An investigation into domestication and foreignization in the english translation of culture spec

THE UNIVERSITY OF DANANGUNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE STUDIES ĐOÀN THỊ NGỌC BÍCH AN INVESTIGATION INTO DOMESTICATION AND FOREIGNIZATION IN THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF CULTURE-SPECIFIC IT

THE UNIVERSITY OF DANANG

UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE STUDIES

ĐOÀN THỊ NGỌC BÍCH

AN INVESTIGATION INTO DOMESTICATION AND FOREIGNIZATION IN THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF CULTURE-SPECIFIC ITEMS IN VŨ TRỌNG PHỤNG'S DUMB LUCK NOVEL AND READERS' PERCEPTION

MASTER THESIS IN LINGUISTICS AND CULTURAL STUDIES

OF FOREIGN COUNTRIES

Da Nang, 2020

THE UNIVERSITY OF DANANG

UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE STUDIES

ĐOÀN THỊ NGỌC BÍCH

AN INVESTIGATION INTO DOMESTICATION AND FOREIGNIZATION IN THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF CULTURE-SPECIFIC ITEMS

IN VŨ TRỌNG PHỤNG'S DUMB LUCK NOVEL

AND READERS' PERCEPTION

Major: ENGLISH LINGUISTICS

Code: 822 02 01

MASTER THESIS IN LINGUISTICS AND CULTURAL STUDIES

OF FOREIGN COUNTRIES

SUPERVISOR: NGUYỄN THỊ THU HƯỚNG, Ph.D

Da Nang, 2020

STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP

Except where reference is made in the text of the thesis, this thesis contains nomaterial published elsewhere or extracted in whole or in part from a thesis by which

I have qualified for or been awarded another degree or diploma

No other person‘s work has been used without due acknowledgements in thethesis

This thesis has not been submitted for the award of any degree or diploma inany other tertiary institution

Da Nang, May 2020

Doan Thi Ngoc Bich

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During the process of fulfilling the graduation paper, I have received muchencouragement and essential assistance from my teachers, family, and domestic aswell as foreign friends Sincerely from the bottom of my heart, I highly appreciatetheir cooperation and support

I would like to send my deep gratitude to Ms Nguyen Thi Thu Huong, thesupervisor of this graduation paper Her useful recommendation, detailed commentsand practical encouragement have helped me obtain the aim and shape my ideas.Therefore, it is the fact that the paper would not have been completed without herenthusiasm

I warmly thank all my family, friends and colleague for their valuable helpthroughout the process of writing the thesis Especially, I give thanks to myinternational friends for their effective and precious cooperation during the process

to complete the survey of the questionnaire

Recognizing the importance of culture-specific items (CSIs) in translation, theresearcher aims to analyze whether Vietnamese culture-specific items have beentranslated into English based ondomestication or foreignization Data were based onculture-specific items taken from —Số Đỏl novel of Vũ Trọng Phụng and theirEnglish equivalents in the Vietnamese version by Nguyễn Nguyệt Cầm and PeterZinoman This research also examines readers‘ perception of the cultural words Itinvestigates if readers have difficulties as well as misunderstanding incomprehending culture-specific items in the English translation of —Dumb Lucklnovel To conduct the survey, the questionnaire was designed with 10 domesticatedcuture-specific items and 10 foreignized culture-specific items taken from —DumbLuckl novel to obtain feedbacks from three foreign readers The findings indicatethat the background information plays a significant role in improving thecomprehensibility of foreign readers about Vietnamese culture-specific items Theoccurrences of foreignizing were much higher than domestication with thedomination of literal translation technique However, the translators should have aparallel combination of both —domesticationl and —foreignizationl whentranslating culture-specific items into English It is essential to provide thebackground information in order to enhance the effectiveness of English translatedVietnamese masterpieces At the same time, it is necessary to consider the level ofthe comprehensiveness to create closeness for foreign readers Besides, translatorsshould conduct a survey about readers‘ perception designed for various foreignaudiences so that translated texts are more popular with international friends

Key words: culture-specific items (CSIs), domestication, foreignization,readers‘ perception

TABLE OF CONTENTS

QUYẾT ĐỊNH GIAO ĐỀ TÀI LUẬN VĂN (bản sao)

Examples of Definition Applied in Translating CSIs of

Table 4.5. The Translational Strategies of Fashion 34

Table 4.6. Examples of Substitution Applied in Translating CSIs of

Examples of Substitution and Borrowing Applied in

Table 4.10. The Translational Strategies of Food and Drink 38 Table 4.11.

Examples of Substitution Applied in Translating CSIs of

Table 4.12. Examples of Literal Applied in Translating CSIs of Food

Table 4.13.

Examples of Literal Translation Applied in Translating

Table 4.14. The Translational Strategies of Addressing System 42 Table 4.15.

