic research status is concerned, there are still some deficiencies in the research of expressions with Chinese characteristics. First, the theory is relatively unitary. Most scholars use German Functionalist Translation Theory, especially Katharina Reiss’s text typology and Vermeer’s Skopos theory. Secondly, the research sample is limited. Most of the scholars talk about political and economic terms, while there is little research on the translation of classical culture terms with Chinese characteristics. The research on translation methods and strategies of political and economic terms is of little use for the whole translation of expressions with Chinese characteristics. Third, the research on “words with Chinese characteristics” is more than that of “expressions with Chinese characteristics”. When consulting references (June 9, 2021), we can find that there are 69 articles about “expressions with Chinese characteristics” and 484 about “words with Chinese characteristics”. It can be seen that most scholars have done a lot of research on the English translation of words with Chinese characteristics. We should pay more attention to the English translation of expressions with Chinese characteristics, and seek the best way to tell Chinese stories.
Brief Introduction to Cultural Turn Theory
The cultural turn theory in translation research is to pay attention to the influence of various elements in the process of translation, the influence of the translator's own culture on the original text, and the study of the image of the original text in the context of the translated version. When concepts are transferred from one language to another, meaning is not so much “transformed”, it is better to say that it has been “recreated” in the regional environment of the latter. The main contents of Susan Bassnett’s cultural translation view include: translation should take culture as the unit, not stay on the previous text; Translation is not only a simple decoding and recoding process, but also an act of communication; Translation should not be limited to the description of the original text, but lies in the functional equivalence of the text in the target language culture; Different historical periods have different translation principles and norms, but these principles and norms are ultimately to meet different needs. Translation is to meet the needs of culture and different groups in a certain culture.(Wu, 2010:123-125)
Bassnett explicitly introduced the concept of culture into translation studies and proposed that the essence of literary translation is cultural translation. In literary translation, we should not only pay attention to the transformation and expression of text, semantics, rhetoric and style, but also consider the cultural differences between the source language and the target language, as well as the translator's position in translation.(Wu, 2009:103-105)
The cultural turn theory studies translation from the perspective of translator’s subjectivity and target culture. It mainly aims at the cultural conflict in translation, solves the untranslatable problem in translation to some extent, awakens the cultural consciousness of the translation community, widens the research field of translation and adds a new dimension to translation research.(Wu, 2010:123-125)
Brief Introduction of the Expressions with Chinese Characteristics and Xi Jinping: the Governance of China Ⅲ
Introduction of the Expressions with Chinese Characteristics
Expressions with Chinese characteristics refer to the unique language expression forms of Chinese, which have the characteristics of Chinese language and culture, and reflect the national conditions and policies of China. Expressions with Chinese characteristics include some political and economic terms, idioms, poems, four-character phrases and expressions with distinctively Chinese national culture, which reflect the national policies, people’s life, culture and their values at that time. Expressions with Chinese characteristic are a unique language phenomenon in Chinese language and culture. In fact, it is highlighted in the process of cultural communication between China and foreign countries. These terms have rich cultural connotations and more distinctive political text features.(Wang, 2020:87-93; Tang, 2013:157-158; Chen, 2019:55-58)
According to the different stylistic features, the expressions with Chinese characteristics are divided into several categories, including political and economic terminology, literary quotations, four-character expressions and idioms and rhetoric expressions.
Political and economic terminology refers to the strategic principles reflecting China’s national conditions and terms with Chinese cultural characteristics. They contain many expressions about our Party’s policies, national interests, political propositions, territorial sovereignty, etc. To a certain extent, they represent the code of conduct and guiding plan issued by the state and the government in an authoritative and standardized way. There are many expressions in political and economic terminology with Chinese characteristics, such as phrases with symmetrical form and structure, abbreviations of numbers, new expressions issued by the government, expressions with communication effect, repetition and so on.
Literary quotations mainly refer to ancient Chinese poetry and prose with rich cultural connotation. Literary quotations can describe something in a concise and vivid way, and they are rhythmic. The content is often a high degree of refinement and generalization of life, creating a beautiful artistic conception with rich imagination and association. The characters are vivid; the language rhythm is clear and harmonious.
Four-character expressions and idioms have a certain structure form and contain connotations. They often appear as a whole in sentences, such as subject, object, attribute and so on. The vast majority of four-character expressions and idioms have been used since ancient times. The usage of these expressions is often different from modern Chinese. They contain rich allusions and are frequently quoted in the state leaders’ speeches. Idioms are simple, profound, philosophical and easy to understand. They are stereotyped sentences, often with exhortation or educational significance. As one of the essences of national language and culture, they have rich cultural connotations. In persuasive speeches, these expressions can prove or summarize opinions, and most of them are created by the people and widely spread. They are colloquial, popular.
Rhetoric expressions refer to the sentences which are involved with the use of language skills, rules, ways or methods, such as pun, metaphor, personification, metonymy, exaggeration, contrast, etc. In political works, the use of rhetorical devices makes the text of the works more beautiful, more persuasive. The features of expressions with Chinese Characteristic are as following: first, these expressions contain full of social-cultural implication and have richer features of the times. Second, there are no direct translation or equivalent translation of such expressions in English, which means that they are uniquely Chinese. Third, these expressions are concise and popular, which raise great discussion and appreciation after publication. Fourth, the range of expressions with Chinese characteristics is large, covering sectors such as politics, economy, culture, history, society and people’s daily life.
