1.2 Significance of the Research

Chinese classical poetry contains profound Chinese culture. How to translate it and how to convey the cultural essence in a well-accepted way has long been a real problem for scholars. This thesis is based on bird image translation, which is an indispensable part in Chinese classical poetry, and is essential in forming the ideorealm in a poem. It is a combination of poets’ special emotions, objective items and different historical backgrounds. Therefore, bird image is a vivid reflection and also a carrier of Chinese culture. Bird image translation is a key in poem translation, whose effectiveness will directly influence target readers’ response. That is to say, effective bird image translation and relevant translation methods will surely contribute to poem translation and its criticism. 

At present, there is no perfect guidance in image translation theory and practice. Traditionally, literal translation and free translation are major translation methods. On the one hand, literal translation requires the similarity in words and phrases, syntactic structure and ways of expression, but it overlooks the effect of its translation. On the other hand, free translation focuses more on the connotation of original material, but pays less attention to literal equivalence. However, Nida’s Functional Equivalence Theory comes in between. It emphasizes the importance of reader’s response and gives a more assuring strategy to translation.    

In this way, the author finds the significance in research on this topic, hoping this thesis can help exploring bird image and poem translation in a deeper way and assisting translators in finding the right methods to bring out more excellent works and achieving the ultimate aim of cultural dissemination.

1.3 Organization of the Paper

Specifically, this thesis is going to elaborate the topic in five chapters:

Chapter 1 is introduction. It focuses the background, purpose and structure of this thesis.

Chapter 2 is a literature review of former research on Nida’s Functional Equivalence Theory and related researches on bird images.

Chapter 3 presents an overview of bird images in Chinese classical poetry. The author makes a short list of the general connotations of some bird images

Chapter 4 is a comparative study on bird image translation from the perspective of Functional Equivalence Theory by the author, including functions of bird images in classical poems, comparative analyses of different translation versions of three typical poems with bird images and five major translation strategies. 

Chapter 5 ends the thesis with a conclusion. It summarizes the translation strategies of bird images and also indicates some deficiencies of this thesis.

Chapter 2 Literature Review

2.1 Nida’s Functional Equivalence Theory

2.1.1 Introduction of Functional Equivalence Theory

    In Toward a Science of Translating, Eugene Albert Nida, one of the most acknowledged translation theorists, gives the definition of “dynamic equivalence” (predecessor of “functional equivalence”): in such a translation, one is not so concerned with matching the receptor-language with the source-language message, but with the dynamic relationship between the original receptor and the message. (1964)

In Nida’s The Theory and Practical of Translation, he makes a further explanation of the intrinsic essence of “dynamic equivalence”, that is: dynamic equivalence is therefore to be defined in terms of the degree to which the receptor of the message in the receptor language responds to it in substantially the same manner as the receptor in the source language.(1982) This explanation demonstrates that dynamic equivalence theory concentrates more on the substantially same responses of the readers in both the source language and the target language. Later, in book From One Language to Anthor, (1986) Nida replaces “dynamic equivalence theory” with “functional equivalence theory”.