论文总字数：96859字

摘 要

如今，随着汉语流行语逐渐成为一种文化现象，它的流行已不容忽视。大多数情况下，汉语流行语产生于社会热点，能生动形象地表达社会习俗和价值观，传播中国文化。近年来，随着中国在国际事务和对外交往方面进入高度话语意识时代，中国的对外宣传和外宣翻译成为了重中之重。提高汉语流行语的英文翻译质量能让英语母语人士更好地了解当前中国的社会现状。因此，英语母语读者对汉语流行语英译的认知度和接受情况值得我们探究并作为重要参考。

本研究以定性分析为主，定量分析为辅，探讨英语母语读者对《孔子学院》期刊中流行语英译的接受程度。作者设计了有声思维实验，邀请了两位英语母语读者作为受试参与了实验，实验过程全程录音，录音材料后由作者转写成为文本，以利分析。根据评价理论，作者采用定量研究方法，对录音转写文本中的表态实词进行了统计；为揭示两位受试对流行语英译的认知度，作者在评价理论的指导下，使用定性分析的研究方法对录音文本进行了进一步的分析。

研究表明，虽然参与实验的两位英语母语读者能够理解并接受大多数汉语流行语英译本中的内涵意义和外延意义，仍有一些英语翻译让两位受试感到困惑，并不能被他们理解和认同。如果英语母语读者不了解某些中国的社会热点，那么他们也很难理解那些产生于社会热点的汉语流行语。从两位研究参与者实验中的反馈来看，那些语法正确且逻辑严谨的意译翻译更容易被他们接受。而对于那些单纯的直译翻译，如果没有额外的解释，很难被两位受试理解。研究同时发现，中西方文化差异是译者在进行外宣翻译时所要面临的主要挑战。如果某个汉语流行语在西方文化中找不到一个与之相对应的概念，那么仅靠直译翻译，英语母语读者很难正确理解那个汉语流行语的意涵。因此，为了增强我国外宣翻译的有效性，译者须要探索总结出一系列专门适用于汉语流行语翻译的翻译策略。更为重要的是，流行语英译本不仅须要合理阐述出某个汉语流行语的释义，更要努力让目标读者了解到该汉语流行语所反映出的中国社会现象，以便他们更好地了解中国文化及社会面貌。

关键词：汉语流行语英译；认知度；外宣翻译；有声思维

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements ii

Abstract iii

List of Tables vii

Chapter One Introduction 1

1.1 Background of the Study 1

1.2 Objective of the Study 2

1.3 Significance of the Study 2

1.4 Layout of the Thesis 3

Chapter Two Literature Review 4

2.1 Publicity-Oriented Translation 4

2.1.1 Previous Studies on the Publicity-Oriented Translation 4

2.1.2 Summary 7

2.2 Catchwords and Chinese Catchwords amp; C/E Translation of Chinese Catchwords 8

2.2.1 Previous Studies on Catchwords and Chinese Catchwords 8

2.2.2 Previous Studies at Home on C/E Translation of Chinese Catchwords 10

2.2.3 Summary 11

Chapter Three Research Methodology 13

3.1 Research Questions 13

3.2 Research Materials 13

3.3 Data Collection 14

3.4 Data Analysis 15

3.4.1 Analytical Framework 15

3.4.2 Analytical Procedure 16

Chapter Four Results and Discussion 18

4.1 Native English Speakers’ Acceptability of the English Translation of the Chinese Catchwords 18

4.2 The Correlation between the Acceptability and Chinese Catchwords Adopting Different Translation Strategies 26

Chapter Five Conclusion 29

5.1 Major Findings 29

5.2 Implications 29

5.3 Limitations and Suggestions for Further Study 30

References 32

Appendix 35

List of Tables

Table 1. The Distribution of Affect, Judgment and Appreciation Linguistic Resource in the Male Participant’s Transcription…………….………………………………….8

Table 2. The Distribution of Affect, Judgment and Appreciation Linguistic Resource in the Male Participant’s Transcription…………...…………………………………...8

Table 3. The English Translation of Chinese catchwords Understood Not Understood and Misunderstood by the Male Participant…………………………..………………9

Table 4. The English Translation of Chinese catchwords Understood Not Understood and Misunderstood by the Female Participant……………………………..…………9

Example:

Table 1. The Distribution of Affect, Judgment and Appreciation Linguistic Resource in the Male Participant’s Transcription

Chapter One Introduction

In this chapter, background of the study, objective of this study, significance of this study and the layout of this thesis will be elaborated one by one.

1.1 Background of the Study

With the continuous improvement of China’s international influence, China has entered the era of high discourse awareness in terms of foreign affairs and communication in recent years. China’s foreign publicity has also become a top priority. It may not be difficult for the world to hear our voice, but to let the world listen to our voice requires more efforts on the issue of foreign cross-culture communication. Translation is one of the most important means of external publicity, whose purpose is to make translation discourse and its presentation truly influential, appealing, and attractive to international audiences thus allow them to better understand rather than misunderstand China.

Language is an indispensable key component of human social life. It closely follows the development of society and will generate some hot spots within a specific period. Catchword, as a unique form of language unit, is more and more widely used and spread by people. Chinese catchwords reflect changes in Chinese society, politics, economy, culture, and so on, which have attracted much attention from researchers. Domestic research on Chinese catchwords began in the late 1990s.

Since it was founded in 2004, Confucius Institute has aimed to promote Chinese language and culture as well as facilitate cross culture communication. Besides, the Confucius Institute has been regarded as a significant platform to carry out China’s international publicity. Playing a crucial role in external pubulicity, Confucius Institute journal has been intentionally chosen by the author as research materials to set up research corpora.