Introduction of Xi Jinping: The Governance of China Ⅲ
Xi Jinping: The Governance of China Ⅲ contains a complication of 92 of Xi Jinping’s spoken and written works from October 18, 2017 to January 13, 2020, along with 41 photographs. It is divided into 19 sections by topic, with the articles in each section arranged in chronological order. For ease of reading, notes are to be found at the end of relevant articles.
Xi Jinping: The Governance of China Ⅲ vividly recorded the process that since the 19th CPC National Congress, guided by the thought that is remaining true to the Party’s original aspiration and founding mission, the CPC Central committee, with Xi Jinping as its core, has fully considered the overall goal of national rejuvenation and the international situation in a context of change at a level unseen in a century, and has coordinated efforts on the great struggle, the great project, the great cause and the great dream. The third volume recorded the great practice which the CPC Central Committee, leads the whole party and whole country to make great progress in all fields of things, which shows the latest achievements of localization of Marxism in China. It has also contributed a Chinese perspective and Chinese ideas to promote the establishment of a global community of a shared future, and it is an authoritative book that reflects the Xi Jinping’s Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics.
The publication of Xi Jinping: The Governance of China Ⅲ has helped officials and the public to understand and apply Xi Jinping’s Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, and to strengthen their commitment to the Four Consciousnesses, the Four-sphere Confidence and the Two Upholds, and to fight for the final victory in building a moderately prosperous society in all respects, and also to help the international community gain a full appreciation of the thought and the reasons for the success of the CPC, Marxism and Chinese Socialism. As for the stylistic features of the English Version, the book contains a complication of 92 of Xi Jinping’s spoken and written works, which all belongs to the political writing.
First of all, the principles of the political writing are faithfulness, accuracy, clarity and completeness, which means that the political writing should have formal and standard use of language in terms of vocabulary. Political writings focus on the logical clarity and precise reasoning, and should avoid ambiguity and vague expressions.
Second, political writings mainly reflect the condition and development of our country, and are highly sensitive. When translating, they should not only be rigorous and faithful to the original text, but also represent the sovereignty and position of our country, and strive to convey the views and attitudes of our government completely and accurately.
Third, the English version should accurately explain the essence of the original text, and it should conform to the expression habits of the English language. The translated text should conform to the using habits of the target language English, which can make it easier for foreigners to understand.
Translation Analysis
The following part is the translation analysis according to the translation methods used by the translators.
Literal Translation
Literal translation is the translation of text from one language to another “word-for-word”, rather than giving the sense of the original. When using literal translation, we would remain the original style, which includes the original sentence structure and the figure of speech.(Xiong, 2014:82-88)
[Example 1]
[ST] 九二共识
[TT] the 1992 Consensus
[Comments] Here “九二共识” is literally rendered to “the 1992 Consensus”. Its core meaning is that the mainland and Taiwan province all belong to China, and the two sides of the Taiwan Strait are not the relationship of two countries, thus clearly defining the fundamental nature of cross-strait relations. This consensus has been defined for a long time, and become a common knowledge all over the world. Thus, we can render this literally, which is faithful not only to the form and structure of the original, but also to the meaning.
[Example 2]
[ST] 三农问题
[TT] issues relating to agriculture, rural areas, and rural people
[Comments] Here “三农问题” is translated to literally and used the annotation as an extra information. “三农” is the abbreviation for “农业，农村，农民”, and they denote different meanings. Numeral Abbreviations contain rich cultural information and simplify language expression. In order to transfer the meaning completely, the translators use the literal translation method, which reproduces the national characteristics of the source culture. In addition, the annotation method is supplemented, which can eliminate the obstacles in cross-cultural understanding.
[Example 3]
[ST] 不要人夸颜色好，只留清气满乾坤。
[TT] Not bent on praise for its bright colors, but on leaving its fragrance to all.
[Comments] The poem is written by Wang Mian in the Yuan Dynasty, which refers that the plum blossom doesn’t need others to praise its color. What it cares about is to keep the light fragrance around the world. President Xi Jinping uses this poetry to express his ambition and chants the character of plum blossom. The translated version gets rid of the constraints of the structure and words of the original text, and it omits the name of plum blossom. However, it directly explains the true meaning of the original text and translates “清气” into fragrance. The translation is natural and fluent, which is not only consistent with the original text, but also conveys the cultural connotation of “work hard on one’s own and leave the good qualities to the world” expressed in the poem to foreign readers accurately.
[Example 4]
[ST] …哪怕刺耳、尖锐一些，我们也要采取闻过则喜的态度，做到有则改之、无则加勉。
[TT] Even if their comments are harsh and sharp, we should be glad to hear them, so that we can correct our mistakes if we have made any and guard against them if we have not.
[Comments] The translators add some adjectives and expand a word to a full sentence. The four-character expressions in China have meaningful connotations. When translating, the translators need to add some detailed information to help the understandings of the targeted readers. Therefore, the translators use addition to supplement the whole meaning, which is easy for foreigners to understand.
