Ethical Values of a Sociosemiotic Approach to Translation
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Jinxia Tang
Jinxia Tang (b. 1980) is an associate professor at Nanjing Normal University Taizhou College, actively researching in the fields of translation and semiotics. Her publications include “Translation strategies of Chinese classics of science and technology: Based on the translation of
Book on Sericulture ” (2015), “A study on C–E translation of Shui Hu Zhuan: Achievements, problems and solutions” (2015), and “Translation ecology vs. translation ethics: From the perspective of the translator’s status” (2012).
Abstract
This article interprets the sociosemiotic approach to translation from an ethical perspective. First, it briefly illustrates the necessity and feasibility of studying the sociosemiotic approach to translation from an ethical perspective, then shifts to the genres of ethics to be used in the interpretation. After that, it proposes an empirical study of the ethical values underlying the sociosemiotic approach to translation. The articles makes it clear that, in translating the referential meaning of a sign, translators who follow the sociosemiotic approach to translation tend to honor ethics of representation if this sign has an equivalent sign in the target language and would like to adhere to norm-based ethics if this sign has no equivalent in the target language. The article demonstrates that, in translating the linguistic meaning, translators who follow the sociosemiotic approach to translation often stick to ethics of commitment, which confers upon them the role of an expert as well as an arbitrator and makes it possible for them to mediate the conflicts between the various parties related to a translating mission. The article also exemplifies that, in translating the pragmatic meaning, translators who follow the sociosemiotic approach to translation, in most cases, prefer ethics of commitment, which allows them to represent the pragmatic meaning incubated in the source text either with the method employed in the source text or with a different method when the method applied in the source text is not appreciated in the target context.
1 Introduction
The term “socio-semiotic approach to translation” was first put forward by Eugene Nida in his book Translating meaning, published in the year 1982. This approach “views translation as an act of decoding and encoding” (Lv 2006: 62), and emphasizes “putting in a broad social background all the signs and symbols relevant to translation, and analyzing their meanings and functions as thoroughly as possible so that the source text can be decoded to the fullest degree and the target text can be encoded to the best extent” (Xia 1996: 10). Up to now the study of the sociosemiotic approach to translation has undergone nearly forty years of development, and many scholars have interpreted this theory from many different angles. This paper attempts to make an ethical study of this theory.
There is every reason for us to study the sociosemiotic approach to translation from the perspective of ethics. It is universally acknowledged that “where there is people’s interaction and communication, there is an arena for ethics to figure” (Wang 2004: 4). And translation, a kind of cross-cultural communication or activity which involves at least two languages and cultures and a couple of relevant parties including at least the source text writer behind the source text, the target reader, the client and the translator, is definitely closely linked to ethics. As a matter of fact, ethics plays a vital role in various aspects of translation such as negotiating the conflicts between the source culture and the target culture, keeping the translator’s behavior within legitimate bounds, establishing a balanced multi-lateral relationship between all the parties that directly or indirectly participate in translation, and last but not least maximizing the desirable effects and at the same time minimizing the undesirable effects of translation upon the cross-cultural communication. Ethical relationship is internalized not only in the activities conducted by those who carry out certain translating tasks and but also in the activities performed by those who explore translation by following a diversity of approaches. Therefore, a study of the sociosemiotic approach to translation from an ethical perspective is absolutely feasible and necessary.
2 Genres of ethics to be used in the interpretation
Now is the time to illustrate translational ethics, the theory of ethics applied in our ethical interpretation of the sociosemiotic approach to translation. The concept of translational ethics, a sub-branch of applied ethics, was initially proposed by French philosopher and translation theorist Antoine Berman in the year 1982 to fight against the trend of negating “foreignness” in translation by the strategy of “naturalization” (see Berman 2000). From then on, the study of translational ethics, in a period of 30 years or more, gradually classified itself into five schools of distinctive features, namely ethics of representation, ethics of service, ethics of communication, norm-based ethics, and ethics of commitment.
