Revista Argentina de Clínica Psicológica 2020, Vol. XXIX, N°2, 1474-1480
DOI: 10.24205/03276716.2020.390 1474
ANALYSIS OF AESTHETIC PSYCHOLOGY AND ITS INFLUENCING FACTORS
IN THE TEACHING OF ENGLISH-CHINESE TRANSLATION APPRECIATION
Shengxue Zhao
Abstract
The translator’s aesthetic psychology directly bears on the translation quality. Therefore, the translation appreciation course should focus on improving the aesthetic consciousness of students, enabling them to understand the aesthetic psychology of the writer and the translator. Drawing on theories of aesthetic psychology, linguistics, literature and art, this paper analyses the aesthetic psychology and its influencing factors in the teaching of English-Chinese translation appreciation through literature analysis and questionnaire survey. The literature translation was taken as an example to facilitate the analysis. In addition,
a translator’s aesthetic process model was set up the teaching of English-Chinese translation appreciation,
according to the features of the translator’s aesthetic psychology. The results show that the development aesthetic psychology of the translator consists of three sub-processes, namely, of aesthetic cognition, integration and reproduction; in the teaching of English-Chinese translation appreciation, the aesthetic psychology is influenced by three factors, i.e. the aesthetic psychology and standards of the writer, the translator and the reader. The research results are of guiding significance to the curriculum design of literary translation appreciation.
Key words: English-Chinese Translation Appreciation, Teaching, Translators, Aesthetic Psychology.
Received: 18-02-19 | Accepted: 20-08-19
INTRODUCTION
With the increasing frequency of China's foreign exchanges and the advent of the era of global integration, the demand for translation talents is constantly increasing. At present, translation discipline at home and abroad is unprecedentedly prosperous. However, behind the vigorous development of translation discipline, there is also a phenomenon that talent cultivation is disconnected with social needs, which has also attracted the attention of experts and scholars at home and abroad to translation teaching.
Translation teaching in China can be traced back to the Tang Dynasty at the earliest. The
School of Foreign Languages, Bengbu University, Bengbu 233010, China.
E-Mail: [email protected]
translation course in the Yixueguan in 1902 is regarded as the beginning of higher education in China (Thomas & Schlutsmeyer, 2004). Since 1944, training interpreters and translators in military, political and diplomatic fields have been the main goal of translation teaching (Haines & Davies, 1904). Around 1949, grammar-translation teaching mode was very popular in foreign language teaching (Schoeller, & Perlovsky, 2016). In 2005, the Ministry of Education approved translation as an independent department to recruit students (Rokkan, 1980). Up to now, the research on translation teaching in China involves various aspects such as curriculum structure, teaching methods, teaching materials, teaching evaluation, etc. (Perkins, 1978), but there are still some problems such as unclear results in comprehensive research on translation teaching and few cross-studies with other disciplines (cognitive science, pedagogy, or psychology).
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Based on the above analysis, from the perspective of aesthetic psychology, this paper makes a brief analysis of the relevant theories about translation, translation teaching and aesthetic psychology, discusses and analyzes the aesthetic psychology and its influencing factors in the Teaching of English-Chinese translation appreciation, and constructs a translator's aesthetic process model in Teaching of English-Chinese translation appreciation based on the translator's aesthetic psychological characteristics, which consists of aesthetic cognition sub-process, integration sub-process and reproduction sub-process. This paper also analyzes the influencing factors of aesthetic psychology on literary translation in Teaching of English-Chinese translation appreciation from three aspects: the original writer's aesthetic psychology and the aesthetic structure of the original work, the translator's aesthetic psychology and aesthetic standards, and the target readers’ aesthetic psychology and
aesthetic standards.
RELEVANT THEORETICAL BASES
Translation and translation teaching
Translation
Figure 1
.
The communication process
involved in translation
Original
author
Translator
Target
reader
Translation
Regarding the definition of translation, scholars in different historical periods have given their own judgments and summaries. Ottinger defined translation as changing symbols into other symbols, with keeping the same meaning as its core issue (House, 2014). Nida, on the other hand, defined translation as the category of communicative activities and believed that the purpose of translation is to make all parties understand it (Hummel, 2010). Through the
definition of translation by scholars in various countries, it can be concluded that the process of translation involves complicated communication among the original writer, translator and target readers (Fletcher, 1920), as shown in Figure 1. The translator is the key to connect the original writer and the target reader, so it can also be considered that the process of translation is actually the process of constructing the translator's aesthetic psychology.