Examples of Definition Applied in Translating

Number Name of Tables Page

Table 4.16 Examples of Literal Translation Applied in Translating

Table 4.17 The Translational Strategies of Entertainment Forms 45

Table 4.19 Examples of Substitution Applied in Translating

LIST OF CHARTS

Chart 4.1. Domestication and Foreignization of Place Names 26

Chart 4.2. Domestication and Foreignization of Place Names 31 Chart 4.3. Domestication and Foreignization of Social Classes 32 Chart 4.4. Domestication and Foreignization of Fashion 34 Chart 4.5. Domestication and Foreignization of Measuring System 36 Chart 4.6. Domestication and Foreignization of Food and Drink 38 Chart 4.7. Domestication and Foreignization of Addressing System 44 Chart 4.8. Domestication and Foreignization of Entertainment

Forms

45 Chart 4.9. Domestication and Foreignization of Expressions 46 Chart 4.10. Domestication and Foreignization of CSIs 51 Chart 4.11. Readers' Perception About Foreignization and

Domestication

52 Chart 4.12. Domestication and Foreignization of Readers' perception 53

LIST OF APPENDICES

Chapter One INTRODUCTION

Each nation has its own geography, lifestyle, history, traditions, customswhich form distinguishing cultures in different territories Vietnam is located in theregion of tropical climate with complex geography and it represents long-term wet-rice agriculture and, the struggle against foreign invasion Those cultural features arevividly reflected in the language Translators play a significant role in conveyingmessages from the source language to the target language It is not easy to avoidcultural and geographic barriers in translation One of the problems of translation is

to transfer culture-specific items which feature the historical, social, and culturaldevelopment of the country

Domestication and foreignization are common translation strategies whichdeal with cultural and linguistic elements Domestication, which gives priority tofluent and understandable style, is adapted to target the comprehensibility ofdomestic readers and minimize the strangeness of the foreign text whereasforeignization keeps the target text foreign and original Bhabha (1994) points outthat translation especially in literature plays a vital part in cultural communication

According to him, language is considered as a kind of cross-cultural communication, which frequently has to face up to „foreignness‘, in the sense that the existence of

cultural elements are probably untranslatable In agreement with Bhabha, Venuti alsoconfirms that translation involves cultural communication; however, the culture hasbeen transferred from the original language to the target language that has certaindifferences in meaning of cultural words This is what has been understood asdomestication, which means that foreign factors in the original text has beentranslated or rewritten into elements that are expressed to aim to be familiar to thereaders, as Venuti says: — foreign text is rewritten in domestic dialects anddiscourses, registers and styles, which results in the production of textual effects that

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signify only in the history of the domestic language and culture! (Venuti, 2000, p.471).

It can be seen that domestication and foreignization are two translationstrategies to deal with linguistic and cultural issues However, the studies aboutdomestication and foreignization in Vietnamese-English translation have been stilllimited, particularly in literature Besides, studies about readers‘ perception are notfound much With an effort to find out how Vietnamese cultural items are translatedinto foreign languages, especially English and analyze domestication and

foreignization as well as readers‘ perceptions of translation, I choose “An investigation into domestication and foreignization in the English translation of Vũ Trọng Phụng" Dumb Luck novel and foreign readers” perception” as my topic.

This study primarily aims to analyse Vietnamese-English translation ofculture-specific items in the novel —So Do! by vu Trong Phung The study alsopresents foreign readers‘ perception of translated culture-specific items in order toprovide effective solutions to expand literal masterpieces translated into English tointernational readers The study hopefully provides foreign readers with an insightinto Vietnamese culture so that they are able to better interact in communication inVietnam

1.2.2 Objectives

To achieve the aim of the study, the following objectives have to beaccomplished:

1 To identify culture-specific items in Vũ Trọng Phụng‘s Dumb Luck novel

2 To find out the use of foreignization or domestication in dealing withtranslated culture-specific items

3 To present foreign readers‘ perception of translated cultural items

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2 What are English readers‘ perceptions about CSIs in Dumb Luck novel?

The study primarily will examine the translation strategies of domestication orforeignization toward culture-specific items including character names, place names,social classes, fashion, measuring system, food and drink, addressing system,entertainment forms and expressions in Vu Trong Phung‘s Dumb Luck novel, whichwas published first in serial form in the Hanoi Newpaper (Hà Nội Báo) starting on 7October 1936 The novel is translated from Vietnamese into English by NguyễnNguyệt Cầm and Peter Zinoman, with an introduction by Peter Zinoman, published

by the University of Michigan Press

Vũ Trọng Phụng (1912-1939) is a writer, a journalist of the twentieth centurywith a number of typical masterpieces Even though he passed away at the age of histwenty-seventh birthday, he composed a body of work consisting of seven plays,eight novels, and five works of nonfiction Dumb Luck is generally regarded as hismost successful masterpiece

Dumb Luck, by the talented and controversial Vietnamese writer Vũ TrọngPhụng was launched in Hanoi in 1936 and translated from Vietnamese into English

by Nguyễn Nguyệt Cầm and Peter Zinoman The masterpiece criticizes the colonialsociety of Vietnam which many Vietnamese greeted the Popular Front victory.According to Peter Zinoman (2003), references to —progress! (tiến bộ), science(khoa học), social reform (cải cách xã hội), —womens rights! (nữ quyền), —thesporting movement! (phong trào thể thao), civilization! (văn minh), —modernity!

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(tân thời) recall the progressive language dominating the public during the era.

