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1、Chinese Translation of Coca Cola:Analysis and Enlightenment AbstractThe Chinese translation of Coca Cola is thought to be a well-known good translation, and many people discussed the translation or brand translation with it as an example. A large number of books or articles generally and abstractly
2、conclude that the Chinese translation leaves people a kind of feeling of coolness and cleanness, pleases and attracts consumers attention and their favor, however there is not still a book or an article studying systematically and scientifically how good the translation is, neither wholly from persp
3、ectives of linguistics, culture and aesthetic translation. Based on the literature review and comparative analysis with cultural translation study and translation aesthetics, the thesis is to discover how good the translation is, based on the analysis of Chinese translation of Coca Cola from the asp
4、ects of linguistics, culture and translation aesthetics, and to build a criticism model of translation of brand names, in addition, to analyze the enlightenment of this translation in other translation activities.Key Words: kekoukele, coca cola, linguitic analysis, socio-cultural preference, beauty
5、1. IntroductionKekoukele, as a Chinese translation of Coca Cola, is well-known in China as a classic good translation. Zhan Pei considers it as a “perfect” translation, and many people also mention it as a typical good brand translation. Wang Bingqin discusses the brands expressive function, in whos
6、e book he concludes that the Chinese translation of Coca Cola by Jiang Yi is a famous translation all over the country. Hu Di thinks that the translation of Coca Cola is classic with the technique of alliteration and assonance, containing both good sound effect and meaning connotation, which sounds
7、fluent and rhythmed, and it also expresses the function and effect of the drink and Chinese psychological need. From articles and books, it is easy to found that the translation of brand is widely discussed, most of which are from a single aspect of culture, translation aesthetics or equivalence the
8、ory, the Chinese translation of Coca Cola is analyzed, but is not systematically and theoretically discussed, not from the perspectives of linguistics, Chinese socio-cultural psychology, and translation aesthetics, neither from the three aspects. Therefore, the paper is to analyze the Chinese transl
9、ation of Coca Cola from different perspectives, to evaluate systemically how good the translation is, and to further perfect the directive role of translation theories to translation activities, especially to the brands translation.2 Analysis of the Translation from the Perspective of LinguisticsLin
10、guistics is the base of translating research, as translation at first is the transformation from one language to another language, which will be affected by two languages, and the linguistic features of each language will have a great influence on translation, so the analysis from the perspective of
11、 linguistics is necessary and useful for the topic. 2.1 Contrast Coca Cola with its Chinese Translation from the Aspect of EtymologyAccording to Online Etymology Dictionary, coca and cola are two kinds of plant:Coca: 1616, from Sp. coca, from Quechua cuca. Coca-Cola invented in Atlanta, Ga., 1886, b
12、y druggist Dr. John S. Pemberton. So called because original ingredients were derived from coca leaves and cola nut. Cola: 1795, “genus of trees native to west Africa, introduced in New World tropics,” Latinized form of W.Afr. name of the tree (cf. Temne kola, Mandingo kolo).” http:/ The New Oxford
13、Dictionary of English, Coca is “a tropical American shrub that is widely grown for its leaves, which are the source of cocaine”, is the dried leaves of this shrub as a mass noun, which are mixed with lime and chewed as a stimulant by the native people of western South America. From books and diction
14、aries, it is easy to draw a conclusion that coca and cola are two kinds of trees which are the ingredient source of Coca Cola. And Coca Cola is a kind of a carbonated non-alcoholic drink with the material of Coca and Cola. Therefore, from the etymology the name of Coca Cola, has not any deep connota
15、tions or meanings, only represents a kind of popular drink.In Ci Yuan, the definition of “kekou” is delicious which means dainty flavor for something. In Chinese Great Dictionary, it is defined as “kekou, which means delicious in English, refers that the food is flavorful and to ones taste”. Accordi