Ethics of representation “goes way back to the ideal of the faithful interpreter and to the translation of sacred texts” (Chesterman 2001: 139). The core value of this model of ethics goes that in translation, an act of decoding the messages encoded by one language and re-encoding them in another language, the source text writer acts as the master, and the translator his or her servant who has to try every means to represent the source text or the intention of the source text writer accurately, without adding, omitting or changing anything; otherwise his or her work is to be rejected.
Ethics of service bases itself on “the concept of translation as a commercial service, performed for a client” (Chesterman 2001: 140) hence advocating that translation is not determined by the source text, or its effects on the source text recipient, or the function assigned to the source text by the author, but by the prospective function of the target text which the initiator of the translation task hope for; therefore “the source text is no longer the first and foremost criterion for the translator’s decisions; it is just one of the various sources of information used by the translator” (Nord 2001: 25) who can employ every fit means to meet the ultimate goal set by the initiator who serve the target readership.
Ethics of communication emphasizes that translators belong not to either the source culture or the target culture but to the intersection of the two cultures partaking in the translation; therefore ethical translators, who surely locate themselves in intercultural space and function as benevolent but impartial helpers, should treat what they are translating as a subject with whom they can indeed communicate and translate in such a way as to optimize the cooperation of all the parties participating in the communication.
Norm-based ethics “has arisen either explicitly or implicitly from descriptive translation studies and norm theory” (Chesterman 2001:141) and regards the prevalent translation norms especially those of target culture as the most authoritative red line which an ethical translator can never touch. This model of translational ethics also demand that translators keep his translating activity in accordance with the translation norms, not surprising the target readers or the translator’s client for the purpose of ensuring a successful target text.
Ethics of commitment, proposed by Andrew Chesterman in the form of the Hieronymic Oath, aims at mediating the conflicts and disagreements among the foregoing four models of translational ethics. This model requires an ethical translator, who is honest about his or her own qualifications and limitations and who act as an arbitrator in case of any dispute between any party relevant to a specific translation appears, to produce a target text which will not represent their source text in unfair way and is as accessible as possible to the target readership, according to the conditions of each translation task.
3 An empirical study of the ethical values underlying the sociosemiotic approach to translation
In order to interpret the ethical values underlying the sociosemiotic approach to translation, this paper quotes altogether seven examples from three master theses which unanimously demonstrate that they study translation by following the sociosemiotic approach to translation. Among them are The application of the socio-semiotic approach to translation in the E-C translation of Mark Haddon’s "The gun,” A socio-semiotic approach to the humor translation in Zhang Wanli’s version of "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” and Translation of Chinese four-character idioms: A socio-semiotic approach. Since translation, in the sphere of a sociosemiotic approach to translation, is a process of decoding the meanings (including the referential meaning, linguistic meaning, and pragmatic meaning) of the source text and encoding the decoded source text in the form of the target text, our empirical study is to be carried out from three dimensions, as laid out by Morris (1938: 43–47): the ethical values involved in the translation of referential meaning denoting the relationship between a sign and its referent, the ethical values underlying the translation of linguistic meaning defining the relationship between the signs which appear together, and the ethical values manifested in the translation of pragmatic meaning explaining the relationship between a sign and its interpretant.
3.1 The ethical values involved in the translation of referential meaning
What ethical values are involved in the translator’s translation of a sign’s referential meaning? Let us take the following examples:
TT: Then feeding on wind and resting in dew in two or three days Laocan reached Dongchang.
(Zhang 2005: 32)
The italicized parts in a) are quoted by Zhang to expound that the translator, while translating “风餐露宿” into “feeding on wind and resting in dew” follows the sociosemiotic approach in his translation. The Chinese characters “风 (wind)” and “露 (dew)” in “风餐露宿 (feeding on wind and resting in dew)” share the same context with the English words “wind” and “dew” in “feeding on wind and resting in dew.” and the referents of “餐 (feed on)” and “宿 (rest)” in the source text context share almost the same referents with their respective English translations in the target text context. The translator, while transferring the referential meaning from the soured text into the target text, has done no adding, omitting or changing to the source text, and paid due attention to the source text writer, and hence follows the ethics of representation.
b) ST: I fetched the pig in, and took him back nearly to the table and hacked into his throat with the ax, and laid him down to the ground to bleed.
