Directionality in Chinese-English translation: An investigation of cognitive efforts and decision-making focussing on the translation of allusions

Abstract

An allusion is an intertextual device, taking either implicit or explicit form, requiring shared cultural knowledge between the author and reader to convey the intended meaning. On the Translation Studies as a culture-oriented subject, however, research into the translation of allusion is very limited, especially in the field of cognitive processing. Meanwhile, in response to the rapid development of L2 translations in the translation industry, directionality has been introduced to look at its impact on the translation process of allusion. It is particularly worth investigating whether and how translators perform differently to the translation of allusion in two directions.
This study focused on the cognitive processing and decision-making in the translation of allusion in both directions between English and Chinese. It adopted a process-oriented approach to examine the translation of allusion through triangulation: the Think Aloud Protocol (TAP), Key-logging and Eye-tracking, to investigate the allocation of cognitive efforts and appropriate translating strategies used by translators. Two research questions will be answered: 1) What are the impacts of directionality and allusion on the translator's allocation of cognitive efforts? 2) What can be observed from the strategies used to translate the allusions in two directions?
A three-phase experiment was designed: A pre-test questionnaire (for 122 participants), a translation test (for 36 participants) recorded by eye-tracking and key-logging devices and a post-test cue-based retrospective interview, respectively. The thesis also touched upon the quality assessment of the translation of allusions for triangulation. The findings revealed that both directionality and allusion affected the allocation of cognitive effort in the translation process. Factors that influence the allocation of cognitive effort have also been identified. The results confirmed differences in translation strategies to deal with allusions because of directionality and investigated the potential factors that motivated the student translators' decision-making process.
This research is the first to combine eye-tracking, key-logging, and cue-based interviews to examine the translation process of allusions and allusive sentences between Chinese and English. It provides a fresh perspective to look at the translation of allusions and specified factors that affect the translation process. It has implications for translation research, pedagogy, and practice, offering theoretical and empirical evidence to the relevant areas and suggesting avenues for future research.

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ORCID for Haimeng Ren: orcid.org/0000-0002-4507-9205

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