Transcript Document

Wide influence of context
•
The concept “context”, since it was raised by
the Polish anthropologist B. Malinowski in 1923,
has drawn wide attention in many fields such as
pragmatics, semantics, logics, anthropological
linguistics, socio-linguistics, psycholinguistics,
applied linguistics, etc. In the past twenty years,
context has been the focus of attention in
linguistics. Translation, either as an independent
science or a branch of comparative linguistics,
should draw on the wealth of context theories so
that it may be further enriched and developed.
The various definitions of context by
different scholars
• Hu Zhuanglin (2001: 405-406) introduces Firth’s theory as
follows:
• (1) The internal relations of the text
• (a) the syntagmatic relations between the elements in the
structure;
• (b) the paradigmatic relations between units in the system;
• (2) The internal relations of the context of situation
• (a) the relations between text and non-linguistic element,
and their general effects;
• (b) the analytical relations between “bits” and “pieces” of
the text (words, parts of words, phrases) and the special
elements within the situation (items, objects, persons,
personalities, events).
“Register” and view of London school
•
Firth’s student M.A.K. Halliday made still further
contribution to the study of context and put forward the
notion “register” in 1964 (Wang Dechun, 1992: 129), which is
a representation of the context of situation. Features of
the context of situation include “things like what is going on,
who is taking part, and what the speech act are designed to
achieve”(Halliday, 1985: 365).
•
The three men formed the mainstream of London school,
and their views on context are said to be static, for they
failed to consider communication events in terms of the
psychological environment of the speaker and hearer and
neglected such personal factors such as the communicators’
experience, knowledge etc.
a more dynamic view
•
With the thrust of pragmatics, a more dynamic
view of context emerged.
•
Mey, in his Pragmatics: An Introduction,
defines context as: “Context is a dynamic, not a
static concept: it is to be understood as the
continually changing surroundings, in the widest
sense, that enable the participants in the
communication process to interact, and in which
the linguistic expressions of their interaction
become intelligible (1993, 2001: 39)”.
D. Sperber ‘s understanding
•
According to D. Sperber (1986, 2001: 15), a context is a
psychological construct, a subset of the hearer’s
assumptions about the world. It is these assumptions, of
course, rather than the actual state of the world, that
affect the interpretation of an utterance. A context in this
sense is not limited to information about the immediate
physical environment or the immediately preceding
utterances: expectations about the future, scientific
hypotheses or religious beliefs, anecdotal memories, general
cultural assumptions, beliefs about the mental state of the
speaker, may all play a role in interpretation.
Conclusion of Mey’s and
D. Sperber’s views
•
The two linguists believe that
context is a psychological construct
that exists only in the hearer’s mind
and is constantly changing. It is a
variable.
Wang Jianping’s definition of context
•
The Chinese scholar Wang Jianping (1989: 24)
gives a very good definition of context. He points
out that context comprises those factors
manifested as linguistic forms before or after a
linguistic expression and those subjective or
objective environmental factors on both of which
a good grasp of the definite meaning of the
linguistic expression depends during the process
of communication.
Focus on the chart on page 96
First level
Second level
Third level
Extra-lingual
context
Cognitive background
context
Personal experiences, cognition of real and
unreal world knowledge
Socio-cultural context
Social custom, thought pattern, ethnopsychology, religious beliefs etc.
By-language context
Psychology, phonemic, kinemic and other
temporary factors
On-spot context
Time, place, setting, event, participants,
etc.
Discourse context
Paragraph, text, intertext
Sentential context
Semantics, syntax
Lexical context
Collocation, choice of words
Para- lingual
context
Intra-lingual
context
Dynamic
Opaque
Generat
ive
Static
Tranparent
Restrict
ive
The functions of context
• Restrictive Function
• Interpretive Function
Restrictive Function(1)
•
First, let’s see how extra-lingual
context restricts people’s way of using
language.
• The same animal “狗” in Chinese and
“dog” in English have different associative
and affective meanings in different
cultures. In Chinese we have “狗腿子”, “狗
头军师”, and “狗屁”. While western
people often say “love me, love my dog”, “a
lucky dog”, etc.
Restrictive Function(2)
•
Next, let’s see how intra-lingual context realizes its
restrictive function.
•
Saeed (1997,2000: 182-183) provides a good case in point,
where the same text with different titles is understood in
different ways.
• A Prisoner Plans His Escape (A Wrestler in a Tight
Corner )
•
Rock slowly got up from the mat, planning his escape. He
hesitated a moment and thought. Things were not going well.
What bothered him was being held, especially since the
charge against him had been weak. He considered his
present situation. The lock that held him was strong, but he
thought he could break it.
Interpretive function(1)
•
First, we will see how intra-lingual
context realizes the interpretive
function. The word “quick” has many
senses. But in the following two
sentences, its meaning is definite.
• a. He has a quick ear for music.
• b. Taxis are quicker than buses.
Interpretive function(2)
•
•
•
•
•
Para-lingual context also helps to narrow down the
meaning of an utterance.
Niu and Chen (1999: 33) give an example to illustrate how
intonation helps the interpretation of utterances.
A: It’s lovely weather, isn’t it?
B: Lovely weather, isn’t it?
According to the two authors, if B answers the question
with a rising tone, it means B takes a fancy and wants to
continue talking with A; if B answers with a falling tone,
then probably B is interested in the conversation and wants
to end it as soon as possible.
The definition of translation context
•
Translation context (TC) involves
various factors manifested as linguistic
forms and subjective and objective
factors in both the source language
society and culture and target language
society and culture that affect the
translator’s comprehension of the SLT and
reproduction of the SLT in the TLT.