(Shi 2012: 27)
The italicized parts in b) are referred to by Shi to illustrate that the translator, while translating “一斧头砍在它的嗓子上” (Shi 2012: 27) into “hacked into his throat with the ax,” turns to the sociosemiotic approach to translation. In b), the referents of “hack,” “throat,” and “ax” in the source text culture and those of “砍 (hack).” “嗓子 (throat),” and “斧头 (ax),” in their target text culture are the same, hence once again making it possible for the translator to seek equivalence and follow the ethics of representation in his translation.
In a) and b), due to the universal similarity between the two languages, the signs in the source text and their equivalent signs in the target text denote the same referents, which makes it possible for the translator to practice ethics of representation in transferring the referential meaning of the linguistic signs created in the source text to the target text. However, there exist both similarities and differences between the two languages concerned in translation. The following examples will demonstrate what ethical values translators prefer in translating a sign which cannot find a sign equivalent to it in all aspect in the target culture.
TT: Mr Lin’s perfect plan of the night before was completely snowed under by those red and green streamers of the competitor.
(Zhang 2005: 35)
d) ST: He chased me round and round the place with a clasp-knife, calling me the Angel of Death, and saying he would kill me, and then I couldn’t come for him no more.
(Shi 2012: 24)
The italicized parts in c) and d) are cited by their respective citers to elaborate that the translators, while translating the italicized part of the source text, make use of the sociosemiotic approach to translation. “算盘 (abacus）in c), although with an English version “abacus,” cannot be translated as “abacus” all the time because “算盘 (abacus)” in certain Chinese contexts refers to something that “abacus” cannot refer to. “算盘 (abacus),” in “如意算盘 (perfect plan) carries the connotation of “small plan or scheme,” while “abacus” in English just means “a calculator frequently used in China before the birth of modern calculating devices.” Therefore, if “算盘 (abacus)” here is translated into “abacus,” the target reader, most probably, will never understand what it really refers to in the idiom “如意算盘 (perfect plan).” The translation of “如意算盘” into “perfect plan” reflects the translator’s consideration of the target reader and obedience to the norms of the target culture, and is really indicative of the translator’s application of norm-based ethics.
“Angel” in English denotes “a benevolent spiritual being from Heaven that may act as a protector or messenger.” The Chinese version of “angel,” in most cases, is “天使(elegant being from the Heaven who blesses his or her subject),” a sacred being which is never associated with “death.” If “angel” in the source text context of d) is translated into “天使(elegant being from the Heaven who blesses his or her subject),” the Chinese readers, more often than not, tend to be puzzled. The translator’s translation of “angel” in “the Angel of Death” into “ 鬼” (evil spirit) is out of his consideration of being in accordance with the image of “天使” in the mind of Chinese readers, hence following norm-based ethics.
3.2 The ethical values involved in the translation of linguistic meaning
This section aims at what ethical values that the translator, under the guidance of the sociosemiotic approach to translation, adopts in translating the linguistic meaning of the signs created in the source text. In view of the fact that the linguistic meaning of a sign reflects itself not only in phrases but also in sentences, two examples (one for phrases, one for sentences ) are quoted here.
TT: “Certainly there is Tung Cho”, cried Chuang Fei.