TRANSLATION TEACHING
Translation is a cognitive science of translation practice. Strengthening students' cognition of translation and cultivating students' translation ability are the core tasks of translation teaching (Ferguson, 1986). Figure 2 shows the mastery of advanced translation majors in a university over different texts. It can be seen from the figure that most students are familiar with translating government official documents and news media materials, and they can barely or basically translate environmental protection, science and technology materials, but they found difficult to translate literary works.
Figure 2
.
Master's degree of mastery of
different texts
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Environmental protection Technology Literature News media Government document Law
Finance
Mastery Basically cope Barely cope Hard to deal with
Aesthetic psychology and translation
teaching
Aesthetic psychology is an interdisciplinary subject of psychology and aesthetics. It is a branch of psychology that studies and explains the laws of human psychological activities in the aesthetic process (Leder, Belke, Oeberst et al.,
ANALYSIS OF AESTHETIC PSYCHOLOGY AND ITS INFLUENTIAL FACTORS IN THE TEACHING OF ENGLISH-CHINESE TRANSLATION APPRECIATION 1476
2004). As mentioned above, the process of translation is actually the process of constructing the translator's aesthetic psychology. Therefore, it is very important for translation teaching to cultivate students' aesthetic consciousness and understand the original writer's aesthetic psychology and the translator's aesthetic psychology in the process of translation teaching.
Literature is the art of language and the materialization of beauty. Literary works often contain higher aesthetic value, and the translator's aesthetic psychological activities are more active in the process of literary translation. Therefore, this paper takes the teaching of English-Chinese translation appreciation of literary works as an example to analyze the translator's aesthetic psychology.
ANALYSIS OF AESTHETIC PSYCHOLOGY AND ITS INFLUENCING FACTORS IN TEACHING OF ENGLISH-CHINESE TRANSLATION APPRECIATION
Construction of the translator's aesthetic process model in the Teaching of English-Chinese translation appreciation
Figure 3
.
Translator's aesthetic process
model
Translator's Aesthetic Process Model
Subcognitive process
Aesthetic integration subprocess
Aesthetic reproduction subprocess
Figure 4
. Basic process of aesthetic cognition
sub-process
Language structure layer
Artistic image layer
Historical humanities content layer
Philosophical meaning
The translator is a special reader and a bridge between the writer of the original text and the readers of the target text. Through his own understanding of literary works, the translator embodies the aesthetic feeling and artistic conception to be expressed in the original text into the target text to the greatest extent. According to the translator's aesthetic psychological characteristics, this paper constructs the translator's aesthetic process model in Teaching of English-Chinese translation appreciation based on the translator's aesthetic psychological characteristics. As shown in Figure 3, the three processes are interrelated and permeated among each other, and the process is dynamic, complicated and repeated.
Aesthetic cognition sub-process
In translation teaching, teachers' task is not to teach students specific grammar and semantic translation, but to teach students the main process and methods of translation. Figure 4 shows the basic process of aesthetic cognition sub-process.
The translator should first interpret the aesthetic structure and the writer's aesthetic psychology according to the text, which is also the beginning of the process of aesthetic cognition. Therefore, to understand the linguistic structure of literary works is the first step that the translator should take in the translation process. This includes the translator's perception of the form, sound and meaning of the language, as well as the translator's association and imagination of mechanical characters. This process also makes the artistic images (characters, things, artistic conception, etc.) of literary works gradually become clear in the translator's mind and their aesthetic perception and imagination of the works active, so as to resonate with the original writer of the literary work. Then the translator will resume his rational thinking of literary works, and further have in-depth thinking and reflection on literary works from the historical and humanistic content layer and philosophical meaning layer. Of course, this is only an idealized aesthetic cognition process of the translator. The actual translation and cognition process may have sequence or synchronization of several level, or only some levels play a role, which is also related to the translator's translation level and aesthetic cognition level of literary works. However, under normal circumstances, the
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Table 1.
An analysis of the historical, humanistic, and cultural content of "
Drunk Man Pavilion
”
Project Original Translation Significance 1. 醉翁之意不在酒, 在乎
山水之间也.
1. But it was wine that attracted him to this pot. It was the charming scenery, which wine enabled him to enjoy.
Phonology 2 . 至于负者歌于途,行者休
于树,前者呼,后者应.