Free Translation
Free translation is the translation by meanings. That is, the translation is done according to the real meanings of a sentence or even a paragraph, instead of completely word to word. When using free translation, people usually pay little attention to the form and style of the original text. Instead, they would think of the original meaning carefully. In order to use free translation effectively, the translator should know the culture of original text and targeted text well, and have an extensive knowledge about them.(Xiong, 2014:82-88)
[Example 1]
[ST] 四风
[TT] Four Malfeasances for favoring from over substance, bureaucratism, hedonism, and extravagance
[Comments] Here “四风” is the abbreviation for four problems happening in the leading group and it is harmful. “风” here is not the wind in English, instead it is a metaphor, which means that the bad habits or problems in the leading group can be spread quickly if not solved in a proper way. The translators use “malfeasance”, which can translate the meaning correctly; and they add some details to the translated version, from which the foreign readers can understand the meaning effectively.
[Example 2]
[ST] 恩德相结者，谓之知己；腹心相照者，谓之知心。
[TT] People drawn to each other by kindness and virtues make good friends; people who hold together with a meeting of minds make bosom friends.
[Comments] It is a typical example of Classical Chinese, which is different from today’s Mandarin and has full potential meaning for each word. So, the translator used paraphrase to explain the sentence, which can remove obscurities in the understandings to the original text and can create a communicative effect to the targeted readers.
[Example 3]
[ST] 生搬硬套或强加于人都会引起水土不服。
[TT] Blindly copying the models of others will only be counterproductive
[Comments] Here “水土不服” refers that a person cannot understand the weather condition and eating habits of one place. President Xi compares it to the unsuitable strategies used by some official people. The translators shift the original noun form into a clause, which is easy to understand. In this way, the translated version suits the habits of English expression, and would not cause misunderstandings to the targeted readers.
[Example 4]
[ST] 打好改革组合拳
[TT] forge a synergy
[Comments] Here “打好改革组合拳” contains a figure of speech, metaphor, which compares the combination of several plans to the complete set of martial arts, the Chinese boxing. The translators omit the Chinese boxing, instead, they use “synergy”, which refers to the extra energy, power, success, etc. that is achieved by two or more people or companies working together, instead of on their own, which conforms to the meaning that our Chinese people work together to achieve the prosperity and success of the Reform and Opening-up. However, in this way, this kind of translation suits the goal well, but loses the cultural meaning.
Recreation
Recreation refers to a translation method that the translator decontextualizes the meaning and form of the original text and creatively reprocesses the original text in order to achieve a certain translation purpose (such as meeting the specific needs of the target audience).(Xiong, 2014:82-88)
[Example 1]
[ST] 我将无我，不负人民。
[TT] Never fail the people.
[Comments] It is a sentence spoken by Xi Jinping in March, 2019 when he made a state visit to Italy. At that time, Italy’s speaker of the House of Representatives asked Xi Jinping what he was feeling when he was elected as the president of China. Here “我将无我, 不负人民” is Xi Jinping’s deepest expression of affection for the Chinese people and his firm declaration as a national leader for the country and people. “我将无我, 不负人民” is a kind of political words, which mainly reflect the position and development of our country. When translating, it should not only be faithful to the original text, but also be flexible. We should strive to convey China’s sovereignty completely and accurately. As for the translated version, “Never fail the people” spreads the meaning effectively and the targeted readers can understand the sentence accurately.
Culture Replacement
Culture Replacement refers to replace the source text with some similar expressions in English because of language differences between English and Chinese. In essence, culture replacement belongs to the category of free translation and is one of the closest ways to the target language readers’ understanding. Using this method can not only convey the meaning of the source language, but also facilitate the understanding of the target language readers.(Xiong, 2014:82-88)
[Example 1]
[ST] 天网恢恢，疏而不漏
[TT] Justice has long arms.
[Comments] In this sentence, there is no equivalent meaning for “天网恢恢，疏而不漏” in English, so the translators use “Justice has long arms”, which is an English idiom, as a replacement. This kind of translation not only retains the original meaning, but also conforms to the English expression habits.
Through text analysis, we can find that for these four categories, the literal translation can remain the original form and structure well to some extent, but also remains some obstacles for the targeted readers. In translating expressions with Chinese characteristics in the political essays, we should consider several aspects, such as politics, accuracy, purpose, and make a true arrangement to these aspects. So, the translated version should follow these rules and be rendered well. For those selected expressions, they are all selected from the political papers and essays whose purpose for translation was mainly about spreading the messages. So, for those expressions with Chinese characteristics, sometimes their Chinese characteristics will be omitted, which remains to be discussed and solved in the future.
An Analysis from the Perspective of the Cultural Turn Theory
The Background and Social Situation
According to the cultural turn theory, when translating the original texts, we should pay attention to the context. The scholars Bassnett and Levefere advocated to pay attention to social context, history instead of formalism stage. In the process of spreading Chinese culture, the transformation of expressions with Chinese characteristics has the particularity of time, space and society, which requires to have the correspondence of the particular expressions in the contexts. When translating, not only should we pay attentions to the coordination between language symbols and political implication, but also should focus on the coordination of domestic and international context. After analyzing the expressions with Chinese characteristics in Xi Jinping: The Governance of China Ⅲ, we can find that the expressions should be translated accurately according to the original meaning conveyed by the government.