1.2 Objective of the Study

As a language variety, Chinese catchword endowed with its own characteristics, which poses great difficulties for foreigners. The English translation of Chinese catchwords is both important and beneficial in this fast-developing information society, especially for intercultural communicators (Hui; Sun; Zhang, 2016). As is known, international publicity translation can facilitate cross culture communication between China and western world. But because of the limited research and study on the international publicity translation of Chinese catchword, it has not brought much attention in China. As a language learner, the author personally intends to put the newly emerged Chinese catchwords into daily communication use, sometimes with her foreign friends. Thus, the author eagerly expects those Chinese catchwords can be better comprehend by foreigners through international publicity translation. In this study, the author explores native English speakers’ familiarity with the Chinese catchwords selected from Confucius Institute journal and their acceptability towards the English translation version of those Chinese catchwords.

1.3 Significance of the Study

This research can be regarded as a meaningful one for the following reasons. First of all, it accords with an area of significance that has been identified by the publicity department. That is to say, this study provides practical insights for translators and also institutes who have devoted themselves in the field of translating text with peculiar Chinese characteristics. Second, when the author analyzes the participants’ acceptability of English-translated version of Chinese catchwords, translation strategies adopted on those Chinese catchwords have been taken into consideration, which provides suggestions for further study that researchers should reckon with the target audience’s acceptability towards the translation in order to adjust their translation strategies. Third, the study is of great ingenuity for it combines the discussion of international publicity translation with English translation of Chinese catchwords simultaneously. Catchwords can be seen as a newly-born language phenomenon with the history of no more than three decades which are usually inspired by hot social events and quickly spread from the social media to people’s daily conversation. Today, more and more catchwords are integrated into Chinese language and reflect numerous aspects of our lives. The Confucius Institute and its journal are vital channels for us to spread Chinese cultures and let foreigners recognize the huge change and development in present China. Thus, to explore every possibility of improvement with regard to the quality of English-translated version of Chinese catchwords may shed light on better and more comprehensive understanding about China from the target audience of our publicity-oriented translation.

1.4 Layout of the Thesis

First, the research reviews previous studies about publicity-oriented translation and the English translation of Chinese catchwords respectively in Chapter 2. Then Chapter 3 introduces the research methodology. Chapter 4 reveals participants’ acceptability of the English-translated version of Chinese catchwords collected from Confucius Institute journal and also discusses the correlation between participants’ acceptability and different translation strategies adopted on the English translation of Chinese catchwords. Finally, the author makes conclusions to this research and proposes limitations and future research direction in the last chapter.

Chapter Two Literature Review

This chapter reviews previous studies on the publicity-oriented translation and Chinese catchword as well as the C/E translation of Chinese catchword.

2.1 Publicity-Oriented Translation

2.1.1 Previous Studies on the Publicity-Oriented Translation

The past two decades since China’s reform and opening up have witnessed the ever-growing international communication in China. And the understanding on China’s external publicity, an important part of international communication, has been clearer than before(Sun, 2013). Israel Epstein, a Polish-Chinese journalist, and several other experts(2000) deem that the translation from Chinese to other foreign languages , or more accurately, the external publicity takes place on all occasions when we contact and communicate with foreigners, for example when doing foreign trade in terms of export and tourism or dealing with foreign affairs, and also in the process of cultural and educational exchange. According to The Dictionary of Publicity and Public Opinion, “external publicity” is defined as “the publicity campaigns which introduce to the international community China’s political, economic and social life and our stance on international affairs”(China Economy Daily Press The Dictionary of Publicity and Public Opinion 1992: 227). External publicity is an indispensable part of China’s diplomatic work, through which overseas audiences can learn about China’s foreign policy, socioeconomic profile, traditional culture and achievements, including the human rights situation in an objective and genuine manner, so as to win the understanding, trust and support from them.

Effective external publicity can help to establish a good international image of China and create a favorable international public opinion environment for China’s modernization. (Li amp; Jia, 2012) To carry out effective external publicity is to let foreign audiences know more about today's China, recognize its development, achievements, unique culture, and facts in other dimension. Whether or not these facts can be accepted in the end and whether the external publicity can have a positive impact depend to a large extent on if the content and means are acceptable to the audience. (Chen, 2007)

With the economic achievements, cultural and ethical progress as well as the political development, and the continuous expansion of our external publicity, overseas audiences have become increasingly aware of China's image and their impressions on us have also constantly improved. However, on the whole, overseas audiences' understanding of China is not commensurate with China’s image in the international arena. There are still many significant accomplishments in China remaining not being recognized by overseas audiences. Although China has invested a large amount of money and utilized materials and human resources each year in doing external publicity work, the result is always contrary to our expectations and sometimes even fails to reach the goals. Because we do external publicity on the basis of Chinese audiences’ own way of thinking and communicating rather than foreigners' ones(Chen, 2010). In an article published on Chinese Journalist by the Xinhua News Agency, the author pointed out that many of China's publicity-oriented reports “are not in line with the reality nor successful in catching overseas audiences' attention. Those journalists just use domestic ideas, methods, and slogans to engage in external publicity” (Xinhua News Agency Chinese Journalist http://www.chinesejournalist.cn/2004/2/2-20.htm) Another American journalist Liang Guoxiong (“Principles Of Argument”. http://www.hol.gr/greece/texts/aristo4.txt ) from World Journal suggested that “The external publicity-oriented reports from Chinese media often promote China's views and positions to the international society in a tone tailored for domestic audiences. Those kind of external publicity-oriented reports are always filled with too many ideologically loaded terms and too blunt viewpoints. Foreigners who don’t have stereotypes about China barely show their interest in reading those reports, let alone accept the opinions conveyed in those reports.”

