Agencies in English Translations of Contemporary Chinese Women Writers: A Contextual, Paratextual and Textual Study

<p>The concept of agency has been frequently applied in translation studies (TS), especially in sociology of translation, but is still ill-defined, with no agreement on what it is precisely. This research discusses agency within a combined sociological and gendered framework, seeking to offer a systematic investigation of what agency entails in TS in order to better understand the intercultural communication of female voices from a non-hegemonic culture. In doing so, it questions a simplified understanding of agency as intermediary and argues that agency, as a theoretical tool with sociological implications, is always structural, relational and dynamic. Drawing upon ideas from Pierre Bourdieu’s field theory, I first construct a field of translating contemporary Chinese women writers into English from the 1980s to the 2010s, outline the general structure that governs such translation activities and provide a diachronic analysis of how translation agents operate within different translation discourses to promote women writers. Then I refer to Bruno Latour’s actor-network theory to identify two specific agencies: 1) a feminist agency that promotes the works of Zhang Jie (1937-) in the 1980s, when there was a juxtaposition of political and feminist translation discourses; and 2) a commercial agency enacted by the male director Zhang Yimou’s film adaptation The Flowers of War (2011) operating on the translation of Yan Geling’s Thirteen Hairpins of Nanjing (Jinling shisan chai 金陵十三钗), first published in 2005. In these two case studies, I trace two translation networks and investigate how their different agencies have either strengthened or weakened the female voices inscribed in the original texts. While contextualizing how agents operate in the translation process, I examine their agency through both paratextual and textual analysis, ultimately providing what I believe is a more comprehensive understanding of agency which can enhance the analytical and explanatory power of this theoretical concept in TS. The original contribution of this research to the academic discourse is three-fold. Theoretically and methodologically, it constructs an integrative framework that combines not only sociological approaches of TS, but also feminist translation studies and feminist translation criticism. Not only does it provide a field-oriented study of how women’s writing is translated and presented through different agencies, but it also uncovers strengthened feminist voices and recovers lost female voices in different translation discourses. Moreover, as a response to the ongoing intersectional and transnational turn in the study of women and translation, it goes beyond the gender-centric framework of the traditional feminist translation studies. By exploring other social and cultural specificities for Chinese women writers who enter the Anglo- American context, this research highlights the influences of political and commercial translation discourses, exposing the dilemma of translating women writers from non-hegemonic languages into English, whereby the translator or the writer either emphasizes a woman-centric perspective in the paratext or deletes references to women’s concerns in order to improve readability for a Western readership. Last but not least, this research fills a gap in existing scholarship on translating women writers into English, or what is called “the outward translation studies” currently prevalent in the Chinese academia, yielding insights into the global circulation and reception of contemporary Chinese literature.</p>

Agencies in English Translations of Contemporary Chinese Women Writers: A Contextual, Paratextual and Textual Study

<p>The concept of agency has been frequently applied in translation studies (TS), especially in sociology of translation, but is still ill-defined, with no agreement on what it is precisely. This research discusses agency within a combined sociological and gendered framework, seeking to offer a systematic investigation of what agency entails in TS in order to better understand the intercultural communication of female voices from a non-hegemonic culture. In doing so, it questions a simplified understanding of agency as intermediary and argues that agency, as a theoretical tool with sociological implications, is always structural, relational and dynamic. Drawing upon ideas from Pierre Bourdieu’s field theory, I first construct a field of translating contemporary Chinese women writers into English from the 1980s to the 2010s, outline the general structure that governs such translation activities and provide a diachronic analysis of how translation agents operate within different translation discourses to promote women writers. Then I refer to Bruno Latour’s actor-network theory to identify two specific agencies: 1) a feminist agency that promotes the works of Zhang Jie (1937-) in the 1980s, when there was a juxtaposition of political and feminist translation discourses; and 2) a commercial agency enacted by the male director Zhang Yimou’s film adaptation The Flowers of War (2011) operating on the translation of Yan Geling’s Thirteen Hairpins of Nanjing (Jinling shisan chai 金陵十三钗), first published in 2005. In these two case studies, I trace two translation networks and investigate how their different agencies have either strengthened or weakened the female voices inscribed in the original texts. While contextualizing how agents operate in the translation process, I examine their agency through both paratextual and textual analysis, ultimately providing what I believe is a more comprehensive understanding of agency which can enhance the analytical and explanatory power of this theoretical concept in TS. The original contribution of this research to the academic discourse is three-fold. Theoretically and methodologically, it constructs an integrative framework that combines not only sociological approaches of TS, but also feminist translation studies and feminist translation criticism. Not only does it provide a field-oriented study of how women’s writing is translated and presented through different agencies, but it also uncovers strengthened feminist voices and recovers lost female voices in different translation discourses. Moreover, as a response to the ongoing intersectional and transnational turn in the study of women and translation, it goes beyond the gender-centric framework of the traditional feminist translation studies. By exploring other social and cultural specificities for Chinese women writers who enter the Anglo- American context, this research highlights the influences of political and commercial translation discourses, exposing the dilemma of translating women writers from non-hegemonic languages into English, whereby the translator or the writer either emphasizes a woman-centric perspective in the paratext or deletes references to women’s concerns in order to improve readability for a Western readership. Last but not least, this research fills a gap in existing scholarship on translating women writers into English, or what is called “the outward translation studies” currently prevalent in the Chinese academia, yielding insights into the global circulation and reception of contemporary Chinese literature.</p>

