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Abstract:There have been many disputes about the translation of the Beijing 2008 Olympiad Mascots since it was first announced in 2005. And it was at last translated directly as the Chinese phonetic alphabet "Fu Wa". So this essay is going to explore some ideas of the English translation of "Fu Wa", and meanwhile discuss some translation approaches of culture-loaded words.
Key Words:"Fu Wa" culture-loaded words Foreignizing Translation
On 11th November 2005, the BOCOG (Beijing Organizing Committee of the 29th Olympic Games) announced the Beijing 2008 Olympiad Mascots as five cartoon babies and they are called "Fu Wa" together. And they were first translated as "Five Friendlies".Since then there have been many disputes about the translation of the Beijing 2008 Olympiad Mascots.
Three disadvantages of "Five Friendlies" were quickly brought up. In the first place, regarding to the meaning of the words, " Friendly" has two meanings: one is "behaving in a kind and pleasant way; acting like a friend" and the other is "game of football etc. which is not part of a serious competitive series". Both the two meanings have the same plural form, " friendlies". In the second place, "friendlies" sounds like "friendless" which means "having no friend" which is quite confusing when people are saying it. The third, the spelling of "friendlies" is "friend" "lies" which in many ways causes misunderstandings. In all, it is not reasonable to use "Five Friendlies" as the English version of "Fu Wa".
Professor Wang Yinquan says: " Five Friendlies" can’t demonstrate the Chinese culture, and yet it doesn’t conform to the acquirement that the Olympiad Mascots must represent the culture of the host-country with the hope to give publicity to its culture and tradition. Therefore we must find such a word as the 2008 Olympiad Mascots. " Fu Wa" at last was chosen as the international version of the 2008 Olympiad Mascots with five nick names " Bei Bei, Jing Jing, Huan Huan, Ying Ying and Ni Ni" which means "Beijin welcomes you". This reminds me of the word " Kong Fu"when its representative martial actor Li Xiaolong first appeared in Holywood films as a martial arts master and when it first appeared in the English vocabulary. " Kong Fu", a kind of Chinese martial arts is not found in any other cultures and it represents Chinese culture only. Another culture-loaded word is "ya men" which can’t find an equivalent in English language. So this kind of culture-loaded word is translated literally with the aim of publicizing the Chinese culture.
Because of the differences between China and the west world in history, tradition, conception, and the situation of the country, there are many hindrances in the translation between Chinese and English. And there are just 40% equivalents between the two languages, so there is just a little part of the two languages can be easily translated. Speaking of the Chinese culture-loaded word, they are in some ways can’t be translated; otherwise it would lose its culture characteristics. Under such circumstances, we can’t just adopt Domesticating Translation Approach which is opposite to Foreignizing Translation Approach. Domesticating Translation and Foreignizing Translation were firstly put forward by Lawrence Venuti in 1995. By domestication, it is used to describe the translation strategy in which a transparent and fluent style is adopted in order to minimize the strangeness of the foreign text for TL readers. As for foreignization, it is used to designate the type of translation in which TL is produced which deliberately breaks the target conventions by retaining something of the foreignness of the original.
In fact, the domestication and foreignization theory were originated from the German scholar Schleiermacher who says "translator can either leave the writer in peace as much as possible and bring the reader to him, or he can leave the reader in peace as much as possible and bring the writer to him."Actually, in such a cultural atmosphere as domestication is the standard approach, he advocate the later one, which in the circumstance of translating culture-loaded words can fully display the foreign country’s culture and tradition, and this can inspire the nation’s confidence.
In all, the English version of "Fu Wa" is really a typical example of foreignzing theory, and many other culture-loaded words in Chinese remain to be rethought about.
References:
[1]AS Hornby,李北达.Oxford Advanced Learner’s English-Chinese Dictionary[Z].北京:商务印书馆,2002. 591.
[2]Eugene A. Nida. Language , Culture and Translating[M] .上海外语教育出版社,1993.