Publicity-oriented translation serves for external publicity. Whether or not the external publicity can work well with target audiences depends on the quality of the translated text. In recent years, the study of publicity-oriented translation has gradually attracted the attention and interest of experts and scholars in China. Different scholars have applied both Chinese and foreign translation theories in translating text for the use of external publicity, such as functional translation theory, relevance theory, discourse theory, equivalence theory, text typology, memetics etc.

Being regarded as an eminent translator as well as a pioneer in the field of publicity-oriented translating, Huang (2004) proposed the “three closeness” principle which stated that the text for publicity-oriented translating should be close to the practice of China’s development, close to foreign readers’ demand for Chinese information, and (the way it to be translated) close to foreign readers’ thinking habits. Translation is not only a simple information exchange between the source language and the target language, but also a cross-cultural communication. Chinese and western people have different cultural backgrounds, values, and ways of thinking because of the historical development and geographical environment are not the same in China and the western world. As is often the case that there are many expressions with Chinese characteristics in foreign publicity materials, which sometimes puzzles target readers who do not know much about Chinese culture and lack China's political background information. Thus, translators are required to add extra explanations to these words and phrases in order to further explain their connotations and denotations. In short, the publicity-oriented C/E translated text must comply with the grammar rules of English language, and also be reader-friendly, in other words, clear to grasp viewpoints, easy to understand main ideas and pleasing to the eye (Li amp; Jia, 2012). Publicity-oriented translation plays a crucial role in making Chinese discourse truly influential, appealing, and attractive in the communication with international community. It requires translators to cultivate a high level of cultural awareness and enhance their abilities to contact, get along and exchange ideas with people from different cultural background. More importantly, translators are supposed to build up an audience awareness and bear the difference between Chinese rhetoric and English rhetoric in mind while they strive to find ways of translating acceptable to foreign audiences(Chen,2013).

2.1.2 Summary

Firstly, after combing through piles of previous studies concerning publicity-oriented translation, it has been quite obvious that when it comes to doing publicity-oriented translation, to what extent the target audience can understand and accept the publicity-oriented translation text matters most, which sets the practical foundation for this thesis. Under the premise of fully understanding the original text, translators are expected to raise audience awareness (Chen, 2013) and make the publicity-oriented translation in conformity with both target language’s syntactic structure, discourse construction, logical coherence and conversational style and target audiences’ psychology and thinking habit.(Yuan, 2013 ) Secondly, successful publicity-oriented translation must be able to attract and impress the public in the real world. The first step to effectively influence the audience is to choose appropriate themes for publicity-oriented translation. With the understanding of the needs and preferences of the target audience, themes that are in accordance with the target audiences' expectation should be selected as publicity-oriented translation materials(Chen, 2013). Most foreigners care more about and want to know more about “What is today’s China like?” (Zhao, 2004) That is to say, the materials for publicity-oriented translation should not only be those aimed at introducing to the world what happened in and to China in the past, but those materials presenting present China to the world should also be included. Thirdly, there have been numerous studies discussing and providing translating strategies for publicity-oriented translation, but few has examined to what extent the translation materials are understood and accepted by target audiences. Based on the lack of domestic research in this field, this thesis will focus on the target audiences’ aspect to understand the publicity-oriented translation materials and profile their acceptability in order to offer some suggestions to others’ further research.

2.2 Catchwords and Chinese Catchwords amp; C/E Translation of Chinese Catchwords

2.2.1 Previous Studies on Catchwords and Chinese Catchwords

The catchwords are a new thing in the language system. The earliest expression of "catchwords" can be traced back to 1984 when the editorial department of "The Basics of Modern Terminology" organized by Japan's Liberal National Public Organization launched the Japanese new language catchword. Since then, the "catchword" began to be known by the public. In 1990, the American Dialect Society began to select the American annual catchwords of the year. In China, the annual catchwords have been released by the authority since 2002, and the corresponding studies on Chinese catchwords have also begun to thrive.

With regard to the definition of "catchword," the academic community has different opinions. The Chinese Dictionary's interpretation of "catchword" is "a vocabulary widely popular in society in a certain period of time" (7th edition of Modern Chinese Dictionary, Commercial Press, 2016, p. 838). The English Dictionary explains catchwords as "unforgettable and repeatedly used words or phrases, such as slogans for political parties and advertising products." (Webster's Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary of the English Language. New York: Portland House, 1989: 632. ), "The widely used and more popular phrase, especially the slogan used by the mass or a campaign" (The American Heritage Dictionary of the English language. Boston: Houghon Mifflin Company, 1979: 477.), "words or phrases summarizing a particular concept which are mainly used to express the fashion, such as 'motivation' , 'X generation' (the unknown generation)" (The New Oxford dictionary of English, edit by Jedy Pearsall, Patrick Hanks, 1998:666.).

The definitions of Chinese catchwords given by Chinese researchers have different focuses. Some scholars have emphasized the popularity, frequency of utilization and range of application of catchwords. Hu Mingyang and Zhang Ying (1990), who first proposed the concept of “catchwords,” believe that “catchwords refer to the words and phrases being widely popular at a certain period of time among a certain group of people, especially teenagers" " They are a kind of epidemic for a while but will be quickly replaced by other newly emerging words and phrases and thus disappear from the system of common language." Choi Pengke (2012) believes that “catchwords refers to the linguistic units newly generated in a certain language community which are civil, replicable, contagious, and mutative and can reflect social hotspots and social attitudes at a certain period of time. These linguistic units have two important parameters. One is a common tense, that is, some new linguistic units used by people in a language community during a certain period of time or old linguistic units that are given new meanings; the second is the diachronic state. Language units have a parabolic distribution in the amount they appear, which quickly surge from scratch and suddenly drop after reaching the peak.” Some scholars classify catchwords into special speech categories. Guo Xi (2004) pointed out that catchwords are “a form of language widely popular among certain people in a certain period of time”. Other scholars, such as Yang Wenquan(2002) and Lu Keying(2006), give the definition of catchword with consideration of its nonverbal communicative functions. They consider catchwords as the vocabularies prevail among a certain group of people within a certain period of time; as the product generated by the politics, economy, culture, environment and people’s psychology in the society; as the language which can reflect the social landscape, culture and customs of the time.

