Relevance and Couplet Approaches to the Translation of Dietary Terms – An Italian Cuisine Example

• Main Authors: Li-wen Chang, 張瓅文
• Other Authors: 藍月素
• Format: Others
• Language: en_US
• Published: 2009
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/19763031657526712100

碩士 === 長榮大學 === 翻譯研究所 === 97 === Cuisine, as an indispensable part of a culture, plays an important role in cultural exchange. Regarding translating cuisine and dish names, most research focuses on translating Chinese cuisine names into English, with research on translating Western cuisine dish names from English into Chinese being particularly rare. Effective dish name translation serves as a communication bridge between different two countries, making Western dish names particularly worthy of translation. The purpose of this research is to propose couplet translation approaches to help translate cultural terms present in Western cuisine dish names. The methods used in this research are content analysis and survey. Based on Peter Newmark’s translation strategies for new words, this research adopts the “couplet” approach as the main approach. In addition, based on D. Sperber and D. Wilson’s “relevance theory”, this research uses a questionnaire to evaluate if couplet translation approach can create an optimal relevance for the readers when they read the translation of the dish names. The results of this research show that cultural terms have to be translated by “transliteration + componential analysis”, “literal translation + free translation” and “literal translation + componential analysis”. The translator also has to consider the relevant connection that the readers may make when they are reading. To conclude, this research is of importance in explaining the translation approaches of cultural terms and in providing a better understanding of their influence on readers.