Burden-carries sing their way along the road, travelers rest awhile under the trees, shouts from one, responses from another.
Artistic image 3 . 伛偻提携 old people hobbling along, children in arms, children dragged along
by hand
Historical humanities
4 . 人知从太守游而乐,而不 知太守之乐其乐也
They rejoiced with him, though they know not at what it is that he rejoices.
translator's reading aesthetics and translation behavior are often synchronized in the process
of aesthetic cognition, that’s, the translator has
sub-consciously chosen the appropriate translation to interpret the original text while reading the original text.
This paper takes the Drunk Man Pavilion as an example to analyze the aesthetic cognition process of British sinologist Herbert. A. Giles' translation. Table 1 shows Herbert. A. Giles' analysis of the meaning, rhyme, artistic image, historical, humanistic and cultural content of the
Drunk Man Pavilion.
Pavilion of the Drunken Old Man
1) The analysis of meaning and rhyme in language structure
The meaning of Sentence (1): The drunken man is not interested in wine, but the beautiful mountains and rivers there. However, since the translator failed to have a thorough understanding of the meaning of the original text, the meaning of the sentence is changed to "It was not wine that attracted him here, but the wine that made him appreciate the beautiful scenery here".
In Sentence (2), after understanding the sentence pattern features of combining the parallel and prose sentences in the original text, the translator adopts the method of combining long and short sentences in order to show the well-organized and lively rhythm of the original text, so that the target readers can also realize the rhythm of the original text.
2) The analysis of the artistic images
The meaning of Sentence (3) is that the old man walks with his waist bent and the child is led by the adults. In the text, the old man and the child are referred to by the walking posture and appearance of the old man and the child. In the translation, the translator also understands the
artistic images expressed in the original text, and thus reproduces the walking characteristics of the old man and the child through the vivid images of "hobbling along" and "dragged along", which are very vivid.
3) The analysis of historical and humanistic contents
In addition to the literal meaning, Sentence (4) also implies that the prefecture chief enjoyed pleasure with the people and appreciated his achievements. However, the translator has not learned the psychology of historical figures, and only reflects the prefecture chief's pleasure in playing.
Aesthetic integration sub-process
To do a good job in translation, we must reach the state of "turning the original works into my own works". Obviously, the translator cannot reach this state when the process of aesthetic cognition over literary works is finished. After the end of aesthetic cognition, the translator has a certain understanding of the rhyme, rhetoric, artistic images and other information of literary works, which however, are in a scattered and unstable state, so the translator needs to carefully and repeatedly empathize with the perceived information and organize the information into an organic whole, which is the aesthetic integration sub-process. According to Gestalt psychology theory, the aesthetic integration sub-process can actually be regarded as a process of constructing Gestalt intention. In the aesthetic integration sub-process, the translator should gradually construct the corresponding Gestalt layers of rhyme, meaning, rhetoric and other information obtained in the process of aesthetic cognition, and finally combine them into the Gestalt of language structure layer. By the same token,
ANALYSIS OF AESTHETIC PSYCHOLOGY AND ITS INFLUENTIAL FACTORS IN THE TEACHING OF ENGLISH-CHINESE TRANSLATION APPRECIATION 1478
they will also construct the Gestalts corresponding to artistic image layer, historical and humanistic content layer and philosophical meaning layer.
Aesthetic reproduction sub-process
The aesthetic reproduction sub-process is the process in which the translator starts to translate. In this process, sentence-making, chapter-making and word/phrase selection are the three main tasks of the translator. Before that, the translator needs to formulate some macro translation strategies for continuing translation. Figure 5 shows the basic process of the aesthetic reproduction sub-process.
Figure
5
.
Basic
flow
of
aesthetic
reproduction sub-process
Develop macro translation strategies
Make a sentence
Into chapters
Word selection
1) Formulate macro translation strategies In the process of aesthetic cognition and aesthetic integration, the translator should also think how to translate, what style and words to select and whether to remove some text content of the original work. Taking the translation of English poems into Chinese as an example, the translator should first consider whether to translate the original text into Chinese prose style or poetic style, and then whether to translate the original text into ancient Chinese or vernacular Chinese.