As for the characteristics of Chinese catchword, there are three main features. Firstly, Chinese catchword is the sign of the times (Han, 2007). Under the impact of the reform and opening-up policy, many new things and concepts have emerged in China during the past several decades. To address these new things and new concepts, modern Chinese language has produced new batches of new words. It can be seen that catchwords are the sign of the development of the society which can reflect the characteristics of the times. Some of the Chinese catchwords are often closely related to major social events. Secondly, some Chinese catchwords are used in specific field or by people in some specific communities.(Yang, 2002) The so-called community is a group of individuals who share certain social attributes in common (such as origin, age, gender, occupation, social class, educational background, hobbies, moral concepts, religious beliefs, etc.). Each community has its own catchwords that may only be popular within the community's register, such as catchwords used in the entertainment circle, football world, campus, on the Internet and even catchwords generated from China’s Spring Festival Gala. Thirdly, Chinese catchword has its novelty and originality in terms of linguistic features.(Han, 2007) For example, the way Chinese catchwords are formed is always untraditional. And Chinese catchwords also have novel semantic and phonological features.

According to Han Li(2007), Chinese catchwords can be classified into five categories: catchwords newly coined, catchwords which are traditional words with newly added denotations, catchwords coined by using rhetoric, catchwords borrowed from foreign language and catchwords originated from slang or dialect. In this research, the author referred to the classification of Chinese catchwords given by Han Li when collecting and selecting the research materials from Confucius Institute.

2.2.2 Previous Studies at Home on C/E Translation of Chinese Catchwords

A language, the carrier of culture, embodies a nation’s history, cultural background, thinking pattern, values, social customs and so on. Stemming from the particular cultural environment, the Chinese catchwords, with humor, novelty and vigor, are closely connected with Chinese culture, in which social customs and values are vividly expressed.(Feng, 2015) Therefore, from cultural perspective, catchwords, as a new form of language, transmits particular culture of a given language. Communicatively, with greater popularity among people, catchword is stronger in communication because it differs from traditional communication form for its conciseness in conveying the intention more vividly and explicitly. (Zhang, 2016)

Chinese catchwords are endowed with its own characteristics, which pose great difficulties for the better understanding of foreigners. The English translation of Chinese catchwords is both important and beneficial in this fast-developing information society, especially for the purpose of intercultural communication.(Hui; Sun; Zhang,2016) Along with the rising position of China in the world and the tremendous contribution to the world, more and more foreigners pay attention to Chinese culture. The English translation of Chinese catchwords is urgent and necessary to transmit Chinese culture.(Si, 2015) Chinese catchwords are closely related with Chinese culture and China’s social events thus its translation should be conducted on the premise of a mastery of Chinese culture and social hotspots.(Xiao amp; Tang,2017) In translating the Chinese catchwords, the translators need to make a flexible use of the transformation on linguistic, cultural and communicative dimension, and make an adaption to the eco-environment of catchwords to carry out the translation with a higher degree of adaption, so as to be better accepted and understood by the people from foreign cultures.(Guan, 2014) According to Feng Jinxia(2015), the strategies to translate Chinese catchwords into English can roughly be summarized as following 5 tactics: literal translation, free translation, literal translation plus interpretation, paraphrase and back translation.

2.2.3 Summary

Generally speaking, the previous researches on Chinese catchwords at home mostly focused on its linguistic features, cultural analysis, dissemination mechanisms, pragmatic meaning and impact on traditional values. Studies on the C/E translation of Chinese catchwords mainly argued the strategies for proper translation, for example, from memetic perspective or with eco-translatology approach. However, few researchers have noticed that the quality of translation works can be improved by analyzing the feedback about the translation from the target audience. Knowing how the audience understand or misunderstand the translation can be useful for the translators to make further adjustment to their translation strategies. Besides, research that combines the C/E translation of Chinese catchwords with publicity-oriented translation is rare and fragmented.

The author of this thesis tries to explore the mental model of the target readers after they read the English translation of some Chinese catchwords. Thus the feedback and attitude of target readers can be served as useful materials for further assessment of the effectiveness of those English translations of Chinese catchwords. Also, the thesis aims at throwing lights on further studies of the C/E translation of Chinese catchwords for the purpose of external publicity, propagating the transmission of Chinese distinctive culture and letting more foreign target readers get acquainted with the social development in today’s China.

It should be noticed that previous studies mentioned in this chapter on the criteria to classify Chinese catchwords and the strategies to translate Chinese catchwords into English provide theoretical framework for the following chapters to collect and select research materials and further discuss the results of the TAP experiment in this thesis.

Chapter Three Research Methodology

The research questions and research materials are presented in this part. Simultaneously, the research tool used for data collection and theoretical framework for data analysis are introduced here.

3.1 Research Questions

This research conducts an empirical study to solve two questions 1) How do native English speakers understand and accept the English translation of Chinese catchwords? 2) What is English native speakers’ acceptability of English translation of Chinese catchwords adopting different translation strategies?