[3]范仲英.实用翻译教程.北京:外语教学与研究出版社,1994.
[4]张培基等.英汉翻译教程.上海:上海外语教育出版社,1980.
Key Words:"Fu Wa" culture-loaded words Foreignizing Translation
On 11th November 2005, the BOCOG (Beijing Organizing Committee of the 29th Olympic Games) announced the Beijing 2008 Olympiad Mascots as five cartoon babies and they are called "Fu Wa" together. And they were first translated as "Five Friendlies".Since then there have been many disputes about the translation of the Beijing 2008 Olympiad Mascots.
Three disadvantages of "Five Friendlies" were quickly brought up. In the first place, regarding to the meaning of the words, " Friendly" has two meanings: one is "behaving in a kind and pleasant way; acting like a friend" and the other is "game of football etc. which is not part of a serious competitive series". Both the two meanings have the same plural form, " friendlies". In the second place, "friendlies" sounds like "friendless" which means "having no friend" which is quite confusing when people are saying it. The third, the spelling of "friendlies" is "friend" "lies" which in many ways causes misunderstandings. In all, it is not reasonable to use "Five Friendlies" as the English version of "Fu Wa".
Professor Wang Yinquan says: " Five Friendlies" can’t demonstrate the Chinese culture, and yet it doesn’t conform to the acquirement that the Olympiad Mascots must represent the culture of the host-country with the hope to give publicity to its culture and tradition. Therefore we must find such a word as the 2008 Olympiad Mascots. " Fu Wa" at last was chosen as the international version of the 2008 Olympiad Mascots with five nick names " Bei Bei, Jing Jing, Huan Huan, Ying Ying and Ni Ni" which means "Beijin welcomes you". This reminds me of the word " Kong Fu"when its representative martial actor Li Xiaolong first appeared in Holywood films as a martial arts master and when it first appeared in the English vocabulary. " Kong Fu", a kind of Chinese martial arts is not found in any other cultures and it represents Chinese culture only. Another culture-loaded word is "ya men" which can’t find an equivalent in English language. So this kind of culture-loaded word is translated literally with the aim of publicizing the Chinese culture.
Because of the differences between China and the west world in history, tradition, conception, and the situation of the country, there are many hindrances in the translation between Chinese and English. And there are just 40% equivalents between the two languages, so there is just a little part of the two languages can be easily translated. Speaking of the Chinese culture-loaded word, they are in some ways can’t be translated; otherwise it would lose its culture characteristics. Under such circumstances, we can’t just adopt Domesticating Translation Approach which is opposite to Foreignizing Translation Approach. Domesticating Translation and Foreignizing Translation were firstly put forward by Lawrence Venuti in 1995. By domestication, it is used to describe the translation strategy in which a transparent and fluent style is adopted in order to minimize the strangeness of the foreign text for TL readers. As for foreignization, it is used to designate the type of translation in which TL is produced which deliberately breaks the target conventions by retaining something of the foreignness of the original.
In fact, the domestication and foreignization theory were originated from the German scholar Schleiermacher who says "translator can either leave the writer in peace as much as possible and bring the reader to him, or he can leave the reader in peace as much as possible and bring the writer to him."Actually, in such a cultural atmosphere as domestication is the standard approach, he advocate the later one, which in the circumstance of translating culture-loaded words can fully display the foreign country’s culture and tradition, and this can inspire the nation’s confidence.
In all, the English version of "Fu Wa" is really a typical example of foreignzing theory, and many other culture-loaded words in Chinese remain to be rethought about.
References:
[1]AS Hornby,李北达.Oxford Advanced Learner’s English-Chinese Dictionary[Z].北京:商务印书馆,2002. 591.
[2]Eugene A. Nida. Language , Culture and Translating[M] .上海外语教育出版社,1993.
[3]范仲英.实用翻译教程.北京:外语教学与研究出版社,1994.
[4]张培基等.英汉翻译教程.上海:上海外语教育出版社,1980.