Introduction to Chinese-English Translation of pictographs that contain elements of sound,form,and meaning.These ideographic features of the language may have some bearing on Chinese cognitive processes,while the linear structure of English may have some influence on Western abstract cognitive process. Comparison of Words in English and Chinese Students of language are familiar with the famous,much-debated Sapir- Whorf hypothesis,which argues that the nature of a particular language determines the thought patterns of its speakers.While it is hard to make an absolute case for language determining cognitive and thought patterns,most linguists agree on the probability of a link between language and different ways of thinking.In this context,it is helpful to look at words and the objective realities for which they stand. Objective reality exists regardless of man:people of different cultures and languages have similar responses to many objects and use words with a similar meaning to represent them;e-g,“mountain”in English and山 in Chinese both refer to the same physical reality and mean the same thing without containing very strong cultural connotations.Generally speaking the translation of actual physical objects is relatively straightforward,such as“computer'”nto电称or计算机，and“water广into水.All these words refer to specific physical things with few differences in various cultures.Not all words,however,match up so neatly. Abstract words used to describe concepts may seem to mean the same thing in both languages but in fact have vastly different cultural connotations.For cxample,“individualism"and个人主义refer to more or less the same thing,but their associations for Chinese and Americans are completely different.A culture that sets great store on freedom of the individual will interpret the word in a largely positive way.while 22
Chapter 2 Some Comparisons between English and Chinese one that places the collective above the individual will understand it as primarily negative.There are many such words that look the same but carry very different meanings;e.g.,"Red China"in English has a pejorative connotation,but iscmctely positive in红色中国.Colors have strong cultural associations:in many Western cultures white is worn at weddings, but Chinese traditionally wear white at a funerul and scarlet at a wedding. Many things that seem the same are in fact"false friends."Here is another example:“t'snot funny!"can be translated这并不可笑，which completely fails to convey the underlying angry feelings of the speaker:another example,"us and them"often means diametrically opposed (even hostile) sides but if translated as我们和他们becomes4 neutral statement. Many words have referential and additional meanings.Referential meanings are generally fixed-e.g,“road”and路mean the same thing today as they did fifty or even a hundred years ago.The visual meaning associated with the colors red and white also have not changed significantly:fifty years ago,Chinese and Americans all stopped when they saw red traffic lights,and today they still do so.Additional meanings,however,are much less fixed;the color white,for example,has changed over time in China. Whereas in the past the Chinese wore red when getting married,today many young urban Chinese also get maried in white.Thirty years ago the term (girlfriend)would elicit shyness and embarrassment from the couple, but today,young people are completely at ease using it,showing that the additional meaning of the word has changed with the times. Another important point to bear in mind is the fact that Chinese and English categorize physical things differently.Here is an example:it is possible tomix and produce inumerable different shades using three basic colors,but different cultures have taken this infinite number of colors and placed them into a finite number of categories.Once humans use words to describe colors,they are forcing reality into their own linguistic frames. 23
Introduction to Chinese-English Translation It is said there are eleven basie colors in Chinese and English,and that combinations of these words can produce names for 2,048 different shades, but because the cultures have different groupings for colors,these do not necessarily correspond precisely.The basic colors of red,yellow,green. black,and white match up well,but the various other shades may not: Chinese has no single equivalents for"azure"or"maroon." These examples remind us that all words are "tyrannical,"in the sense that reality is often foreed into lexical structures that differ greatly from language to language.making exact equivalents difficult.Sometimes what appear to be the closest equivalents do not really match up in terms of meaning.Since all human communication has to make use of the same medium of language,even if we know that specific words do not represent exactly the same reality,we still have to use them.The well-known saying from general semantics"the map is not the territory"aptly describes the fact that words often do not reflect reality.There are many such examples,but most illustrative for Chinese-English are the terms for family relationships. In Chinese there are many different terms for relations on the paternal and maternal side,categorized by generation,sex,and age,so the simple term should strictly be translated as"son of your mother's sibling who is younger than yourself,"but since English does not distinguish such niceties, it is simply rendered as"male cousin." There are times,however,when there is no close cquivalent,and then the translator has to create a new word.This happens most frequently for scientific and technical terms.Since most modem technology has originated in the West,and many terms did not exist in Chinese,many new words have been created,suchas旁道术(bypass))and因特网（仙he Intemet).The same applies to Chinese terms now commonly used in English,such as"Tai Chi”(太极)， Qigong”(气功)，and many terms in traditional Chinese medicine. 24
Chapter 2 Some Comparisons between English and Chinese Comparison of Syntax The parataxis of Chinese and the hypotaxis of English mean that their respective syntaxes are also very different The relationship between words in an Englisheeiscery indicated byalink wordDon'tom nni I call you,"where the two verbs are linked by the conjunction"until."Chinese is different:the same sentence is rendered不叫你不要进来，where the sense of"until"is implied and is filled in by the listener English is thus sometimes described as an "objective language"and Chinese a"subjective"one,or,to put it another way,English is a language of"objective rules"and Chinese a language of"subjective interpretations."To convey meaning,English relies to a greater cxtent on strict rules of grammar and syntax,while Chinese has loose and flexible syntax and relies on the individual words themselves to carry more of the meaning. These differences often spell trouble for translators.Putting a hypotactic language into a paratactic one often means the features of the first get transferred into the second,so English into Chinese produces English- sounding Chinese,and the reverse produces Chinese-sounding English (Chinglish). Another comparison is word order.Both languages basically follow the SVO order (subject-verb-object),which makes simple sentences easy to translate.Chinese says我买了一本书，and English says"I bought a book,"where the word order is exactly the same.On this level,even a computer can translate.However,both languages use more than simple sentences to express ideas,and as soon as things become more complicated, the issue of word order arises."I bought a book yesterday"cannot be translated as我买了一本书昨天，The adverb of time must be moved forward to conform to Chinese usage.This is still an uncomplicated sentence. and reordering is straightforward.When Chinese sentences become much more involved,however,reordering becomes a major problem.For example
Introduction to Chinese-English Translation 亚洲机会多，发展潜力大，生活刺激，确实是华侨共同的想法has been translated as"Overseas Chinese share the common belief that there are many opportunities in Asia,great potential for career development,and that life there is fast paced and exciting,"and here there have been many changes in word order. Differences in the order of subordinate clauses are another major issue in Chinese-English translation.Adverbial elauses in English can come before or behind the subject,but in Chinese,there is even greater flexibility (see Chapter 10.Adverbial Clauses).The attributive clause in English is aiways placed to the righr of,or affer,the modified element,so English is called a Right Branching Direction(RBD)language-e.g"The musician who olayed at the conert is from China”In Chinese,this becomes在t乐会上演 奏的那位音乐家是从中国来的，where the modifier is placed to the lefi or before the modified element,making Chinese a Left Branching Direction(LBD) language (see Chapters9 and 10 on relative and adverbial clauses). Another syntactical feature is the use of the passive voice.While Chinese and English both have a passive voice,its usage varies considerably, both in context and in frequency.(For more details,see Chapter 11,The Passive Voice.) Discourse Structures The term discourse can be used in a number of different senses,but in linguistics it mainly refers to structures beyond the sentence level The study of discourse deals with the coherence of sentences,propositions,and tum- takings in conversation.An important aspect of discourse studies is thus coherence,or the logical unity of sentences. Chinese and English order meaning differently.In English,the juxtaposition of a number of sentences forming a logical unit requires the 26