3.2 Research Materials

The multilingual periodical of Confucius Institute is a series of publications sponsored by the Confucius Institute Headquarters (Han Ban). In March 2009, the English version of Confucius Institute was firstly launched. In this research, the Chinese catchwords and their English translations are mainly selected from the cultural columns of the English version of Confucius Institute periodical. The author combed the periodical published from 2009 to 2017 in order to grasp as diverse as possible Chinese catchwords for the research. Then 15 specific Chinese catchwords and their English translations were picked out as research materials.

These 15 Chinese catchwords were selected in accordance with the definition for the 5 categories of Chinese catchwords given by Han Li (2007). The five categories are: catchwords newly coined, catchwords which are traditional words with newly added denotations, catchwords coined by using rhetoric, catchwords borrowed from foreign language and catchwords originated from slang or dialect. In other words, typical examples of Chinese catchwords for each category can be found in the research materials. For instance, “中国通” (people having an old-China-hand/ an expert on Chinese culture) belongs to the first category; “淘宝” (go treasure hunting) represents the second type; “空巢” (empty nest) represents the third one; “hold住” (hold on/ keep it under control) represents the forth and “忽悠” (coaxing) represents the last type.

Simultaneously, the 5 translation strategies for translating different types of Chinese catchwords summed up by Feng Jinxia (2015) have also been taken into consideration during the process of selecting Chinese catchwords and establishing the research materials. According to Feng Jinxia(2015), the strategies to translate Chinese catchwords into English can roughly be summarized as following 5 tactics: literal translation, free translation, literal translation plus interpretation, paraphrase and back translation. Each Chinese catchword selected as the research materials is representative of one particular translation strategies. For example, free translation strategy is adopted into translating the Chinese catchword “淘宝” (go treasure hunting) ; literal translation strategy is adopted into translating the Chinese catchword “剩女” (left girls); literal translation with interpretation has been applied to explain the Chinese catchword “空巢” (empty nest which describes the void and lonely conditions of parents after their children grow up and leave home); the Chinese catchword “高富帅”is paraphrased into “tall, rich and handsome”; back translation strategy is used to translate the Chinese catchword “hold 住” into its source language.

3.3 Data Collection

This research adopts TAP (Think Aloud Protocol) as a means to collect research data. In order to measure and depict native English speakers’ acceptability of English translation of Chinese catchwords in Confucius Institute, The author invited two Americans participating into the TAP experiment. One participant is a male, white, 34-year-old, from Seattle, Washington. He got his Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts majoring in anthropology. Before he came to China and became a foreign teacher, he worked as a lecturer in a university and a video game developer at the same time. The other participant is a female, also white, 24-year-old, from Navasota, Texas, USA. Before she came to China to continue her further study as a Chinese language student, she got her Bachelor of Science majoring in Health in the USA. The two participants meet the requirement of TAP experiment for both of them are native English speakers who use English as their first language.

Both of the two TAP experiments were conducted strictly in accordance with the TAP experimental requirements, in which participants spoke aloud what were in their mind after they read the instructions given by the researcher. Extra guidance or unnecessary instructions have been limited to a minimum. And what the participants said were all recorded and then transcribed into two copies of transcription by the author. The experimental questions and the two copies of transcription can be seen in the appendix.

3.4 Data Analysis

3.4.1 Analytical Framework

Appraisal is “an interpersonal system at the level of discourse semantics” (Martin amp; White 2005: 33).

It is concerned with how writers/speakers approve and disapprove, enthuse and abhor, applause and criticize, and with how they position their readers/listeners to do likewise. It is concerned with the construction by texts of communities of shared feelings and values, and with the linguistic mechanisms for the sharing of emotions, tastes and normative assessments. It is concerned with how writers/ speakers construe for themselves particular authorial identities or personae, with how they align or disalign themselves with actual or potential respondents, and with how they construct for their texts an intended or ideal audience. (Martin amp;White 2005:1)

In other words, Appraisal Theory is related to the linguistic resources for and by which a text/speaker adopts to express, negotiate and naturalize his inter-subjective and ultimately ideological positions (White 1998).

The central part of Appraisal Theory is “system”, and its focus is “Appraisal”. Language is only the analytical “tool” by which language users' attitude, view and stance can be found out (Wang Zhenhua 2001:14-15).

Being a multi-dimensional theory, there are three subsystems within the Appraisal System: Attitude (the main system), Engagement, and Graduation (which are attendant systems). The Attitude system is related with the Appraisal linguistic resources which express the speaker’s emotional feelings, his judgment of human characters and behaviors, and his appreciation of human performances, artificial things and natural phenomena. There are three sub-categories under Attitudinal system: Affect, Judgment and Appreciation. Affect is a commonly-used psychological term. In Appraisal theory, it relates to “resources for construing emotional reactions” (Martin amp; White 2005:35). Generally speaking, Affect is regarded as the linguistic resources which present the speaker’s emotional feelings or reactions to certain things or phenomena. Judgment refers to the Attitudinal evaluation in which human qualities and behaviors are positively or negatively evaluated according to a set of social norms, such as rules, regulations, social values and social expectations. Appreciation is applied by speakers to show their appreciation to things including the natural phenomena, the products made by human beings and the performance gave by human beings. And according to Martin and White(2005), there are still some sub-categories under Affect, Judgment and Appreciation.

A speaker’s opinion and stance are achieved through the use of attitudinal lexis in a discourse. And there are both positive and negative attitudes which respectively and differently demonstrate how the speaker perceives and cognizes people’s behavior or some certain things. That is to say, the speaker’s opinion and stance towards someone or something can be speculated and presented through the identification and analysis of the attitudinal lexis applied in his or her discourse.

