《修辞与翻译》课程复习提纲

《修辞与翻译》课程复习提纲

l 关于西方修辞的基本认识

修辞在西方指的既是通过语言及其他象征手段的技巧性利用改变他人的认识、态度、行为的社会实践，实现这一实践的目的的一种艺术，也是研究如何进行这一实践的一门学科。

n the art of speaking or writing effectively;the art of speaking well;the art of persuasion; the art of argumentation; the art of adapting discourse to its purpose;

n the skill in the effective use of speech

n the discipline devoted to the study of the rhetorical art

修辞者/受众

修辞形势/情境

修辞意图/效果

修辞资源/策略

l 修辞与翻译的密切关系

1. Lessons we have drawn:

l criteria of translation are always audience-specific;

l for C-E translation, the target audience can only be native readers of English;

l we should guard against the tendency to mistake bilingual Chinese readers for the target audience of C-E translation.

l a translation could be the right one sometimes, and a wrong one at other times; in translation, there can be no criterion of correctness/accuracy that transcends time, place, context, audience;

l whether a translation is right or not depends on the purpose it is meant to serve

l the best translation is not the most correct translation, but the one which produces the greatest social, cultural, intellectual and cognitive effects.

2. relevant theoretical perspectives

[The translator should be concerned about] the expectations of the putative readership, bearing in mind their estimated knowledge of the topic and the style of language they use, . . . since one should not translate down (or up) to the readership. . . . On the basis of the variety of language used in the original, you attempt to characterise the readership of the original and then of the translation, and to decide how much attention you have to pay to the TL readers, (In the case of a poem or any work written primarily as self-expression the amount is, I suggest, very little). You may try to assess the level of education, the class, age and sex of the readership if these are ‘marked’ . (P. Newmark 1988: vii; )

Translation is, of course, a rewriting of an original text. All rewritings . .

. manipulate literature to function in a given society in a given way. Rewriting is manipulation, undertaken in the service of power, and in its positive aspect can help in the evolution of a literature and a society. Rewritings can introduce new concepts, new genres, new devices, and the history of translation is the history also of literary innovation, of the shaping power of one culture upon another. But rewriting can also repress innovation, distort and contain, and in an age of ever increasing manipulation of all kinds, the study of the manipulative processes of literature as exemplified by translation can help us towards a greater awareness of the world in which we live. (A. Lefevere 1992: xi)

The first major example of the transformative impact of translation is the large-scale translation of Buddhist scriptures into Chinese. The enterprise begins around 70 CE and continues for almost nine centuries. . . . As Lin Kenan points out, the effect on Chinese culture was profound:‘Because Buddhism was introduced into China through translation, the commingling of and conflict between the exotic Buddhism and the native Confucianism and Taoism have set the foundation of Chinese thought’. . . .

A second significant moment in the history of Chinese translation will be the arrival in numbers of Christian missionaries from the West, and in particular of Jesuit missionaries from the late sixteenth century onwards. The missionaries themselves saw the translation of Western texts into Chinese as a way of securing influence over the Chinese