Women as Heroes in Shakespearean Drama

Shakespeare studies Nature in the context of human behaviour. His drama deals with transformations and he displays these changes on both social and personal levels through alternating the graphic images from characters to situation. In an authoritarian society where lives of women were governed by a belief system which resulted out of Nature’s disposition of preordained roles in society, the portrayal of dominating female voices would have bothered many. Shakespearean drama is a protest against the society which is always dominated by the destructive forces of male paranoia, egocentrism, patriarchal instinct of exploitation of the weak, male sexual anxiety and corrupt abuse of rules of justice by the powerful. A study of the female mind presented in Shakespearean drama is seen at its best in The Winter’s Tale. The following article is an attempt to explore some of the aspects of Womanhood in Shakespearean art.

Women in Rap Songs: A Difference between Male and Female Voices

Hip-hop has become a male-dominated industry, and it has reached all over the world, including the Philippines. This study analyzed two Original Pilipino Music (OPM) rap songs: Neneng B by Nik Makino feat. Raf Davis, and Pantsu by Zae. The two songs were examined to see how women are represented and how women's empowerment is promoted. Addressing the objectives, this study used a qualitative design that involved stylistics and text analysis. Using the Feminist Theory and applying Sara Mills' Feminist Text analysis model, the lyrics were examined in a word, phrase/sentence, and discourse level. This research revealed that a female artist's song promotes woman empowerment while the song written by male artists has more objectification tendencies. This study further implicates the role and position of women in modern-day society with music.

Voicing the Suppressed Female Voices in a Male-Chauvinistic Society: A Study of Vijay Tendulkar’s Silence! The Court is in Session

Vijay Tendulkar (1928-2008) is considered a prominent Indian playwright, movie and television writer, literary essayist and social commentator primarily in Marathi in the twentieth century. The playwright acquaints the readers or the audience with the Indian socio-cultural milieu through the journey of characters in Silence! The Court is in Session. This paper aims at analyzing the perceptions of the people towards women in a male-dominated, patriarchal society. The paper will analyze that whether social sanctity, morality, ethics, values are applied to both genders i.e. man and women with the same lenses or favours any of them. If there are dual standards for measuring the character of an individual based on gender, how can one hope for justice? This paper will give an expression to the silenced, the hushed up, the repressed, the suppressed and the oppressed voices, liberating the women while interrogating the male-chauvinistic world.

Skilled play : positioning the player at the centre of the digital game

This thesis argues that a focus on the player and the skill sets required to play video games - a player-skill perspective - provides a productive framework from which to examine and address many contemporary 'problem areas' within game studies. Familiarity, social performativity, and material mastery form three crucial, interlocking junctures where skill and mastery are framed as essential components for undertanding games. The game controller is positioned as a 'gatekeeper' between player and game; a precluding factor in engaging with the medium. Participant responses from original qualitative research, which places a primacy on female voices, are framed within a gaming climate of historically increasing complexification of game genres and material components, and point to several trends in how women can (and do) contend with gendered technology.

Skilled play : positioning the player at the centre of the digital game

This thesis argues that a focus on the player and the skill sets required to play video games - a player-skill perspective - provides a productive framework from which to examine and address many contemporary 'problem areas' within game studies. Familiarity, social performativity, and material mastery form three crucial, interlocking junctures where skill and mastery are framed as essential components for undertanding games. The game controller is positioned as a 'gatekeeper' between player and game; a precluding factor in engaging with the medium. Participant responses from original qualitative research, which places a primacy on female voices, are framed within a gaming climate of historically increasing complexification of game genres and material components, and point to several trends in how women can (and do) contend with gendered technology.