3.4.2 Analytical Procedure

In order to investigate the native English speakers’ acceptability of the English translation of the Chinese catchwords in Confucius Institute, the transcription of the TAP experiment, in other word, the discourse should be analyzed under the frame work of Attitude system. The analysis of the transcription was done in three steps: First, since Appraisal Theory works at the lexical level, the Attitudinal lexis in the two copies of transcription were identified and classified according to the three sub-categories of Attitude system: Affect, Judgment, Appreciation and their sub-categories. In this process, quantitative research method was adopted. Then, two concrete tables showed the number and ratio of the Attitudinal lexis of each category. Finally, qualitative researching method was adopted to analyze some illustrative examples selected from the discourse in order to depict the participants’ acceptability of English translation of some Chinese catchwords.

Chapter Four Results and Discussion

In this chapter, the data collected from the TAP experiment are illustrated in concrete tables and the transcription of TAP experiment are analyzed in details, meanwhile, the correlation between participants’ acceptability and translation strategies are discussed.

4.1 Native English Speakers’ Acceptability of the English Translation of the Chinese Catchwords

Table 1. The Distribution of Affect, Judgment and Appreciation Linguistic Resource in the Male Participant’s Transcription

Table 2. The Distribution of Affect, Judgment and Appreciation Linguistic Resource in the Female Participant’s Transcription

According to these two tables, there are in total 129 Attitudinal lexis in the male participant’s transcription with 27 affect linguistic resources, 15 judgment linguistic resources and 87 appreciation linguistic resources; there are in total 52 Attitudinal lexis in the female participant’s transcription with 10 affect linguistic resources, 1 judgment linguistic resources and 41 appreciation linguistic resources. It’s obvious that the appreciation lexis largely outnumbers the other two categories of the Attitudinal words or phrases, which indicates that the two participants applied a large number of appreciation linguistic resources to access the English translation of Chinese catchwords.

By further analyzing some typical examples, it becomes easier to reveal the two native English speakers’ acceptability of the C/E translation of the catchwords. As for the male participant, he acquired the correct meaning of 9 Chinese catchwords with the help of the English translation. The other 6 Chinese catchwords with English translation for each all cause him some difficulty in comprehension. The female participant grasped the exact meaning of 11 Chinese catchwords with the help of the English translation. The other 4 made her confused to some extent.

Table 3. The English Translation of Chinese catchwords Understood / Not Understood / Misunderstood by the Male Participant

Table 4. The English Translation of Chinese catchwords Understood / Not Understood / Misunderstood by the Female Participant

Some typical examples were picked out from the table above and they are explained in details one by one.

(1) “hold 住” is a Chinese catchword originated from the pigeon English in Hong Kong which means to keep something under somebody’s control. There are two versions of English translation for this Chinese catchword in Confucius Institute journal, one is “to hold on”, and the other one is “to keep it under control”. Both of the two translation options were shown to the two participants.

The excerpt from the male participant’s transcription: “Um, I think I prefer [ Affect: happiness, affection] number one, hold on. Um, It's simple [ Appreciation: composition, complexity], and I think It needs less explanation [ Appreciation: composition, complexity]. Um, number two, to keep it under control. I think that if you're going to use that phrase, then, um, they're much sounds a bit more awkward [-Appreciation: reaction, impact] and unnecessary [-Appreciation: valuation]. The number of words is unnecessary [-Appreciation: valuation]. Uh, especially in the context in which you would be used you might tell someone, I can guess to wait or um, and so “hold on” just seems a lot shorter [ Appreciation: composition, complexity] and faster [ Appreciation: composition, complexity] and easier [ Appreciation: composition, complexity].”

According to the excerpt, we can tell that the male participant didn’t get the correct meaning of this Chinese catchword because he was misled by the first translation version “hold on” adopting the “back-translation strategy” which seems more similar to a native English phrase. The female participant preferred the second translation version “to keep it under control” and she also understood the denotation of this Chinese catchword. However, her personal option would be “handle it” rather than “keep it under control”.

(2) “Empty nest” in Chinese “空巢”is a Chinese catchword coined by using rhetorical devices. It means that when children have grown up and moved away from their childhood homes especially when they go to college or get married, there are only parents left in the family and the parents may experience the feelings of depression, sadness, or grief.

The excerpt from the male participant’s transcription: “Empty nest”, uh, “empty nest” does sound like a native [ Appreciation: reaction, quality] English phrase. Um, in fact, we even have, um, something called “empty nest syndrome” in in in English, which means when kids have left, and there's no one still at home, parents get lonely. So we yeah, that absolutely feels like native [ Appreciation: reaction, quality] English. Um, I like [ Affect: happiness, affection] this kind of literal translation because I think it's very visual [ Appreciation: reaction, impact], especially with “empty nest”. I can imagine [ Affect: security, confidence] birds leaving a nest. So it's quite clear [ Appreciation: composition, complexity] what this means.

From the excerpt, it’s apparent that the male participant grasped the denotation and even the connotation behind this Chinese catchword because there is nearly a same saying “empty nest syndrome” existing in the western culture. Similarly, when it comes to the Chinese catchword “高富帅”(translated into English as “tall, rich and handsome”), things go in the same way. Due to the alike saying “tall, dark and handsome” existing in the native English, the male participant immediately understood this Chinese catchword. And even without any additional information, he could tell that this phase must be used to describe those ideal guys for female to catch. The female participant totally understood these two Chinese catchwords as well. And she even gave these two Chinese catchwords their equivalent English phrases: “empty nesters” and “a tall glass/ drink of water”.

(3) “剩女” with its English translation of “left girls” is a Chinese catchword referring to those highly educated and well paid girls who remain unmarried at their thirties.