2) Make sentences
The article is made up of sentences, so sentences are the key to translation. Depending on the unit chosen by the translator, the translation can be divided into two categories. One category is to translate words or phrase as units and then link them into smooth sentences. However, this translation method is only aimed at translating literal meanings, lack of smooth and harmonious connection in sentences, failure of transmitting the overall intention, and letting
alone aesthetic value. Therefore, it’s not
recommended. The other is to translate sentences as units, which focuses on the overall transmission of the original intention. In order to keep the sentences smooth and vivid, individual words and phrases can be neglected when necessary. Of course, this process is inseparable from the translator's thinking and mastery of the original text in the aesthetic cognition and aesthetic integration sub-processes.
3) Making chapters
After the translator translates the original text sentence by sentence, it does not mean that the translated sentences are smooth and coherent. Therefore, the translator should first check whether the sentences and paragraphs are coherent and smooth. Secondly, he should consider whether the combined articles express the style and aesthetic value of the original work. The translator will inevitably make some modifications and adjustments.
4) Word/phrase selection
Word/phrase selection runs through the whole process of translation. After the aesthetic reproduction sub-process is finished, the translator only obtains the first draft of the translation. In order to obtain a translation that can perfectly show the artistic conception and aesthetic value of the original text, the translator still needs to make repeated modifications, analysis and polishing, especially the proper nouns in the original text and the words/phrases with the finishing effect, so as to make the translation fit with the original text as much as possible.
Influencing factors of aesthetic psychology on literary translation in Teaching of English-Chinese translation appreciation
English-Chinese translation is a complicated process, which may be influenced by many factors, but in general, the following three factors play important roles in literary translation:
Figure 6
.
Influencing factors of aesthetic
psychology on literary translation
Influential Factors of Aesthetic Psychology on Literary Translation
Author's Aesthetic Psychology and Aesthetic Structure of Original Works Translator's Aesthetic Psychology and
Aesthetic Standards Aesthetic Psychology and Standards
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The writer’s aesthetic psychology and the aesthetic structure of the original works
Literary works are the writer’s polished draft
or blueprint of the literary work, which is composed after the design, conception and combination when his aesthetic consciousness collides with his long-term accumulated living materials. Therefore, literary works are the processing of social beauty and natural beauty with strong personal aesthetic color. The writer's aesthetic psychology almost runs through the whole literary work. Therefore, a good translation must capture and understand the original writer's aesthetic psychology and the aesthetic structure of original works.
Translator's aesthetic psychology and standards
The translator's subjective participation is the source of literary translation creativity. The translator will perceive the writer's aesthetic experience in the process of literary creation and reproduce the literary works aesthetically in combination with their own aesthetic psychological structure and aesthetic standards. A good translator should try his best to control the negative influence of personal aesthetic psychology and perfectly express the wishes of the original writer.
Readers' aesthetic psychology and standards
The target readers are the main target audience of the translation. The readers of the translation include not only literary lovers, but also includes researchers of literary works. If the psychological analysis in some original works is lengthy, but it has little to do with the development of the story, the target readers will feel tired to the translation made according to the original text. If the translation is made from the perspective of the aesthetic psychology of the target readers, the translator will choose to delete it. Therefore, the translator must consider the aesthetic psychology and aesthetic standards of the target readers when translating.
CONCLUSIONS
The translation of literary works is the artistic processing and creation of the original works, and the translator's aesthetic consciousness is the key to the success of literary works. This paper analyzes and discusses aesthetic
psychology and its influencing factors in Teaching of English-Chinese translation appreciation, and the specific conclusions are as follows:
(1) At present, it’s difficult of translation
majors in colleges and universities to translate literary works. However, literary works often contain higher aesthetic value, and the translator's aesthetic psychological activities are more active in the process of literary translation. Therefore, literary works are selected as the research object of the paper.
(2) This paper constructs a translator's aesthetic process model in Teaching of English-Chinese translation appreciation based on the translator's aesthetic psychological characteristics and the model consists of aesthetic cognition sub-process, the integration sub-process and the reproduction sub-process. (3) This paper analyzes the factors that influence the aesthetic psychology on literary translation in Teaching of English-Chinese translation appreciation from three aspects: the writer's aesthetic psychology and the aesthetic structure of the original work, the translator's aesthetic psychology and aesthetic standards, and the target reader's aesthetic psychology and aesthetic standards.
Acknowledgements
The study was supported by Anhui Provincial
Education Department in “2017 Major Project of Humanistic and Social Science in Anhui Provincial Universities, Anhui, China (Grant No.
SK2017A0633)”, and by 2018 Major Teaching
Research Project of Humanistic and Social Science in Bengbu University (Grant No. 2018JYXMW3).
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