The Translators
Bassnett pointed out that translation, like poetry or novels, cannot have the best version, and the evaluation of a translation can only be based on the purpose, function and process of translation in a specific context. Therefore, when evaluating or analyzing a translated version, we should consider the translator’s purpose, translation function and other factors in its specific context. Therefore, even if the same text is translated, the translator's translation strategies will change dynamically with the change of translation purpose. Compared with other types of text translators, translators of foreign political discourse are generally institutional groups to which the government belongs. The English translation of Volume Ⅲ is organized and coordinated by the national foreign language Bureau and completed by a certain number of translation experts at home and abroad. The translation strategies adopted should focus on the purpose of foreign publicity. Therefore, the English translation of foreign publicity in Volume Ⅲ should also keep pace with the times. Besides, the core terms should also conform to the English narrative habits and methods.
The Targeted Readers
By improving the language collocation in line with the acceptance habits of English readers, strengthening the connotation free translation and information supplementary translation of words with Chinese characteristics, improving wording expression and other translation strategies, so as to improve the readers’ accurate access to the original information, so as to improve the overseas readers’ cognition of the core ideas and views of China’s development. The translated version strives to target the English audience in terms of expression, follow the rules of English language rhetoric, and provide readers with the context of understanding Chinese social and cultural knowledge to the greatest extent.
Conclusion
This article attempted to explore the Chinese to English translation of expressions with Chinese Characteristics from the cultural turn theory. It is necessary and practicable to carry out such a study in which the cultural turn theory is applied to the translation of expressions with Chinese Characteristics. Based on the cultural turn theory, this article focused on the translation of four types of text - political and economic terminology, literary quotations, four-character expressions and idioms and rhetoric expressions. Large quantities of examples are extracted from Xi Jinping: The Governance of China III and analyzed. Through detailed analysis, the use of various kinds of translation methods can be applied to the translation of expressions with Chinese characteristics under the guidance of the cultural turn theory. These translation methods include literal translation, free translation, recreation, paraphrase, addition, combination, shift, omission, and so on. Among these translation methods and strategies, their advantages and disadvantages are obviously lying on several aspects, like the conveyed meaning, original forms and structures, the specific Chinese character and corresponding English expressions etc. The Chinese to English translation of expressions with Chinese characteristics is important for spreading Chinese culture and communicating with other culture in today’s cross-culture circumstance. In order to achieve this goal, the translator should have a deep understanding towards Chinese culture and foreign culture, which includes the social background, language usage etc. Moreover, the translator should understand the potential meaning conveyed from the original texts and choose the suitable translation methods and strategies, thus transferring the message accurately and fluently to the targeted readers. However, there are some limitations in this translation study. First of all, the translation methods and strategies discussed in the chapter four are limited. Therefore, the analysis may not be comprehensive and would neglect some important ways of translation. Second, the author’s own limitation of knowledge to the professional field to some degree leads to inconvenience and difficulty in thesis writing. In addition, the translation study about Xi Jinping: The Governance of China III is limited; the author can only get the relative message from studies on foreign publicity translation. Due to the limitations of this translation study, there are some suggestions. First, the merits and demerits of the selected translation theory should be fully understood. When analyzing the translation methods under the guidance of the designated theories, the author should make full consideration and try to find new ideas in the field of translation study. Second, the author should be careful for the features of these expressions with Chinese characteristics. After all, this translation study is only an attempt to use the cultural turn theory into the translation of expressions with Chinese characteristics. Due to the limited space here, the study could not cover all the aspects and make a comprehensive analysis. Many problems and issues remain to be solved in the future.
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Written by --Li Wenxuan (talk) 13:46, 8 December 2021 (UTC)
黄锦云The Cultural Turn in the Chinese Traditional Translation Theory
李姗 Analysis of Brand Name Translation Under the Principle of Cultural Turn
Abstract
Amid the deepening and widening of globalization, communications between different countries and regions in various fields have become increasingly frequent, particular in the sector of economy. Transnational corporations spring up like mushrooms. More and more brands are introduced inside and expanding outside. The first step of enterprises to expand overseas lies in the translation of the brand names. A good name foresees a good start. In this regard, cultural elements should be carefully taken into consideration.
This paper centers on the analysis of brand name translation in light of the principle of cultural turn. It could be divided into four parts in total. The first part is a brief introduction of the current international situation, and the purpose of this research. The second part is the short literature review in terms of both brand name translation and cultural turn. The third part is the main body of this paper, including the analysis of some successful cases of brand name translation as well as the analysis of failure ones. The last part is the summary of the whole and the significance of the phenomenon of cultural turn in translation. Through this analysis, this paper aims to arouse people’s awareness of culture’s influence and urge them to pay more attention to cultural elements during the translation of brand names.