The investigation into different readers‘ comprehension around the world isconsidered as a new trend nowadays Therefore, this study also investigates threeforeign readers‘ perception about Vu Trong Phung‘s Dumb Luck novel Reader 1 isalso an English teacher from South Africa and has spent 2 years in Quang Ngai.Reader 2, an English teacher is Australian and has lived in Central Vietnam for 5years but has travelled all over from Northern to Southern Vietnam Reader 3, anEnglish teacher, comes from Colombia and has lived in Sai Gon and Quang Ngai for

a year

—Số Đỏl of Vũ Trọng Phụng published in 2018 and —Dumb Luckll (2003) translated from Vietnamese into English by Nguyễn

Nguyệt Cầm and Peter Zinoman are chosen to conduct the

research The English version of —Dumb Luckl (2003) was named

it is quite popular in the international book market

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1.5 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

This study aims to explore how cultural items are translated from Vietnameseinto English, and explain the misunderstanding in communication betweenVietnamese and foreigners because of culture barriers The results of the study canprovide useful insight for the translators, English learners, educators about thetendency of domestication and foreignization, especially in translating literature Thestudy hopefully provides foreign readers with an understanding of Vietnameseculture

The study is presented in the following parts:

Chapter 1: Introduction

The introduction chapter introduces background and rationale of this study,and summarizes research questions and outline of this paper

Chapter 2: Literature Review and Theoretical Background

Chapter 2 is theoretical background which clarifies some important concepts

in the study In this chapter, some of the previous research on weather forecasts werepresented

Chapter 3: Research Methods

Methodology of this study is introduced in chapter 3, which describes datacollection and data analysis in detail

Chapter 4: Findings and Discussions

Chapter 4 focuses on the results and discussion In this chapter, answers toresearch questions raised in the Introduction section are provided though quantitativeanalysis

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Chapter 5: Conclusions and Implications

Conclusions are drawn to general findings of this study, limitations of this

study stated and suggestions put forward for the future research

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Chapter Two THEORETICAL BACKGROUND AND LITERATURE REVIEW

In this chapter I review some of the previous research on domestication andforeignization, in order to gain an overall view of the state of affairs in this researcharea, and to pinpoint what further research needs to be conducted This chapter isarranged as follows: 2.1 Literature Review 2.2 Theoretical Background 2.3Summary

Many researchers have presented evidence about the dominant translationalstrategies They demonstrate that foreignization seems to become more and morepopular in translation Ebrahim Davoudi, Sharifabad, Mojde Yaqubi, and TengkuSepora Tengku Mahadi (2013) point out that domestication dominates foreignizationwith the rate of seven and three Both domestication and foreignization translationstrategies involve losses which are unavoidable in translating (p 98)

Firstly, according to Esmail Zare-Behtash and Sepideh Firoozkoohi (2009, p.1582), domestication is regarded as the principal method applied in the Persiantranslations of six books of Hemingway These language theorists also claim that —domestication has been the most pervasive cultural translation strategy from the1950s to the 2000s! (p 1582) However, there is no doubt that there is the shift fromdomestication to foreignization or vice versa —over the last six decades!

MSc Eriola Qafzezi (2013) investigates into children‘s literature translatedinto Albanian to show the level of visibility of the original author and culture versusthe translator in the original language and domesticating vs foreignizing tendencies.The author used the translational strategies by Vladimir Ivir, including substitution,omission, lexical creation (domestication) and borrowing, literal translation,definition, and addition (foreignization) The researcher investigates intoforeignization and domestication tendencies in Gulliver‘s Travels and four Albanianvariants of —Alice‘s Adventures in Wonderland! and revealed that there was little

variation in all variants with almost the same rate —Dominating tendency intranslation of CSIs in Gulliver‘s Travels is evidently foreignization! (MSc EriolaQafzezi, 2013, p 572) Generally, —both Outlaws of the Marsh translated by SidneyShapiro and All Men Are Brothers translated by Pearl S Buck use these two kinds ofmethods although the former domestication-oriented while the latter isforeignization-oriented! (Ling Yan, 2013, p 35).

More recently, Awadh G Baawaidhan (2016) described translationalsolutions of CSIs The study showed that foreignization was applied frequently intranslating the titles of episodes and popular proverbs, while the translator has useddomestication in other categories including religious expressions and culturalexpressions

As for readers‘ perception, Libin Wang (2012, p 46-47) confirms thatAustralian university students find it difficult to comprehend the English translation

of the eight Chinese slogans In spite of learning Chinese, and some in high-levelclasses, participants feel fairly difficult to comprehend Chinese political slogans —Some participants merely commented on the slogans instead of interpreting them!.However, due to their limited background of Chinese culture, a number of theparticipants were likely to obtain partial understanding of a number of slogansdespite culture-specific items

Chesnokova, Zyngier, Viana, Jandre, Rumbesht andRibeiro (2017), examinedreactions to —a canonical romantic poem in four languages—English, Portuguese,Russian, and Ukrainian—by readers from two different cultural settings—Brazil andUkraine! (p 842) The researchers conclude that there is a similarity in —relation tohow Brazilian and Ukrainian readers respond to Poe‘s poetry! (p 844) Both readers‘own culture and the language in which they read a poem may have an effect on theirresponses The authors also suggested the area of cross-cultural reader response tooriginal and translated poetry should be explored further Despite the trendy research inreaders‘ reactions to translations, there is such limited investigation in Vietnamese-Englishtranslation This study aims to provide a brief look into English readers‘ response to theEnglish translation Dumb Luck