“What is the use of pursuing Lv Pu? Far better seize the chief rebel and so pluck out the devil by the roots”
(Zhang 2005: 37)
The italicized parts in e) are exploited by Zhang to illustrate that the translator, while translating the linguistic meaning of 斩草除根 (pluck out the devil by the roots), has adopted the sociosemiotic approach to translation. In the Chinese idiom “斩草除根 (pluck out the devil by the roots),” the relationship between the two signs “斩 (pluck out)” and “草 (the devil)” is “VO” and this relationship is retained in the target text, as is exemplified in “pluck out the devil.” However, the “VO” relationship between “除 (pluck out)” and “根 (the roots)” in the source text can find no reflection in the target text. It is not because the translator here does not want to represent this relationship in the target text, but because he is not allowed to. Unlike the English language, which can emphasize a transitive verb by putting an auxiliary verb before it, the Chinese language, in order to highlight the meaning of a one transitive verb, prefers to attach another verb phrase synonymous with it to this verb (together with its object), hence resulting in tautology, which is denied in English. In light of this, “pluck” cannot be used twice or have a synonym attached to it in the single verb phrase, which in turn makes it impossible to transcribe into the target text the “VO” relationship between “除 (pluck out)” and “根 (the roots).” The translator here on the one hand pays his respect to the source text writer, as shown in “pluck out the devil,” and on the other hand honors the target readers by keeping his translation in accordance with the grammatical rules of English so as to ensure the readability of the target text. He as a whole cherishes ethics of commitment.
f) ST: Because it has nothing to do with the gun, does it? The gun is one of those dark stars that bend light.
(Shen 2016: 30)
Shen quotes f) to demonstrate that the translator, while translating the linguistic meanings of signs (lined together in the form of a sentence), employs the sociosemiotic approach to translation. The source text has two sentences, as does the target text, which means the translator adopts the ethics of representation in retaining the number of sentences. The first sentence of the source text makes use of a comma and a question mark, and this is also true of the first sentence of the target text. The second sentence of the source text has just a full stop, while that of the target text has two commas and one full stop. This reveals that the translator here takes into consideration not only the interests of the source text writer but also the interests of other parties to the translation, especially the target readers. In the second sentence of the source text, “those dark stars” is modified by a relative clause “that bend light.”
The translation of “The gun is one of those dark stars that bend light” into “那支枪是那些自身不发光但折射光芒的星星中的一颗,” (Shen 2016: 30) no doubt can be understood by the target readers, but sounds quite awkward, because the Chinese language seldom makes a long sentence the attribute of a noun phrase. Therefore, for better readability, the translator reorganizes the original sentence in the following way: firstly, “它们 (they)” is employed to refer to “those stars”; secondly, “dark” is removed from its original position and cooperates with “它们” to form a new clause; thirdly, the original relative clause is combined with “它们 ” to form another clause. Due to the abovementioned problems and solutions, the original one complex sentence in English is changed into three clauses in Chinese, which in turn leads to a change in the number of quotation marks. In a word, the translator here pays due respect to the various parties concerned in translation, mediates the interests of each party, and practices ethics of commitment.
3.3 The ethical values Involved in the translation of pragmatic meaning
Having analyzed what ethical values the translator has in mind while translating both the referential meaning and the linguistic meaning of signs, now is the time to make it clear what ethical values work in the translator’s mind when he or she deals with the pragmatic meaning of a sign. Let us take the following examples:
g) ST: “and other times, when things is dull, they fuss with the parlyment; and if everybody don’t go just so he whacks their heads off. But mostly they hang round the harem.”
(Shi 2012: 33)
The italicized parts and the underlined parts in g) are quoted by Shi to demonstrate how the translator makes use of the sociosemiotic approach to translate the pragmatic meaning of signs. The original discourse as a whole is to show Huck’s lack of school education and his young boy’s perception of the king’s national affairs. In order to show Huck’s lack of education, Mark Twain here resorts to two methods: 1) intentional misspellings like “parlyment” (for parliament) and “whack” (for hack); 2) intentional grammatical errors like “is ”(for “are” in “things is dull”) , “don’t” (for “doesn’t” in “everybody don’t”). With the purpose of indicating Huck’s immature perception about the King’s daily national affairs, Mark Twin chooses informal or colloquial expressions like “fuss with the parlyment,” “hang around the harem” for instance. The translator, while showing Huck’s perception of the king’s daily national affairs, makes use of similar devices and translates “fuss with the parlyment,” “mostly,” and “hang around the harem” respectively into the Chinese informal expressions like “跟会胡捣乱,” (Shi 2012: 33) “多一半功夫,” (Shi 2012: 33) and “呆在后宫里” (Shi 2012: 33).
