Essays on Writing and Language in Honor - Sino-Platonic Papers

SchriJEfestschhr$: <strong>Essays</strong> in Honor of John DeFrmis
Speaking from the perspective of a translator, the problem is that of
what to leave in or out. In addition the audience which the translator
addresses is totally different from that addressed by the original speaker.
Thus the emotional reaction that a (spokentwritten) text will generate will of
course be different and may present particularly difficult problems of
translation.
The method
The original Chinese and the translated English texts were given to
native speakers of the respective languages to determine their immediate
reaction and their perception of the speakers' attitude and mood in the
discourse. The informants were 14 native speakers of English (Australian,
English and American) and 8 'Chinese native speakers from PRC. They
were all asked to express their immediate reaction to the text and their
perception of the speaker's attitude, mood and tone of voice.
The mults
Among the native speakers of English, reactions varied a great deal
despite some commonalities which were noted such as "uninformed". and
"humb1e" as applied to the mood adopted by the speaker.
Some keywords or phrases used by the English informants are
indicative of the different reactions:
"This is more a satire than an actual speech". "Complacency", "makes
me wonder how much of it is true", "forced optimism" , "deferential",
"defensive", "slightly aggressive", "formal pleasantries", "approval
seeking", "doctrinaire", "sycophantic", "insincere", "lackey's voice", "people
pleasing", "he feels guilty about a poor showing", "apologetic", "talking up
to his listener", "have the feeling of attending some religious meetings",
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