2.2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

2.2.1 Translation and Culture

Translation has a close relationship with culture as stated by varioustranslation theorists It is true that researchers find it hard to isolate the meaning ofcultural items from their cultural background According to Bassnett and Trivedi,translation occurs in —a continuum!, not in —a vacuum!; it is not a separate processbut a series of related things It is true that it is part of a continuous process of —intercultural transfer! Besides translation covers a significantly dominant activitythat includes all types of —stages that process of transfer across linguistic andcultural boundary.! (Bassnett & Trivedi, 1999, p 2)

The definition of culture is quite necessary and vital in investigating theimplications for translation since it informs us of customs, lifestyle, intellectual andhumane values of a particular people or society A large number of scholars defineculture in various ways Larson (1984) states culture as —a complex of beliefs,attitudes, values, and rules which a group of people share! (Larson, 1984, p 430).Schmitt (1999) claims that culture is considered as —everything that a person shouldknow, be able to feel and to do, in order to succeed in behaving and acting in anenvironment like somebody from this environment! (Schmitt, as cited in Gambier,Shlesinger, & Stolze, 2007, p 33) Newmark (1988) regards culture as —the way oflife and its manifestations that are peculiar to a community that uses a particularlanguage as its means of expression! (p 94)

Aixelá (1996) defines the culture-specific item as: (indented)

—those textually actualized items whose function and connotations in a source text involve a translation problem in their transference to a target text, whenever this problem is a product of the nonexistence of the referred item or of its different

intertextual status in the cultural system of the reader of the target textl (p 58)

According to Li and Xia (2010), the process of translation consists of twolanguages which carry distinct cultural features; therefore, this translation is both the

procedure of transfer between languages and —a communication between diverseculturesl Leppihalme (1997) investigates into cultural studies, and points out that thetarget language does not totally assemble with the origin of linguistic material Sheproposes that:

—The texts occur in a given situation in a given culture in the world, and each has aspecific function and an audience of its own Instead of studying specimens of languageunder laboratory conditions as it were, the modern translation scholar-and the translator-thus approaches a text as if from a helicopter: seeing first the cultural context, then thesituational context, and finally the text itselfl (Leppihalme, 1997, p 3)

Nida mentions that —the translator must be a person who can draw aside thecurtains of linguistic and cultural differences so that people may see clearly therelevance of the original messagel (Nida and Waard, 1986, p 14) Nida (2001, p 82)claims that —for truly successful translation, biculturalism is even more importantthan bilingualism,l because without the function of specific-culture items, words areunlikely to express their meanings Nord (2001, p 34) also points out that —translating means comparing culturesl There is no denying that culture-specificitems have a profound connection with the source language and target language andcause certain difficulties for translators because they express material and intellectualculture from which a source language originates, whereas names have universalfunctions of a complicated part of speech (Willems, 1996, p 2000)

Newmark (1988) finds out many way to classify CSIs into five cultural itemsincluding (1) ecology (flora, fauna, winds, etc), (2) material culture (artifacts food,clothes, houses and towns, transports), (3) social culture (work and leisure), (4)organizations, customs, ideas (political, social, legal, religion or artistic), and (5)gestures and habits Vlahov and Florin (1980) (cited by Tellinger, 2003) speak of

realia and classify these items as follows: 1) geographical (geographic formations,

man-made geographical objects, flora and fauna that is special to a certain place); 2)ethnographic (food and drink, clothing, places of living, furniture, pots, vehicles,

names of occupations and tools); 3) art and culture (music and dance, musicalinstruments, feasts, games, rituals and their characters); 4) ethnic (names of people,nicknames); and 5) socio-political (administrative territorial units, offices andrepresentatives, ranks, military realia).

2.2.2 Domestication and Foreignization

The debate between domestication and foreignization is able to be regarded as thepolitical and cultural rather than linguistic expansion of arguments controversy over freetranslation and literal translation (Wang Dongfeng, 2002, p 24)

Domestication produces the kind of translation in which a fluent andnoticeable is adopted to limit foreign element of the original text to aim readers‘acceptable comprehension, while foreignization shows a strange tendency to readersand disrupt —target conventions! by maintaining something of the

strangeness of the source text (Shuttleworth & Cowie, 1997, p 59) Domestication is thekind of translation with the aim of reducing foreign factors of the source language, which isequivalent with cultural value in the target language (Munday, 2001) Whereas Nida, who isregarded as the linguistic theorist who prefer domestication, favor domestication as themethod that find out real naturalness of the expression based on —dynamic equivalence!.Therefore, —the message has to be tailored to the receptors‘ linguistic needs and culturalexpectations! (Munday, 2001, p 42)

On the contrary, foreignization specially targets to retain the strangeness ofthe original-language text (Shuttleworth & Cowie, 1997) Eugene Nida is considered

as the spokeman for those who support domesticating translation, whereas the Italianscholar Lawrence Venuti represents for those who get hooked on foreignizingtranslation In Venuti‘s view, foreign elements have more priority to representcultural and linguistic variety of the foreign language (Venuti, 1995) —Domestication and foreignization are two basic translation strategies which provideboth linguistic and cultural guidance! (Yang, 2010, p 1) for translators in transferringculture-specific source texts into parallel target texts

Macro-factors and micro-factors have an influence on foreignization anddomestication Macro-factors appeal translators to historical and social background.They consist of cultural asymmetry, historical background, language reality, politicalinterference, ideology, aesthetic stereotype and needs of the reader Microfactorsdepend more on purpose of translation, the translators‘ orientation as well as theircultural attitude Nida (1964a, p 145-154) once said: —Since the translation itself isthe focal element in translating, his role is central to the basic principles andprocedures of translating No translator can avoid a certain degree of personalinvolvement in his work.!

