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Western Impact on China Through Translation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 March 2011

Tsuen-hsuin Tsien
Tsuen-hsuin Tsien
Affiliation:
University of Chicago
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Extract

Translation is not only a science or an art, but also a practical tool of international communication in the world-wide exchange of ideas. The importance of translation has been heightened by the increasing contacts among nations of widely divergent cultures. In the Western world, translation is considered more frequently from the linguistic than the cultural point of view, for the West has a common pattern of culture underlying its linguistic variety. The problem of communication between the East and the West is more difficult in that there are not only language barriers but also divergent cultural patterns.

The translation of Western works into Chinese began near the end of the sixteenth century. Moved by religious enthusiasm, the Jesuits initiated the process and the Protestant missionaries followed. Since the middle of the nineteenth century, translation programs have been a characteristic part of Chinese governmental activity directed toward modernization and, consequently, both the subject matter translated and the languages from which they were translated indicate trends in modern Chinese thought as well as changing governmental policies. Moreover, the motivation of translation and the shifts in intellectual interests are reflected in the character and quantity of translations produced at different times.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 13 , Issue 3 , May 1954 , pp. 305 - 327
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1954

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References

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2 “Translation” is here defined as a rendering of foreign material into Chinese language without change of its original idea. A compilation on V/estern subjects is not considered a translation, except for those earlier missionary writings as tabulated in tables I and II, of which the originals cannot be completely identified. Material in the following tables represents separate titles of books only; translated articles in periodicals are not included.

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17 One scholar commented: “Religious (Christian) books are all superficial and unworthy to be studied; the style of translation is especially bad.” Cf. Chao Wei-hsi , Hsi hsueh shu mu ta wen (A bibliography of Western studies), (Kweiyang, 1901), Preface, 1a.

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35 The translations made by Fryer have been kept in the East Asiatic Library of the University of California. The writer is indebted to Dr. Richard G. Irwin for the detailed information concerning the Fryer collection as described in his unpublished paper entitled “John Fryer's Legacy of Chinese Writings.”

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37 These include 66 on natural science, 38 on military science, 35 on engineering and manufacture, 11 on medicine, 7 on agriculture, and 21 on history and institutions. A complete list was included in Yün-kung, Wei, Chiang nan chih tsao chü chi (An account of the Kiangnan Arsenal), (Shanghai, 1905). 2/15–22Google Scholar.

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43 Published terminologies include those of chemistry, pharmacy and pharmacology, astronomy, physics, mineralogy, meterology, geology, anatomy, bacteriology and immunology, pathology, electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, chemical engineering, general psychology, sociology, economics, education, statistics, etc. See Chung hua nien chien (Chinese Yearbook), 1948 (Nanking, 1948), 2Google Scholar. 1773.

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62 Hsun, Lu, No han (Cheers on the sidelines), (Shanghai, 1926), ivGoogle Scholar.