POWER RELATIONS AND TRANSLATION INEQUALITY IN CHINA

Chinese translation to and from Japanese and English verifies the hypothesis that power differential influences the flow and reception of translations. Fluency has dominated the Chinese tradition. But some scholars recently advocate foreignization for E-C translation and domestication, for C-E translation. English is much more respected as a source and target language. This indicates the power of English dominance and cultural variations in translation strategies. In defining and classifying language dominance, one needs to take into account not only the power of a language at the world and regional levels, but also the relative strength of one language in relation to the other. This may better accommodate the translation between specific countries.