Yang (2010) concludes that readers are able to understand the translated items

by domesticating translation while translation strategy of foreignization remains thesource text, —formal features and in turn informs the readers of the SL- culture, butalien cultural images and linguistic features may cause the information overload tothe reader!

2.2.3 Translation Procedures

Some scholars have suggested translation strategies for translating CSIs areAixela (1996), Ivir (1987), and Davies (2003) Aixela (1996) has classified strategiesfor translating CSIs in two groups including substitution and conservation.Substitution strategies include synonymy, limited universalization, absoluteuniversalization, naturalization, deletion, and autonomous creation Conservationstrategies consist of repetition, orthographic adaptation, linguistic

(non-cultural) translation, extratextual gloss, and intratextual gloss Davies (2003)also has recommended seven strategies for translating CSIs such as preservation,addition, omission, globalization, localization, transformations and creation Amongtranslation theorists, Vladimir Ivir (1987) is regarded as the scholar proposingstrategies for translating CSIs in details He favors seven approaches to conveycultural gaps such as borrowing, definition, literal translation, substitution, lexicalcreation, omission, addition His approach involves the transfer of cultural

characteristics by combination of different translation methods Ivir proposes theapproaches given in details as follows.

2.2.3.1 Borrowing

—Borrowing! refers to the use of loanwords from the source language intothe target language to fill cultural gaps This method seems a powerful tool toovercome cultural gaps In case translators overuse too much borrowed terms in aone text, it possibly results in a great obstacle for communication While this strategyintroduces a borrowed word into the target language, it is important to make sure thatreaders have a sufficient knowledge of the loanword The loanword is advantageouswhen there is a need for it Only when the borrowed expression is repeated will it besuccessful Besides, the borrowed words integrate easily both phonology andmorphology into the target language This process frequently combines withsubstitution or definition Moreover, a general familiarity of the audience with theloanword enables an acceptance of a new expression as a part of their language Lastbut not least, the attitude and understanding of the audience toward the sourcelanguage and their mother tongue contribute into the success or failure of thetranslated product as well as a translator

to extension of the text or over-translations Therefore, translators should only haveconcentration into explaining the relevant text

2.2.3.4 Substitution

Ivir (1987, p 42) describes —substitutionl that —typically, in fact, a sourcecultural element finds not an empty slot, but something that is like it - though notquite like it - in the target culture The translator is then tempted to exploit thatsimilarity and use the corresponding target-language expression as a full equivalent -the case with which he makes the decision depending on the cultural closeness of thetwo elements.l Substitution is a procedure which translators replace something similar to theoriginal cultural expression, but not totally the same —Substitutionl is likely to removethe strange element of foreign culture Therefore, substitution becomes moreconvenient if intercultural terms own the common features

2.2.3.5 Lexical creation

This strategy means the translator creates a new term or —non-lexicalizedwordsll to convey CSIs in the target language However, according to Ivir, it requiresthe large amount of attempt and creativity of the inventor as well as the readers‘knowledge for comprehension, so it is employed less frequently than the othertranslational solution

2.2.3.6 Omission

From the Ivir‘s opinion, —omissionl is applied not only for unnecessary but alsopragmatic reasons By removing a CSI that does not need to be preserved in translation, Ivirbelieves that this procedure is employed for communicative purposes

2.2.3.7 Addition

Addition is a translational strategy that is used when a literal translationbecomes inefficient to transfer all cultural meaning of the source language and leavessignificant pieces of unexpressed information This process relates to adding culturalinformation implicit into the target language and has a combination of borrowing,substitution, or lexical creation strategies Useful information is added to help readersobtain the author‘s intention as well as bring it close to the target readers‘ perception

Ivir claims that —each of these procedures can be used for the translation of aCSI, but it is important to bear in mind that a combination of any of these procedurescan also be used in translating one and the same CSI, depending on the particularcommunicative actl (Ivir, 2003, p 118)

Based the theories of Ivir‘s taxonomy (1987) above to identify the application

of the two types of translation strategies, the author of the study classifies the mentioned strategies into foreignization and domestication Foreignization includesliteral translation, borrowing and definition while domestication strategy consists ofsubstitution, omission, addition and lexical creation as shown in the table below:Table 2.1 Procedures that can be applied in Foreignization and Domestication

Readers‘ perception plays an important role in perceiving the source languagemessage A successful translated text means that the readers understand the sourcelanguage message despite language barriers as Nida mentions —the readers of atranslated text should be able to understand and appreciate it in essentially the samemanner as the original readers didll (Nida, 1995 p 118).

