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Chapter One Introduction

1.1 Research Background
The orientation towards culture is the most striking feature in the contemporarytranslation studies. This new perspective provides us with a dynamic, macro, anddescriptive way to study translation, instead of the static, micro and prescriptiveapproach. The contextualization and historicism of translation phenomena are helpfulto disclose the external and internal mechanisms of translation.However, since 1970s, there has appeared a trend of “cultural turn” in translationstudy. A group of scholars like Bassentt, Snell-Hornby, Holmes, and Lefevere, beganto discuss translation from a broader view, with more attention paid to theextra-linguistic factors of society, politics and poetics, because they think “translationsare never produced in a vacuum, and never received in a vacuum” (Bassnett &Lefevere, 2001). Only under socio-cultural contexts can translation convey meaningsand perform its crucial function of communicating. Therefore, they commonly heldthat translation is not only the transfer of language symbols but also “an interculturalcommunication activity” (Shaw, 1988; Nord, 1991).
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1.2 Objectives and Research Questions
Guided by the poly-angle advocated in the “cultural turn”, the thesis discussesthe foreignization representation of Mencius’ English versions from the generalpragmatic perspective of Adaptation Theory proposed by Jef Verschueren, with theaim to disclose the pragmatic mechanisms of foreignization. Under the framework ofAT, a case study of the foreignization representation in Mencius’ English versions isintended to offer authentic data, linguistically and culturally, to make clear thepragmatic relationship among a translator, language and culture behind foreignization.Therefore, the thesis is designed to answer the following questions.1. What is the relationship between AT and foreignization?2. How have AT and foreignization representation in Mencius’ English versionsinteracted with each other?3. What limitations can exist in the present study?Hopefully, this study may explore pragmatically, from both macro and microviews, to the essence of foreignization, and shed light on the study of this translationalpractice.
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Chapter Two Literature Review

2.1 Introduction
Before the pragmatic analysis of foreignizations in Mencius’ English versions ismade, it is necessary and essential to have a review on the related researches aboutforeignization and AT since they are the study object of the thesis. This chapter firstcovers the overseas and domestic studies about foreignization in Section 2.2, wherethe definition, the development, and the relationship with literal translation anddomestication are to be reviewed. The review on translation studies under AT is thenintroduced in Section 2.3.
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2.2 Overseas and Domestic Studies on Foreignization
“Foreignization” is first proposed as a term formally used in translation studiesby Lawrence Venuti, the American translation theorist from Temple University, todesignate the type of translation in which a TT “deliberately breaks target conventionsby retaining something of the foreignness of the original” (Shuttleworth & Cowie,2004: 59). Venuti, in his book The Translator’s Invisibility: A history of Translation,suggests that “foreignizing translation” is to send the reader abroad by “registerin