Key Words
Cultural Turn; Brand Name Translation; Cross-culture Communication
摘要
在全球化不断朝着纵深方向发展的背景下，不同国家和地区之间的各方面交流日益频繁，经济领域尤其如此。跨国公司犹如雨后春笋，纷纷涌现，引进来和走出去的公司品牌越来越多。开拓外国新市场的第一步在于选取合适的品牌名。好的名字能预示好的开始。而在此过程中，文化要素需要细心考量。
本文以文化转向为理论原则，以其为指导对品牌名的翻译进行分析研究。本文共包含四个部分。第一部分对当前国际现状以及研究目的进行了简要的介绍。第二部分是关于品牌名翻译和文化转向理论的文献综述。第三部分为本文的主体部分，对成功和失败的品牌名翻译进行了分析。最后一部分则概括总结本文所述内容，并阐述了翻译中文化转向的意义。通过对品牌名翻译进行简要分析研究，本文旨在激发人们翻译时的文化意识，在翻译品牌名时更多地关注文化要素。
关键词
文化转向；品牌名翻译；跨文化交际
Title
Analysis of Brand Name Translation Under the Principle of Cultural Turn
I. Introduction
As each country in the world is woven tightly with one another and economic globalization has developed by leaps and bounds, communications and transactions between different countries as well as regions have become increasingly frequent. More and more brands begin to expand their market in foreign lands. To enter into a new territory, the brands need to enhance their competitiveness, and more importantly to give the potential consumers a perfect first impression and thus make themselves mentally accepted and acknowledged by the potential clients of the targeted region. To have a good start, advertising is a good way to win a certain fame around a circle. But there is no doubt that the top priority lies in proper brand names as a matter of the fact that proper names could impress people with a surprise and then leave a deep and enduring imprint on their mind.
Guided by the policy of Reform and Opening-up, China has initiated One Belt and One Road proposal and is committed to promote comprehensive cooperation in the range of globe, in addition to its active participation in various economic organizations. Beyond doubt, multi-country economic activities and collaborations will develop in depth and breadth. More and more brands will be introduced inside and go outside. Therefore, this paper decides to center on the subject of brand name translation. However, the reality has told us that economic activity is not merely an economic problem and translation is not an isolated activity. “It has to do with authority and legitimacy and, ultimately, with power. Translation is not just a “window opened on another world,” or some such pious platitude. Rather, translation is a channel opened, often not without a certain reluctance, through which foreign influences can penetrate the native culture, challenge it, and even contribute to subverting it.” (Lefevere) It is closely linked to social, political and especially cultural ideologies. Taking this into consideration, this paper desires to analyze the translation of brand names from the perspective of Cultural Turn, to figure out how cultural elements influence brand name translation so as to arouse brands’ awareness of cultural gap in terms of advertising their brand names.
II. Literature Overview
1. Literature Review on Brand Name Translation
Brand names are intangible assets of a company, carefully chosen and aimed at distinguishing itself from other rival brands and products. The same as our names represent our personality and show our originality, brand names play the role as the faces of the brands, in the very fact themselves being a part of the products of their brand. Original, novel and imaginary names could easily attract people’s attention, arouse their interests and ultimately promote the sales of the brands’ products. To fulfill this supreme mission, transnational corporations and companies that prepare to expand foreign market would pay great attention to the translation of their brand names to fit in the cultural context of the target market. Consequently, the translation of brand names has drawn the attention of a number of scholars and researchers.
At abroad, attention has long been paid to the function of brands as the development of marketing strategies. David Aaker has published his book of Managing Brand Equity in the year of 1991, which elaborates on how to create, market, develop and manage brands. Kevin Kelley in the book titled Strategic Brand Management (1998) offers the ways to construct brands, brand equity and brand management. Both of the two books have emphasized the importance of having an excellent brand name and suggested the way to name a brand. (曹昭) As for the papers, there are a measure trove of them in the website. In them, Chow Clement (2007) has showed the dilemma of all marketers whether to translate the brand name into local language, while the cosmetic brand names of Iran were discussed; US brands in China were carefully analyzed to form a name translation model. Besides, Chao Paul and Lin Shengdong (2017) have explored the strategies to translate brand names effectively by means of brand attitude reversal and perceived brand name translation relevance in an emerging market. Schmitt Bernd (2012) advocated to select the right brand name by carefully examining tacit and explicit linguistic knowledge in name translations. All these papers have revealed that brand name translation is of some significance and worth of attention.
In China, the first study regarding the translation of brand names can be traced back to the year of 1994, when Zhou Xiaobing has made a brief analysis of the brands names and classified four approaches to translating brand names against the background of China’s Reform and Opening-up. From then on, there has been several studies conducted in this aspect. However, it was since 2005 that respectively more scholars and researchers have their eyes turned to the translation of brand names. Among these papers, most researches of brand names are related to Skopos theory, for example the studies of Cao Zhao (2006), Liu Xi (2018) and Wang Yifang (2015), who believed that the translation of brands names should be progressed in response to certain purposes. And some scholars centered around the guiding influence of functional equivalence on the translating process, such as Tian Yuxia (2011) and Du Shuling (2015). In addition, some analyzed the translation of brand names from the perspective of culture, including Tang Degen (1997), Liu Jiuping (2001) and Ai’ Supin cooperated with Cao Rong (2007). Besides the perspectives mentioned above, there are also some studies conducted in terms of psychological theories, aesthetic principles of Xu Yuanchong and other approaches.