Readers‘ reactions contribute in the success of a translated masterpiece.According to Li and He (2012, as cited in Libin Wang, 2012) —Translators‘ opinions

on translation might be subjective, but reader‘s reactions can be regarded as anobjective criterion to judge whether translation is good or bad Therefore, reader‘sreactions play a significant role in functional equivalence and readers of translation isthe most crucial factor during translation processl (p 10)

Miall and Kuiken (as cited in Anna Chesnokova et al., 2017) asserted: —Using scientific research methods to examine literary reading, Miall and Kuikenargue that studies in reader response should move away from ideal readers andexamine genuine readers‘ emotional reactions to poetry They hold that thisperspective allows us to develop a better-informed view of the evaluative process andobtain evidence-based data that may bring to light the extent to which real readers‘response to poetry is universal or culture/ language specific Athough Miall andKuiken give prominence to actual readers‘ backgrounds, they do not compare readersfrom different cultures reading in a foreign language This is precisely what thisstudy does I

Venuti (1998) stated:

—Schleiermaker allowed the translator to choose between the domesticating method,

an ethnocincinteric reduction of the foreign-language cultural values, bringing theauthor back home and a foreignization method, an ethnodement pressure on thosevalues to register the linguistic and cultural differences of the foreign text sending thereader abroad.I (p 20)

The effect of the two cultural translation strategies to readers as illustrated fallows:

Generally speaking, quite many previous language researchers investigate intodomestication and foreignization The research in domestication and foreignization inVietnamese literature seems very limited Moreover, the comprehensibility of foreignreaders is a crucial factor in the success of any translated product; however, readers‘reaction about understanding SCIs is not studied much In this study, we will exploitthe use of domestication or foreignization in the translations of CSIs in Vũ TrọngPhụng‘s Dumb Luck Novel and survey readers‘ perception about the Englishtranslation of CSIs My study hopefully contributes to literature masterpiecestranslated into English and introduces Vietnamese culture to international friends.

Chapter Three METHODOLOGY

In the previous section, I presented a framework for the investigation ofdomestication and foreignization in the English translation of culture-specific items

in Vu Trọng Phụng‘s Dumb Luck Novel and reader‘s perception This chapterpresents how I designed my research to explore domestication and foreignization inthe two languages concerned This chapter is divided into four sections: 3.1 ResearchDesign 3.2 Research Methods 3.3 Procedures 3.4 Reliability and Validity 3.5Summary

This descriptive and qualitative study was conducted to investigate intoVietnamese CSIs translated in domestication or foreignization The theoreticalframework employed in this study was translation procedures To support myanalysis, evidences were used where necessary to highlight the qualitativeinformation obtained from the contrastive analysis

3.3 PROCEDURES

3.3.1 Data Collection

The data used for analysis was taken from Vũ Trọng Phụng‘s Dumb Luck Novel inVietnamese and English in categories of character names, place names, social classes,fashion, measuring system, food and drink, addressing system, entertainment andexpressions I analyzed and explained why CSIs belong to domestication or foreignizationand pointed out their translational procedure A great effort is done to explore and hightlighthe dominant cultural translation strategies and survey readers‘ perception The followingare typical examples of CSIs

Example 1: Character names

The original

source

The targetsource Foreignization Domestication Procedure

1 Xuân Tóc

Đỏ

(p 14)

Red-HairXuân (p 34)

translatio n

2 chị hàng

mía

(p 14)

a sugar cane(p 34)

translatio n

Example 2: Place names

The original

source

The targetsource Foreignization Domestication Procedure

Buồm (p.26)

Hàng Buồmstreet (p.165)

2 Chùa Hương

(p 43)

The PerfumePagoda (p 53)

translatio n

The following steps to collect data will be involved:

- Collecting culture-specific items in Vũ Trọng Phụng‘s Dumb Luck novel,translated by Nguyễn Nguyệt Cầm and Peter Zinoman

- Analysing the translation strategies adopted in the English translation of CSIs

- Pointing out the dominant translation strategy - domestication orforeignization - in the English translation of —Dumb Luckll novel and readers‘comprehension about CSIs in the English translation of —Dumb Luckl.

- Survey three foreign readers‘ perceptions toward Vũ Trọng Phụng‘s DumbLuck novel Taken from the English translation of —Dumb Luckl, themultiplechoice questionnaire is created to do the survey with the total number

of 20 CSIs including 10 CSIs of the foreignizing strategy and 10 CSIs of thedomesticating strategy Reader 1 is also an English teacher from South Africaand has spent 2 years in Quang Ngai Reader 2, an English teacher isAustralian and has lived in Central Vietnam for 5 years but has travelled allover from Northern to Southern Vietnam Reader 3, an English teacher, comesfrom Colombia and has lived in Sai Gon and Quang Ngai for a year

- Analyzing and discussing the results

Table 3.1 The Division of the CSIs and translation procedure

Culture-Specific Items (CSIs)

RQ1: Which translation strategy - domestication or foreignization is used more often in translating CSIs in English?

In order to answer this research question, CSIs were detected and analyzedwith consideration to the definition of foreignization or domestication and thecomparison between the original text and the translated text to clarify CSIs offoreignization or domestication The statistics would show the dominant strategy -domestication or foreignization This procedure was conducted after the data of CSIswere analyzed

RQ2: What are English readers' perceptions about CSIs in Dumb Luck novel?