16、ng to these definitions it can be found that kekou means delicious and tasteful, suitable to eat or drink, and kele means something making people happy and pleasant. So the four characters have a good feeling to the customers. In 1930s, Chinese American named Jiang Yi firstly chooses “kekoukele” as
17、the Chinese translation of Coca Cola, which made Coca Cola known around the Chinese people and had a great economic and social effect. (Wang Bingqin)From etymology, it is easy to find their origin is different / unequal, the naming of Coca Cola is accidental, the ingredient source of Coca Cola are m
18、ostly known from the English name, that is, coca and cola. While the origin of Chinese translation, based on the deep strong cultural background, can be traced back to 1930s, the meaning of which is delicious and tasteful cola that makes drinkers happy. Therefore, compared to the original, the Chine
19、se translation of Coca Cola has a good drink image which makes the translation more suitable and receivable to Chinese people.2.2 Contrast Coca Cola with its Chinese Translation from their Phonetic AspectIn translation, the phonetic features are very important, because a good translation is a transl
20、ation that expresses not only the meaning but also the form including its phonetic features, for example in the translation of poems. In the translation of brand names, a phonetic feature is also important, a good transformation of which can compensate for the distance of meaning “lost in translatio
21、n”. There are similarities and differences in phonetic features of the two terms from the table. The consonant syllables and are completely kept in the Chinese translation, while the vowel syllables are changed greatly, in which the syllable is changed to, the first is changed to , and the last syll
22、able is changed to. The phonetic feature of Coca Cola is three “c”s with the sound , two “o”s with the sound , two “a”s with a sound, one l with the sound of. And the pronunciation is . From the phonetics, the sound of Coca Cola is sonorous, because sound of the velar stop is sonorous, as initial na
23、ming did concern about the sonority of pronunciation but not the meaning of Coca Cola. In addition, its rhyme feature is very beautiful with alliteration and its stress. When drinkers speak out the word, they feel it a cadenced short word with trochee (a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed s
24、yllable as poets do for poems), which makes others a feeling of lively rhythm and easy to remember. As in Chinese translation of Coca Cola, it is easy to read and remember from the phonetics. There are also three syllables which are sonorous, three Chinese syllables. Its rhyme and stress features ar
25、e also identical with that of its English version. It begins with the syllable with another unstressed syllable, and with another stressed syllable and unstressed syllable, which is known as trochee. (Table 1 and Table 2)On the other hand, the stress has a little change in the position, which is obv
26、ious from its different pronunciation and , but Coca Cola and its Chinese translation both have four vowel syllables, and the consonant syllables are almost the same, which are similar in the position and pronunciation effect. Generally, the Chinese translation retains the basic phonetics features o
27、f Coca Cola, its main sonorous syllable , its rhythm and trochee, and its sound effect. 2.3 Contrast Coca Cola with its Chinese Translation from their Morphologic AspectAs morphology is concerned with word forms, it is akin to phonology which describes how words are pronounced, it is significant to
28、delve into the morphologic features of Coca Cola with its Chinese translation, which can make us better understand how similar the two versions are and how good the translation is. In English, Coca Cola in red italics looks like a stream, which can make drinkers keep the reddish beautiful drink in m
29、emory. In Chinese, as is well known, the morphologic feature is very important, because Chinese characters have their own morphology with their deep image. Chinese characters often contain two parts: meaning parts and sound parts, therefore, beautiful Chinese characters can lead readers to imagine.
30、Coca Cola has its morphologic feature. The “co” repeats, and so does “a”. From its English brand ad, it is easy to see that coca and cola are parallel, and with two capitals “C”s with red color, which looks like the reddish drink with wide imagination. In addition, the brand name is very simple with
31、 only 8 letters, which is only made up of letters c, o, a, l. Therefore, the morphologic feature of Coca Cola is simplicity and streamline features. Chinese is an ideographic writing system and a tonal language, every Chinese character can be regarded as a trinity of pictograph, ideograph and phone.