2. Literature Review on Cultural Turn Theory
Translation is not merely confined to the source language and target language, but also a social and cultural activity. The cultural and background information must be carefully considered during the translation process. Since people of different nationalities and nations all live in the same global village, it is of necessity to have frequent exchanges. Against the barrier of the tower of Babel, translators play the role of ladders, functioning as the bridge of effective communication between different linguistic groups. Thus, translators are actually not translating the two languages, but traveling back and forth within the two cultures (Casagrande, 1954: 338. Zeng Wenxiong)
After the second World War, against the background of hegemony and anti-hegemony, frequent communications across continents and countries, culture and across-culture communication have attracted more and more attention in the field of academic studies. As the beating power of deconstruction has greatly influenced structuralism linguistics, the former dominant linguistic approach to translation studies was shaking. The studies of text structure and meta-language has surrendered to the studies of discourse and the process of translation, which has exactly deepened the research of the cultural information of the text. The latter half of the 20th century has seen the combination of post-modern critical theories and the theory of deconstruction, thus offering a new approach to analyze translation. Different from mainly centering on the text analysis, more attention has been paid to the consideration of social, historical and cultural background of the correspondent time period. While conducting translation studies and putting forward translation principles, the academic community thus shifted their focus from merely language itself to the culture side. Then sprung two kinds of trends, the cultural turn of translation and the translation turn of literature. (Lv Jun, )
That period has witnessed the heat of studies of culture. In the 1970s, Israelite scholar Even-Zohar’s principle of Poly-system Theory together with Tory’s Descriptive Translation Studies have been regarded as the signs of the shift of translation to culture turn. However, cultural turn, in translation, is firstly put forward by Susan Bassnett and Andre Lefevere in their co-operated book Translation, History and Culture in the year of 1990. In this book, they have elaborated on the power and influence of culture-related notions including history, authority and manipulation, and also narrated the aims and context of translation. Language, then, is the heart within the body of culture, and it is the interaction between the two that results in the continuation of life-energy. In the same way that the surgeon, operating on the heart, cannot neglect the body that surrounds it, so the translator treats the text in isolation from the culture at his peril. (Susan Bassnett, 1980: 23)
Translation is not an arbitrary activity. It is conducted under certain principle and aimed to fulfill certain purpose. This paper is to figure out the translation of brand names with an emphasis on cultural elements.
III. Analysis of the Translation of Some Brand Names
Early since the Industrial Revolution and the rise of commercialism, all kinds of commodities appear one after another without an end. The advances of economic globalization and cross-border transportation have also provided convenient access for numerous brands to expand overseas. During the process of expansion, excellent brand names are for a certainty of great benefit to the brand’s further development.
1. Excellent Cases of Brand Name Translation
Focusing on our daily life, there are quite a few excellent translated brand names to analyze.
1.1 The Use of Good Images
BWM = 宝马 The full name of the brand BWM is Bayerische Motoren Werke, which is short of the car plant. To make a stride in Chinese market, the brand chose “宝马” as its Chinese name, which in reality builds up a very impressive image for the brand. “宝” means something beautiful and precious, equaling to rare jewelry or great fortune. “马” is an animal, which used to be the top transport tool for ancient Chinese people and regarding this image, people may hold the belief that excellent horses can run very far in a day and at a high speed. The combination of the two words impresses the idea that the car is very pretty in its design and outlook, and also boasts a good performance and high proficiency.
Land Rover = 路虎
Rover is a luxury car brand. And the word rover originally refers to an ancient nation in North Europe, renowned for courageous deeds. In English, the brand name constructs the picture that its car just like those pioneering people who dare to counteract with any threat above the sea. Obviously, its Chinese version has successfully reproduced its original meaning. Although its ideal choice in the very beginning was “陆虎”, which was pre-chosen by a rival. The present one is also very good. “路” means the road. “虎”, the tiger, in China is very strong and brave. As Land Rover is car brand that specializes in off-road vehicles, the Chinese name “路虎” utterly shows its stance, a soldier of road that no one would dare to or be able to hold back.
1.2 The Endowment of Rich Cultural Connotations
金典 = Satine
“金典” is one of the secondary brands of Yili Industry Group Co., Ltd., a giant milk producer. "金" is gold in Chinese, showing that the milk boasts good quality. And "典" equals to classical or authority, which means the taste of the milk is authentic and great. This brand claims to be of high quality and aims at the high-end market, and in deed it occupies a large piece of pie in the plate of Chinese milk consumption. As a high-end milk brand, the English name it chooses also show its taste. "Satine" is a French word, with the connotation of "as smooth as silk". That implies the milk boasts good quality and tastes silky, which mirrors its orientation of middle and high-end market.
Revlon = 露华浓
Revlon is an American cosmetic brand, with foundation, lipstick and various make-ups on sale and young female as its target consumers. Its Chinese name is "露华浓", which actually comes from a poem written by a distinguished poet from Tang dynasty, named Li Bai. The line that it comes from “云想衣裳花想容，春风拂槛露华浓”, which means when one sees the clouds in the sky, one would think of her gorgeous clothes; when one sees the flowers, one would think of her charming countenance. And the favor of the wind makes the flower even more beautiful. Through the device of metaphor, this poem vividly describes the extreme beauty of the dignified imperial concubine, Miss Yang. When a poem that glorifies the beauty of a gorgeous woman is connected with a brand that aims to build beautiful women, a good association could be constructed at ease. Therefore, the localized name of Revlon could easily attract females' attention and win their favor at the first sight in China.
