Applying Narrative Theory to the Translation of Journalistic Texts

开篇：润墨网以专业的文秘视角，为您筛选了一篇Applying Narrative Theory to the Translation of Journalistic Texts范文，如需获取更多写作素材，在线客服老师一对一协助。欢迎您的阅读与分享！

1. Introduction

‘It is axiomatic that politics pervades every aspect of human thought and activities’ （Newmark， 1991， p.146）. Politically speaking， journalistic texts are perhaps the most sensitive texts， as they can shape and mediate， rather than mirror， reality. Journalists always find themselves rewriting translations to comply with the rules and practices of the medium in which they work （Bielsa and Bassnett， 2009）. This essay aims to apply narrative theory to the study of manipulation in the translation of journalistic texts.

2. Narrative theory

2.1 Introduction to narrative theory and framing

We live in a world of narratives. People cannot make sense of the world until it is put in a narrative mode. Baker defines narratives as ‘public and personal stories that we subscribe to and that guide our behaviour’ （2006， p.19）.

Source text authors can express their own narratives and translators can signal their own views towards these narratives through employing various devices. These devices can be summarised as framing which allows different groups to foreground their own narratives， and challenge and downplay those proposed by others. Without frames， social life will appear to be random facts （Manning， 1992）. In the following sections， how narratives are framed in news translation to mediate and construct reality will be analysed.

2.2 Relationality

Narratives do not exist before people relate facts in a certain order （Baker， 2006）. However， people do not frame these facts randomly； they need to relate facts logically， and this characteristic of narratives is called relationality. The device of relationality can be drawn on to infuse a certain narrative or ideology in an implicit manner into public or meta-narratives， ‘thus obscuring or downplaying its relational load in the source environment’ （Baker， 2006， p.66）. In the following paragraphs， how relationality is employed to frame a narrative will be analysed.

Example 1

Source text： This advantage stems from four forces that first emerged in the 1970s …

Translation： 这一优势来自上世纪70年代粉墨登场的四股力量……

In this example， ‘four forces’ is not translated as its equivalent， namely ‘四方面的力量’， and ‘first emerged’ is translated as ‘粉墨登台’ instead of a neutral term ‘出现于’ . These choices aims to frame a condemning tone into these narratives. If evaluating American capitalism in the long run， readers may find that these forces are actually causes of future financial crisis. Therefore， a disapproving tone needs to be framed into the narrative to meet the general public’s expectations.