32、 (from Guo Jianzhong) From morphologic perspective, “kekoukele” is very simple and easy to write down with only four simple characters, which contains three “mouth” that means mouth, relating to the organ to drink. According to the Shuo Wen Jie Zhi, “mouth” is a pictograph, which is the organ to tak
33、e in food or drink, and “ke” is an Associative Compound, which has two parts, “mouth” is a meaning part and “ding” is a sound part, while “le” means the total name of Chinese music. The phonological feature of Chinese translation of Coca Cola is simplicity, sonorousness of sound effect, visualizatio
34、n and understandability of its visual effect.2.4 Contrast Coca Cola with its Chinese Translation from their Semantic AspectFrom the perspective of semantics, as Coca Cola is only a kind of drink, sometimes is shortened as Cola, the Chinese translation represents its basic meaning as a kind of drink
35、“kele”. Factually, the first translation of Coca Cola leads Chinese people to get to know this kind of carbonated drink, followed by other kinds of “kele”. Therefore, the Chinese translation of this brand has realized its semantic meaning, and brought a new meaning of a “good and fine” drink. Genera
36、lly, the Chinese translation of Coca Cola is not equivalent to original Coca Cola in semantic meaning, in fact, the former adds a more imaginative and aural effect that the latter does not contain. And the origins of the two are absolutely different. But the Chinese translation and its original are
37、similar from the linguistic level with similar morphologic feature and similar phonetic feature. From phonetics, the Chinese translation of Coca Cola has the semantic meaning and stylistic meaning of the English brand as a kind of cola, and it has the similar sound effect with simplicity and sonorou
38、sness. In morphologic feature, Chinese translation also symbolizes the simplicity and visual effect of Coca Cola. And Chinese translation of Coca Cola contains its basic meaning as a kind of drink. To sum up, the Chinese translation of Coca Cola is a good translation to its English from the aspects
39、of linguistics. From the traditional translation theory, the translation is not faithful, as it does not translate its semantic meaning firstly.3 Analysis of the Translation from the Perspective of Cultural TranslationAs the development of translation theories, more and more people gradually realize
40、 that the translation is not only concerned with linguistics, factually “culture impacts and constrains translation” (Li Heqing etc.), and language is not seen “as an isolated phenomenon suspended in a vacuum but as an integral part of culture” (Snell-Hornby), “the translator needs not only proficie
41、ncy in two languages, he must also be at home in two cultures” (ibid). Cultural concepts, which underlie the variety of language usage and language habits, come to be the key area of translation studies. (from Guo Jianzhong) As a result, translation is “seen as a form of acculturation” (Li Heqing et
42、c.), is “the exploration of an unbridgeable gap and of a tension between cultures, variable according to the historical time and the socio-economic motivations of the assessment, its function is to develop cross-cultural constructions while at the same time bridging and underlining the differences.”
43、 (Hewson & Martin) Therefore, people have to pay much attention to the translation from the perspective of culture. All the Chinese people who meet the Chinese translation of Coca Cola at the first sight speak highly of its appropriateness and beautifulness, it is only because it perfectly represent
44、s our Chinese cultural psychology, that is, when they hear the translation, they can form a good imagination to the drink. In fact, the realization of Chinese cultural psychology in the translation is obvious.According to the four simple Chinese characters, the Chinese translation of Coca Cola shows
45、 Chinese preference to the simplicity and seeking to the condensed usage of characters. Chinese people all the time like expressing their feeling or idea with least characters, therefore there are a large pool of Chinese ancient poetry and classics, in which the feature to seek to least characters t
46、o express what those wanted to say is easy to find. Chinese translation of Coca Cola is also made up of four common Chinese characters with strokes respectively five, three, five and five, which are widely used in peoples daily life, even those Chinese learners can easily understand them. Chinese ha
47、ve their psychological tendency to be luck and happy, they want to lead a happy life, healthily and luckily, as a result, in their daily they want to use such kinds of words to show this kind of feeling. Chinese characters are made up of two parts, one of which is the meaning of the characters. Diff
48、erent characters have different feelings. In the Chinese translation of Coca Cola, the first two characters mean delicacy, while the latter two mean happiness, which together mean delicious cola or delicious and happy. So it is easy to find that the Chinese translation of Coca Cola represents the Ch
49、inese cultural psychology of seeking happiness, preference to the good food.From the Chinese translation of Coca Cola, it is easy to get to know that the Chinese peoples preference to the beautiful thing, as the Chinese translation shows a good feeling to the fine and nice food. The Chinese cultural psychology and feeling are represented in the translation, such as the feeling to the naming of food, tendency to harmonious and happy life, simplicity. Theref