Kiehl's = 科颜氏
As one of the most popular cosmetic brands in China, Kiehl's boast a lot in its brand name. It was in the year of 2009 when this brand became a part of L' Oreal Group that it took the Chinese name of “科颜氏”. Before that time, it was called “契尔氏”, which could hardly trigger any related association among people. "科颜氏" may remind one of “神农氏”, a herborist who tastes all kinds of herbs in person to figure out their functions. And Kiehl's stems from a pharmacy which sells unguents made up of natural plants in the very earth period. And at present, it advertises to be gentle and natural, free of stimulus and suitable to sensitive skins. In this regard, the two do share some common points. Thus, the association of the two would also add glory to it. "科" means science and "颜" means good look, the combination of the two would increase the sense of authority and leave consumers the impression that products of this brand would truly improve their outlook.
1.3 The Use of Novel Word Combinations
Mercedes-Benz = 奔驰
The brand name of Mercedes-Benz is in fact the name of its brand founder. But as Chinese people care more about the cars rather than a foreign name, it's definitely true that the cars of Mercedes-Benz may not be greeted with so much fondness if it were literally translated as “梅赛德斯·本茨”, since it could satisfy promising consumers’ curiosity towards it as well as the demands towards a car. The brand knew it so that “奔驰” is an excellent car brand becomes one of the common sense. Both “奔” and “驰” are verbs in Chinese, meaning running in Chinese, and the two of them imply a very handsome speed, just like a horse running at a high speed in a sweeping field.
良品铺子 = Bestore
“良品铺子” is a famous Chinese snack brand familiar to almost everyone who is fond of snacks. The first two characters of the brand name means goods of high quality, and the latter two is the equivalent word for a shop or store in English. Its English translation is "Bestore", made up of "be" and "store". Through the word store, it makes the consumers clear about the orientation of its products on sale and the prefix "be" makes it cuter and a little bit special, distinguishing this brand from the ordinary unnamed stores. Thus, it may give people a impression of warmth and coziness, which completely suits the image of a snack brand.
佰草集 = Herborist
In the wake of the brands above, let's have a look at some domestic brands of China. “佰草集” is a skin-care brand that proclaims to contain natural elements to protect one's skin. Its name connotates the meaning that it's a collection of a wide variety of herbs with medicinal values. Thus, its English translation "Herborist" has vividly showed the features of its products, which could convince people of its natural, moderate and harmless effects. Besides since the herborist refers to a doctor in the context of English vocabulary, it would give out a sense of authority.
美加净 = Maxam
“美加净” is a time-honored cosmetic brand in China. Its selling point lies in the baby care products, though a lot of adult females have been attracted to buy its products. “美” means beauty, and “净” means cleanliness. The two are connected by the word “加”, which means plus. That is to say these products can make one's skin both beautiful and clean. The English name of Maxam has properly expressed this connotation, which impresses people as maximizing one's beauty to largest degree.
茶颜悦色 = Sexy Tea
Sexy Tea, an influential milk tea brand with its headquarter located in Changsha, Hunan province. The design of the brand is quaint, characteristic of ancient Chinese style. And the image of this brand is the pretty caricature of Lin Daiyu, a major figure of "Dream of the Red Chamber", one of the four Chinese classics. “悦色” is a term that means a pretty and satisfying countenance. In its translation, sexy and tea makes a very novel combination. It may easily trigger foreigners' attention and curiosity. How can a cup of milk tea be sexy? What would it taste like? Thus, this kind of emotion would attract a lot of foreign friends to have a try in its shops.
After a careful analysis of the successful brand names in the fields of car, food and cosmetics both in China and at abroad, we may make a summary of the common points that they share. First of all, the translated brand names all possess good meaning in the cultural context of the target market, without any ambiguous or implicit reference to something negative in that culture. Secondly, positive words are used to constitute their names, most of which are combinations of adjectives and nouns that hold propitious bearings. The association of pure verbs with fine connotations also offers great novelty and is of great appeal to the audience. Thirdly, most brands would prefer to reveal the category of their products in their names. That makes it quite easy for the consumers to know their orientation by a mere glimpse. The successful guidelines of these brands would offer valuable experiences for the other brands.
2. Failure Cases of the Brand Name Translation
Besides those excellent cases, failure cases of brand name translation also abound around the globe.
2.1 The Misuse of Negative Images
白猫 = white cat
“白猫” is a producer of wash supplies. It occupies a large share of internal market and its existence could be caught in almost every store and supermarket. It is undoubted that a great number of people would be shocked to see that it is translated into White Cat directly. In reality, cat is a negative image that is usually regarded as an evil creature in western culture. For example, in Edgar Allen Poe’s short novel, the black cat is deemed by people as an incarnation of witches, the embodiment of evil forces. Though the color of white is the symbol for purity and faith, the cat image owns such a strong influence that the positive meaning of the former is easily offset in their combination.
白象 = White Elephant
“白象” is a Chinese brand that produces battery. After it is translated into English, it is literally named as White Elephant, which is definitely a failure case that should be avoided in the context of western culture. Because in English world, white elephant holds pretty negative meaning, referring to those stuff that are elegant but useless. Therefore, the brand name would leave people the impression that the battery the brand sells are the same as white elephants.