The excerpt from the male participant’s transcription: Um, number five, “left girls”. Uh, It definitely does not feel like native [-Appreciation: reaction, quality] English to me, but it's I'm guessing that might also partly be due to the fact that I've heard the term “leftover girls”. And that (leftover girls) feels far more native to me. Um, this not really being a western concept. Uh, It yeah, I wouldn't expect it expect it expect it[-Affect: insecurity, surprise] to naturally feel native [-Appreciation: reaction, quality] for me in English. But again, having heard leftover girls so many times, this just this, well, becomes a mistake [-Appreciation: valuation] rather than an actual uh, term [-Appreciation: valuation]. I don't really like [-Affect: unhappiness, antipathy] that. Ok, I like [ Affect: happiness, affection] literal translations, I think they are fine [ Appreciation: reaction, quality]. Um, my personal problem and I think the problem with a lot of western people is that we don't have this concept. So taking a literal translation does not carry with it the connotation behind it, and therefore loses a lot of meaning and feeling. Because if I talk to someone in America who was a quoted “left girl” or “leftover girl”. She is going to slap [-Affect: unhappiness, antipathy] me, uh, um, and not and not just because I guess it's probably because it's rude [-Judgment: social sanction, propriety], but also because, um, a girl who is in her thirties in America. It, we still consider it somewhat reasonable [ Judgment: social esteem, capacity] for her to get married. It's acceptable [ Judgment: social sanction, propriety] and not unreasonable [ Judgment: social sanction, propriety]. Whereas in china, the age the age is expected to be a much more embarrassing [-Judgment: social sanction, propriety] thing.

The excerpt from the female participant’s transcription: Okay, next one, “Sheng Nv” left girls. Yeah, I think I cannot think of [-Appreciation: composition, complexity] an equivalence to this word, um, to this phrase in English, maybe as for the meaning, my choice of words would to say ,someone would say you're “left over”, um, like “Da Ma”. Um, and so maybe when I read this, my initial thought is that this can be very hurtful [-Affect: unhappiness, antipathy], um, to tell some girls they are left girls because they are unmarried. Um, maybe a word that I would use would be single or um, maybe in English, you could say an old maid, um, maybe a woman who has not been married, who is very old. Uh, but I think a more polite [ Judgment: social sanction, propriety] term is just to say single. Um, hum, an unmarried woman, um, ok.

Contrary to the “empty nest”, “left girls” is the most unacceptable English translation of Chinese catchword for both of the two participants. There are mainly three reasons accounting for why they couldn’t accept this translation. First of all, there is no equivalent concept existing in the western culture. A woman in her thirties and even in her forties is still considered possible and reasonable to get married in the western world. Because of the culture shock, western people couldn’t understand why an overage unmarried woman would be discriminated by the public. They view this Chinese catchword “剩女” as a kind of social discrimination. Secondly, both of the two participants prefer to say “leftover girls” rather than “left girls”, which manifests that the translation “left girls” does not denote the correct meaning for the Chinese catchword “剩女”. Therefore, it is necessary to improve the translation from semantic aspect. Thirdly, “left girls” does not conform to the norms of social etiquette in western culture which sounds rude and hurtful when it’s used to judge others. The male participant gave an example to illustrate that he strongly disagreed to this saying. While the female participant would like to say it in a milder way like “being single” or “an old maid”.

Similarly, “给力”with its English translation of “giving power” is unacceptable to both of the two participants. The male participant regards the translation “giving power” as something like “Chinglish” and he didn’t like it. He assumed that “giving energy” might be a better translation because things like food couldn’t give people power but only energy. The female participant held the same idea who thought at first that this Chinese catchword means to charge a mobile phone. And she also mentioned the ambiguity in this translation because “giving power to someone” may also refer to letting someone become a ruler or leader. Actually, without extra explanation, the two participants didn’t and couldn’t get the correct connotation of this Chinese catchword.

Also, without further interpretations, the Chinese catchword “卡奴” with its English translation of “card slaves” didn’t make any sense for both of the two participants. They couldn’t understand the logic behind the English translation “card slaves”. The male participant even misunderstood it and thought that “card slaves” referred to someone who intended to playing cards or gambling. After the researcher explained the meaning of this Chinese catchword to them in details, both of them got it but they preferred to say “debt slaves” or “slaves to debt”.

(4) “团购” with its English translation of “group purchase” is a popular commercial activity in China which means people joining together to make a purchase and they can get a group discount. However, nowadays in China, group purchase has become a business model for e-commerce. When talking about “group purchase” in China, it mainly refers to shopping online on the group-buying websites.

The excerpt from the male participant’s transcription: Next, “group purchase”. Um, I've heard this [ Affect: security, confidence] and I think I've only heard this in China. I don't think I've ever heard this in. I don't I I've heard people using this term in china, but and I know what they mean [ Affect: security, confidence] by it, but I don't think I've ever heard of in America and the the way of purchasing through group purchase websites. It’s the stuff we don't really use in America. Um, group discounts. There may be some for theme parks and things like that, but not not the same [-Appreciation: reaction, quality] way. We have “Group On”, I guess, which I've never used. So maybe we do have maybe I'm just unfamiliar [-Appreciation: reaction, quality] with it. “Group On”, this, I think we have. The one that I think we have. Um, but yeah, it sounds semi-native [±Appreciation: reaction, quality] to me. Uh, uh, it sounds to me like it has a good [ Appreciation: reaction, quality] connotation because a group of people, a group of friends, can all buy their tickets or their dinner together or whatever for a reduced price. So a good [ Appreciation: reaction, quality] connotation.

