On the Cultural Translation of Chinese Poetry From the Persp(2)
2015-03-05 01:09
导读：3.1 Appellation CultureAppellation culture is a dual-property semiotic system which concerns with appellation and involves both linguistics and culture. It is a semiotic system because it is marked by
3.1 Appellation CultureAppellation culture is a dual-property semiotic system which concerns with appellation and involves both linguistics and culture. It is a semiotic system because it is marked by words or phrases in languages. The evolution of Chinese history and the continuous blending among nationalities in ancient China has given rise to a complex Han culture. Appellation culture is a good case in point. Appellation can be divided into relative appellation and association. A relative appellation is a cultural symbol produced by marriage system. After long-term cultural sediment, it has become well established. In ancient China, the complex marriage system finally led to a complicated relative appellation system, which inevitably causes troubles in translation.E.g.2 未谙姑食性，先遣小姑尝。Verginial: I decide that not my mother-in-law.But my husband’s young sister shall have the first taste.Xu Yuanchng: To meet my mother-in-law’s taste, I send her daughter the first share.Fletcher: But what kind of taste auntie likes, I don’t know,So send to my sister-in-law the first share.In ancient China, there was a traditional custom, which meant to turn cousinship into marriageship. In other words, a girl was supposed to marry the son of her mother’s brother, thus she would call her husband’s parents, i.e. her father-in-law and mother-in-law uncle and aunt or auntie. Fletcher, obviously, has been confused by the surface meaning of “姑”, hence, he translates this word semantically as “auntie”. Although the girl calls her husband’s mother aunt, she has to present as a daughter-in-law and look at the “aunt” as mother-in-law and serve her everyday after the marriage. This is determined by the feudal marriage system. Thus, Fletcher has made a semantic translation.But here the “auntie” only acts as a “signifier”. A good way to deal with it is to uncover its veil and make the readers see clearly its face, to reveal the word in its true colours. After analyzing and consulting reference books, this is not a difficult task. The best way is to take a communicative translation. Both the first two translators have done in this way. “姑”is translated communicatively as “mother in law”. Under this condition, the TL readers will understand the poem in a full; otherwise, they must be confused about the relationship. Now let’s take another example:E.g.3 嫦娥应悔偷灵药，碧海青天夜夜心。Zhang Tingchen