2.2 The Ambiguous Pronunciation of Words
方太 = FOTILE
“方太” is a brand that specializes in manufacturing and selling household electrical appliances. There are two level of meanings lying in this name. Firstly, when the brand is to change a new name, there was a heated TV show by the name of Fang Tai Food Square. The brand desires to attract more people’s attention, especially those audience who are fond of that reality show. Secondly, “方太” can also be seen as the abbreviation of “方便太太”, that is, to make it convenient for the household wives. Thus, the name shares many links with keeping kitchen clean as well as simplifying household duties. However, its translation is far from expressing these two kinds of meanings. The sound of “FOTILE” is extremely similar to the pronunciation of the word futile. Thus, it could be easily uttered in the wrong way and leaves a terrible impression on people’s mind. Few people would take the risk to purchase some appliance that seems to be “futile”.
Standard Chartered Bank = 渣打银行
Standard Chartered is a British bank. When it landed on Hongkong, China, it uses 渣打 as its name. However, in Chinese, “渣” means dregs and “打”is a verb that means breaking up. The combination of the two fail to form a convincing image for the bank. Except those who have certain knowledge about it, ordinary people would not list it as their hold-up vessel of money, as its name grants the bank little credit.
Warsteiner = 沃斯乐/沃斯坦
Warsteiner is a time-honored beer producer in Germany, but it is little fame in China. For it was translated into “沃斯乐” during its first entry into Chinese market. The pronunciation of that name is quite similar to "我死了", which is a taboo word in Chinese culture. Even though it is renamed later, the second name 沃斯坦 still fails to arouse people's wide attention or strong interest.
S&B = 爱思必
S&B is a large-scaled food processing company in Japan. Its sales once surpassed 1 billion US dollars. Its brand name is said to be short of Sun & Bird. However, surprisingly, it chooses “爱思必” as its Chinese brand name even though both China and Japan stand in the continent and are close neighbors. Because it contains negative meaning, which sounds similar to a swear word, equaling with fool.
2.3 The Loss of Cultural Connotation
方正 = Founder
“方正” is a computer brand, invested by one of the top universities Peking University in 1986. Its name is said to originate from a sentence of Biography of the Han Dynasty · Chao Cuo, that carefully examine others’ behavior so as not to misunderstand them; strictly abide by decrees without personal interests; do one’s utmost to accomplish the tasks delegated from superior leaders without complaint; in face of dangers dare not the death; when meeting someone more competitive, do not rob his position; accept proper amount of gains in accordance with conducted efforts; never stay on a position while not qualified; only those people who possess all these virtues could be regarded as virtuous men.（“察身而不敢诬，奉法令不容私，尽心力不敢矜，遭患难不避死，见贤不居其上，受禄不过其量，不以亡能居尊显之位。自行若此，可谓方正之士矣。”）Obviously, “方正” is of rich cultural connotation. However, its correspondent translation is far from appropriateness. The word “founder” refers to the pioneer of something. It carries a heavy weight. But what could not be ignored is that founder also means the failure, breaking-down of something. In light of this, in 2000 when the original founder of this company was experiencing an emergency, foreign media bantered that “Founder’s founder founders”. To avoid such joke, more attention should be paid to the translation of brand name.
DS (Deesse) = 谛艾仕
DS is car brand named after an ancient goddess Deesse. But its translated Chinese neither expressed its original cultural meaning, nor integrated into Chinese culture. The name “谛艾仕” could hardly invoke any association of people towards excellent cars. It was just mechanically translated in line with its pronunciation.
After the analysis of some failure cases of brand name translation, we may draw a brief conclusion about the causes that lead to their failure. Firstly, the failure lies in the misuse of improper images. Different culture has different cultural images. And the connotation that an image or object is endowed with may differ from country to country or culture to culture. Thus, great attention should be called when it comes to choose a name embodied with images. Secondly, the failure lies in the choice of words with ambiguous pronunciation. The words that share similar sounds with original characters may cause misunderstanding in another culture, since it could sound like another word that contains negative meaning. Thus, the desire to have links between original brand name and translated version could run counter to one's desire. Thirdly, the failure lies in the loss of cultural sense. Some name brands are taking on cultural elements that are confined in the source cultural context. But the translators merely frankly translate those names without a thought of conveying the deep-buried cultural meaning so that these brands fail to perform as well as expected. To avoid bad translations, the causes of them listed above desire careful attention.
IV.Conclusion
Why should we turn to culture or pay more attention to cultural information of the target language in the process of translation? Firstly, more attention to culture is he manifestation of taking the target readers into consideration; secondly, it's of great benefit for people in different language communities to acquaint with the culture of another community, thus good for mutual communicating and understanding; thirdly, it's important to the development of multi-culturalism since every culture is precious treasure in the world treasure-house of intellect and heritage and some culture has been long in the dominant position and continuously posing threat to other cultures due to the disparity of political and economic forces. More concern about culture and language is necessary to eliminate and prevent cultural hegemony and supremacy.
Bad translations render the letter without the spirit in a low and servile imitation. Good translations keep the spirit without moving away from the letter. They are free and noble imitations that turn the familiar into something new.
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