However, in the target text, only the substitution of “看”(see) for “砍(hack)” can be taken as hint of Huck’s lack of education. The intentionally made grammatical mistakes in the source text to display Huck lack of education is totally ignored in the target text. This is of course due to the fact that the form of a verb in Chinese language invariably remains the same no matter what form the subject takes. There is no way the translator can resort to intentionally made grammatical mistakes to disclose Huck’s lack of school education. That is to say, the translator’s choice of translating devices is dominated not only by the source text writer but also other agents partaking in his translating practice, and he, based on his specialty and moral values toward translation, pays due attention to each of the agents and sticks to ethics of commitment.
4 Conclusion
Ethical values are intrinsically intertwined with translating practice, thus translators who adopt the sociosemiotic approach to translation undoubtedly bear certain ethical values in mind. Based on the preceding illustration and exemplification, it can be concluded that translators within the domain of the sociosemiotic approach to translation treasure a number of ethical values. In translating the referential meaning of a sign, translators tend to honor ethics of representation if this sign can find a sign in the target language which is equivalent to it in all aspects. If not, translators tend to adhere to norm-based ethics so that they are able to ensure the acceptance of the target text. In translating the linguistic meaning, translators often stick to ethics of commitment, which confers upon them the role of an expert, as well as an arbitrator, and makes it possible for them to mediate the conflicts between the various parties related to a translating mission. Translators directed by ethics of commitment can to the fullest extent possible retain in the target text the linguistic meanings of signs created in the source text as long as the linguistic and translational norms of the target culture permits this, and can also, in accordance with the norms and tenets of the target environment, reorganize the syntactic structure of the original signs, hence making it possible to realize in the target context the intended function of the source text. In translating the pragmatic meaning, translators, in most cases, prefer ethics of commitment, which allows them to represent the pragmatic meaning incubated in the source text either with the method employed in the source text or with a different method when the method applied in the source text is not appreciated in the target context.
It has to be noted that the translation of the three meanings of signs does not take place one by one or in isolation but all at once as a whole. Therefore, due to the unique characteristics of the two languages pertaining to a translating activity, the complete transference of the three meanings from the source text to the target text at the same time is by definition impossible. As for the translation of the three meanings, translators still find support in ethics of commitment and pay due respect to each one with the purpose of maximizing the common interests shared among them.
About the author
Jinxia Tang (b. 1980) is an associate professor at Nanjing Normal University Taizhou College, actively researching in the fields of translation and semiotics. Her publications include “Translation strategies of Chinese classics of science and technology: Based on the translation of Book on Sericulture” (2015), “A study on C–E translation of Shui Hu Zhuan: Achievements, problems and solutions” (2015), and “Translation ecology vs. translation ethics: From the perspective of the translator’s status” (2012).
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Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Part One: Cultural Signs and the Media Landscape
- Literature in its Media Context
- Semiotics of Clothes in Postcolonial Literature
- Communication and Culture in the Meta-Media Era
- Part Two: Cultural Signs in Translation and Discourse Analysis
- Breaking the Boundary of Semiotics
- A Semiotic Perspective of Metaphor Translation
- Ethical Values of a Sociosemiotic Approach to Translation
- Speech Reporting in Chinese Criminal Judgements
- Part three: Semiotic Mediation
- Re-understanding Vygotsky’s Psycholinguistics
- An Interview with Charls Pearson
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Part One: Cultural Signs and the Media Landscape
- Literature in its Media Context
- Semiotics of Clothes in Postcolonial Literature
- Communication and Culture in the Meta-Media Era
- Part Two: Cultural Signs in Translation and Discourse Analysis
- Breaking the Boundary of Semiotics
- A Semiotic Perspective of Metaphor Translation
- Ethical Values of a Sociosemiotic Approach to Translation
- Speech Reporting in Chinese Criminal Judgements
- Part three: Semiotic Mediation
- Re-understanding Vygotsky’s Psycholinguistics
- An Interview with Charls Pearson