The excerpt from the female participant’s transcription: “Group purchase”, yes, I think this is a clear definition [ Appreciation].And when reading “group purchase”, I understand that all people are pitching in together to make a purchase. And if there is no further interpretation? It would yeah, it would make sense. Still makes sense[ Appreciation]. Um, in America, maybe we would like to say a “group deal” or a “group discount”. Yeah, if you're maybe when you go to a store, you are about to make a purchase, you can ask, “Is there a group deal or discount?” And when my family and I travel and we will go do the same thing if we are looking online to make a purchase or to buy the ticket. If you have many people purchasing at one time, you can have a group discount. And even without any additional English interpretation, it still makes sense to me when I see it for the first time[ Appreciation].

According to the two participants’ response, we can see that although the concept of “group purchase” does exist in the western world as well, it is still slightly different from what we call “group purchase” in China. Actually, the “group deal” or say “group discount” mostly happens in off-line shopping especially for buying tickets in the western countries. However, due to the rapid development of e-commerce business in China over the past decade, Chinese people make the group purchase online namely on the e-commerce platform for most of the time. And what Chinese people can buy in the form of group purchase cover a large range of entities, including meals, tickets, commodity and sometimes even intangible service. When referring to the English translation “group purchase” for the Chinese catchword “团购”, the two participants, with western cultural background, are able to get the meaning of this Chinese catchword, but they couldn’t notice the slight difference of “group purchase” between Chinese and western culture(more precisely, the American culture). Therefore, the connotation contained within the Chinese catchword “团购” couldn’t be completely and clearly construed with only a literal English translation for it. That is to say, additional explanation and some background information are required to offer in order to introduce the prevailing social phenomenon to the native English speakers.

4.2 The Correlation between the Acceptability and Chinese Catchwords Adopting Different Translation Strategies

Eugene A. Nida was a linguist who developed the dynamic-equivalent translation theory. Nida believes that translation is not only a science but also a technology, and that truly ideal translation is an art after all. In his view, the purpose of translation is to find the closest equivalence to the source language in the target language. Nida proposed the concept of formal equivalence and dynamic equivalence in Toward a Science of Translating (1964). He pointed out that “dynamic equivalence” is to find out “the closest natural equivalence to the source language in the target language from both semantic and stylistic perspective”, which reproduces the information of the source language (Nida, 2001: 91). The standard of testing whether the translation text corresponds with the “dynamic-equivalence translation theory” lies in whether the target reader could respond in the same way as the original reader would do based on the same information they received. It can be seen that Nida emphasized what the reader would respond to the translation matters a lot. He expected to see the target reader respond and react to the information translated from a source language the same way as the original reader does, if possible. This theory is essentially an equivalent translation theory, emphasizing the reader as the center, which is different from the text-centered equivalent translation theory. (Qiu, 2011) This translation principle is in line with the translation requirements and purpose of Chinese catchwords.

In order to verify the validity of Nida’s “dynamic equivalence theory”, six English translations have been picked out from the research corpora. Firstly, “empty nest” and “tall, rich and handsome” are two literal translations of the corresponding Chinese catchwords. These are two equivalent translations because the two participants obtained the denotation and the connotation of the Chinese catchwords correctly by referring to the English translations. And they even came up with some equivalent sayings in native English like “empty nest syndrome” and “tall, dark and handsome”. However, this doesn’t prove that literal translation always equal to equivalent translation. When it comes to the literal translations “left girls” and “giving power”, these two literal translations really made the participants confused and lost, because the Chinese catchwords “剩女” and “给力” only exist in Chinese cultural context. If there is no extra explanation added to the two translations “left girls” and “giving power”, the native English speakers may have great difficulties in comprehending those two Chinese catchwords because of the lack of cultural background knowledge. So here, these two literal translations turn out to be completely not equivalent translations. Last two translations are “coaxing” for Chinese catchword “忽悠” and “go treasure hunting” for “淘宝”, with free translation strategy adopted for both. From the translation “coaxing”, both of the two participants could understand the denotation and connotation contained within the Chinese catchword “忽悠”, and also how this Chinese catchword functions in a conversation. However, one participant said that although she could agree with “coaxing” as the translation for “忽悠”, she would prefer to say “tricking” or to apply other more casual phrases to express the same thing in daily conversation. The other participant’s response to this translation was similar to this female. He said that “coaxing” was a word far away from their (probably refers to the native English speakers’) everyday vocabulary which would sound very weird in oral English. “Coaxing” should be a semi-equivalent translation because it made sense to the two participants but it would not be their preference nor accepted by them. “淘宝”, translated into English as “go treasure hunting”, is a Chinese catchword developed from a traditional Chinese phrase with newly-added connotation. Nowadays in China, “Tao Bao” stands for “the e-commerce named TaoBao” launched by Ma Yun or “shopping online” for most of the time, but “go treasure hunting” only interprets the original meaning of “淘宝” which puzzled the two participants at first. Actually, both of them could recognize and read the pinyin “Tao Bao” and know that it means to go shopping online. After the translation “go treasure hunting” was placed into a context, it started to make sense to the two participants and they could understand the logic behind this translation. Therefore, the free translation “go treasure hunting” for “淘宝” can also be regarded as a semi-equivalent translation which seems unnecessary and could be replaced by the transliteration version or say pinyin “Tao Bao” because “Tao Bao” has become so well-known by the foreigners that it does not need a translation at all. “Tao Bao” can surely stand on its own original linguistic form without any further interpretations then everyone could still get it.

Chapter Five Conclusion

5.1 Major Findings

By carrying out TAP experiment and further analyzing research data under theoretical framework-appraisal theory, it is found that both of the two native English speakers possess relatively high acceptability towards the English translations of some typical Chinese catchwords selected from the Confucius Institute. However, due to the difference and diversity lying in Chinese and western cultures, as well as different translation strategies adopted to the Chinese catchwords, some of the English translations still remain puzzling or unacceptable for them.

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