To answer this research question, 20 questions about detected CSIs areanswered to detect the percentage of foreignized or domesticated CSIs which areunderstood exactly with the culture of the original text by readers At the same time,the survey investigated the difficulties and suggestions for the translation

In this study, every attempt to obtain the reliability and validity has beenadministered

In terms of reliability, As a Vietnamese, I found it convenient to compare CSIs

in the translation of —Dumb Luckll and the original novel Additionally, the studywas carried out on the basis of the theoretical background of experienced linguists asmentioned in chapter 2, and the procedures of study which would guarantee theconsistency of the result of study All findings in this thesis resulted from the analysis

of evidence, statistics and frequencies For that reason, the validity was alsoconfirmed

This chapter presents research methodology and the ways to collect dataincluding how to collect samples and apply the procedure of data collection Inaddition, data collection, reliability and validity of the thesis are also mentioned inchapter 3 This chapter shows detailed methods for data collection and analysis, theresults of which will be presented in the next chapter

Chapter Four FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS

In this chapter I compare evidence from two English corpora and Vietnamesecorpora, in terms of the total number, frequency, and overall usage characteristics inboth languages This chapter is divided into three sections An analysis of

domestication and foreignization is provided in 4.1, and readers‘ perception is in

4.2 and Summary is in 4.3

Section 4.1 will present culture-specific items (CSIs) in Vũ Trọng Phụng‘sDumb Luck novel and the translation strategy of foreignization or domestication intranslated culture-specific items

4.1.1 Character names

Table 4.1 The Translational Strategies Of Character Names

Strategy Substitution Omission Lexical

creation Addition Borrowing

Literal translatio n

Definition Numbers

and the

percentage

of CSIs

0 (%)

0 (%)

1 (2.23

%)

0 (%) 3 (9.68%)

25 (80.64

%)

2 (6.45%)

Chart 4.1 Domestication and Foreignization of Place Names

These results show that the dominant method in using —character namesll is theuse of —literal translation! (80.64%), and we can note a little use of —borrowingl

(9.68%), —definitionl (6.45%) and the use of —lexical creationl (2.23%) Otherstrategies do not occur As a result, —foreignizationl accounts for mainly in —placenamesl with 96.77%.

According to Ivir (1987), literal translation is a word by word of the conceptunknown in the target language which is faithful to the original terms Literaltranslation is a method used when translating the lexical phrases literally In DumbLuck, Vu Trong Phung built successfully the contractive characters in themselves likeRed-Hair Xuân, Mrs Deputy Customs Office and so on With the type of —literaltranslationl, the translators remain character names to convey their hidden culturalmeanings in the original text, which not any reader may understand the author‘s allintentions

In —Số Đỏl, each character is a symbol for a social class, in which typicalpeople live up to their fame and ambition in social transition between tradition andmodernity at that time Vu Trong Phung draws the Vietnamese picture in colonial era inwhich —Red-Hair Xuânl is depicted as sneaky, ridiculous man to criticize the society

at that time He used to be an orphan and was adopted by his uncle However, he hasbad mood from an early age so his uncle determined to expel Xuan from his house.Since these days, —Red-Hair Xuânl initially became a homeless or stress boy withouteducation and ate wild plums and minnows caught in the Restored Sword Lake day byday He earned his living such as selling roasted peanuts and newspapers on the streets,running —errands for a theater trope, and hawked Tiger Balm aboard the trainsl (p 37).Therefore, the sunlight made his hair reddish like the western‘s hair With the literaltranslational, Red-Haired Xuân is the main character for the trait so-called —Westernizationl His character‘s name shows his personalities and his lumpen livingexperience His life condition forms his mischievous and uneducated characteristicswith his rude speech and shifty actions This is manifested in his uncultured sayingstyle when he flirted with the sugar cane girl: —God Damn my mother‘s milk!l (p 35), orwhen he replied to the fortune-teller about the reason why his hair is no longer black: —Damnit! That's what I get for not having a hat!l However, living in the ridiculous, Red-Hair Xuânsoon became an idol for everyone to admire and praise to —Dr Xuanl, —Me sừ Xuanl (p

132) -a student at the medical collegel, —a tennis professorl (p 153), —a skillful

measure of women, and a designer who has created many beautiful; and fashionableoutfitsl (p 98), —the manager of the Europeanization Tailor Shopl (p 98) The comicalsociety made —Xuânl from an uneducated boy into a rich and phony learner, thesymbol for —westernizationl Using tricks to advance, Red-haired Xuan has a certainposition in society, but is still a humorous character, with his cunning nature and tricks.Especially when he speaks in public —Oh, my people! Although you are angry with

me, I still love and esteem you! Go back to work! Go back to your comfortable lives!l(p 184) The crowd roared with approval —long live RedHaired Xuân!l, —long livehis heroic defeat!l (p 185) —Red-Haired Xuânl character bears the significant imprint

of the original language to convey the meaning of hidden meanings

Mrs Deputy Customs Office, Bà Phó Đoan, who is considered as the soul of the

Annamese nation, was a widow at the young age Đoan, transcribed French

phonetically as —douanel, is the name of his husband to allude his post as deputycustoms officer, which means elegance and respect In contrast, Đoan‘s personality istotally complete Mrs Deputy was married and windowed twice and refused to remarry

to show her marital fidelity and dedication to her deceased husbands Although sheopposed any lecherous relationship, she required Xuân to —ruinl her Consequently,Xuân recommended Mrs Deputy Customs Office would be awarded —the Medal ofSiamese virtuel (p 186) The title in Vietnamese spirit is the honor for women‘s —marital fidelityl In case unfortunately their husband passed down early, the wives had

to worship their husband for the rest of their lives without remarriage Mrs DeputyCustoms Office‘s character in the eyes of Vu Trong Phung is really an immoral —MeTâyl (p 39), a lustful, greedy woman

—Ông Văn Minhll Mr Civilization! married a rich wife and added his wifename - Văn (literature) to his name - Minh (light); therefore, creating a new name —Văn Minhl He replaced his wife‘s name before his own as the action of —gallantryl.His name means civilization but his behaviors are completely ignorant He studied inFrance for six or seven years without earning any foreign certificate, once he returnedVietnamese and extremely detests diplomas He is so modern that he schemed for Great

Grandpa Hồng to have a legal death and a solemn funeral procession Mr Van Minh isinterested in a testament because it became real and is not only an unrealistic theory Inaddition, High School Graduate Tân was very happy because he had the opportunity toshow off his photographic skill.

Mrs Civilization anxiously waited for a modern funeral to take advantage ofputting on the fashionable outfits of the European tailor shop, finally her desire turnedout real Miss Snow had a chance to show off in her public her sexy body through athin mourning

Vu Trong phung built characters in —Dumb Luckl with a satirical implication.For example, Mrs Deputy Customs Office‘s name means serious and decent, which iscompletely on the contrary with his personality Mr Civilization and Mr ILL appealpeople with the movement called modernization or civilization However, theircivilization is against science and immorality —Me-sừ Min Đơl (p.209) Officer Min

đơ (p 162) is —a policeman of the fourth rankl —Me-sừ Min Toal (p.210) —OfficerMin toal (p 162) is —the glory of the Hanoi Police and a great hope of Indochinal (p.163)

Vietnamese herbalists are traditional physicians who produce herbal medicine orown unique methods of inherited treatments passed down over many generations Dr.Sleep (p 84) and Dr Lung (p 84) are translated literally to aim their medicalknowledge Due to not admitting the talent each other, they frequently havecontroversial utterances and lower the other‘s reputation, which became topics ofgossip for local people These herbalists also criticize medicine due to doctors withoutdiploma

However, there are cases of —borrowing! translational strategy such as —JosephThiết! (p 75), Grandpa Hồng (p 75), a part of reasons is that —Thiết! and —Hồng! expressthe practical meaning in Vietnamese —Hồng! means —pink! to symbolize for happiness andbeauty while —thiết! implies —strength! because it refers to —iron!, a kind of hard metal —Borrowing! refers to the use of loanwords from the source language into the target language tofill cultural gaps This method seems a powerful tool to overcome cultural gaps —TYPN,nghĩa là: Tôi yêu phụ nữ!! (p 97) is translated into —Mr ILL - it stands for _I Love Ladies!‘!

(p 68) with the —lexical creation! method This strategy means the translator creates a newterm or —non- lexicalized words! to convey CSIs in the target language The name of —Mr.ILL! is probably created due to his ill idea on the road of revolution in the Europeanizationshop —Mr ILL! used to produce fashionable items in order to deceive women supporting themodern style but heap reproaches upon his wife for wearing modern clothes as themanifestation of immorality In So Do, Vu Trong Phung criticizes the chaotic society ofpopularization, romance, urbanization of fashion, sports, medicine, even moral standards andsocial statues His naming of the characters in the story depicts the contrast in theirpersonalities and what is shown by the names Foreignisation was found to be popular intranslating the names.

Literal translatio n

Definition Numbers

and the

percentage

of CSIs

0 (%)

0 (%)

0 (%)

0 (%)

8 (42.11%)

11 (57.89

%)

0 (0%)

As for place names, the translator manages to apply the foreignization techniquegiving the local original characteristics to the target language In this regard, literaltranslation and borrowing strategies have been used

Chart 4.2 Domestication and Foreignization of Place Names

According to the results (table 4.2) and (chart 4.2), it is remarked that translatorswidely used the translational strategies of —borrowing! (42.11%), literal translation(57.89%), while other strategies were not found in the translation of place names Therewas 100% foreignization in the English translation of 19 items in general The nameplaces such as —Old Fish Road, White Bamboo Lake, the Restored Sword Lake, thePerfume Pagoda, and West Lake ! were literally translated into English There isimplication about Vietnamese background For example, Hồ Hoàn kiếm - the RestoredSword Lake is linked to the legendary tale and a symble of Hanoi which Le Loi kingreturned the sword to the Gold Tortoise The image of Turtle Tower, standing on a smallisland near the centre of the lake, demonstrated the ending of the war, development ofnational economy as well as care for people‘s peaceful and happy lives

Some place names are repeated in the target language with the translationalstrategy of borrowing including —Hàng Cỏ street, the Lady Banh Pagoda, Triều

Châu Hotel, Hàng Buồm street, Hàng Đậu Police Station l —Hàng Cỏ, Hàng Buồm, Hàng Đậu.l refer to Hanoi‘s 36 streets of the Old Quarter in Hanoi Artisans and tradersfrom various villages have sold their products here for thousands of years The streets are named after their sold products such as silk, bamboo, silver and so on