language

b. Cultural substitution
This strategy involves replacing a culture-specific item or expression with a target-language item which does not have the same propositional meaning but is likely to have a similar impact on the target reader. The main advantage of using this strategy is that it gives the reader a concept with which s/he can identify, something familiar and appealing. There have been criticism on this strategy in the Chinese translations circles by the ‘faithfulness school’, which argues with an accusation that it destroys the original image. Examples are plenty: whether ‘shedding crocodile tears’ or ‘The cat’s tears for the mouse’ (Chinese expression translated by myself) should be used; whether ‘kick down the ladder’ or ‘dismantle the bridge after crossing over the river’(Chinese expression translated by myself) ; whether ‘A rolling stone gathers no moss’ or ‘A running river does not stink and worms do not eat well-used doors and windows’; etc. The translator’s decision largely depends on the purpose of Chinese translations. Nord (2001) provides a pair of concepts that is of great help for us: documentary Chinese translations (preserve the original exoticizing setting) vs instrumental Chinese translations (adaptation of the setting to the target culture). Whether a Chinese translations ought to be instrumental or documentary when cultural and historical elements are involved is therefore the translator’s decision. If s/he focuses on the transmission of the original flavor for readers’ reference, documentary Chinese translations is preferred; if s/he mainly intends to convey the information for basic communication, instrumental Chinese translations is sufficient. Moreover if the purpose of a Chinese translations is to achieve a particular function for the target addressee, anything that obstructs the achievement of this purpose is a Chinese translations failure. Examples in Chinese translations of advertisement and other business areas provide the most convincing proof because the quality of your Chinese translations determines the sale of the products. If they are sold well in the target customers you deserve good pay.

e. Accommodate to target textual tradition
Here in this part I wish to stress the paramount importance of cohesion. Similar to Part d, the Chinese seldom use cohesive words to bring a text together, if any, especially in old transcript. Unlike Chinese, English has five cohesive devices according to Halliday and Hason (1976): reference, substitution, ellipsis, conjunction, and lexical cohesion. Though it can not be said that Chinese do not have similar cohesive devices there are not many at least. This becomes eminent stylistic differences of English and Chinese textual traditions. Very often it is this difference that betrays a piece of writing a Chinese translations, not an original written by a native. ( for more details please refer to my paper The Importance of Teaching Cohesion on the Textual Levelat www.accurapid.com ) The pair of terms —parataxis (the juxtaposition of clauses or phrases without the use of coordinating or subordinating conjunctions) and hypotaxis (The dependent or subordinate relationship of clauses with connectives.) well depict such textual characteristics respectively between Chinese and English. There has been an opinion that modern Chinese have been much influenced by the western languages through borrowing and simulation. It is one characteristic of the development of all languages, but such influence will never become the main stream. We, as translators, must be always aware of the above–mentioned differences.
2. Accommodate to target cultural acceptability.
a. Accommodate to target cultural conventions
As is discussed above, cultural conventions take roots in our mind. Cultures that are relatively homogeneous tend to see their own way of doing things as ‘naturally’, the only way, which just as naturally becomes the ‘best’ way when confronted with other ways. In addition, what is significant in one culture might lose all its significance in another. Take color for example. Red in China always implies happiness and is used a great deal on weddings and important festivals such as the Spring Festival. White is for funerals, though some parts in the south wear black with small white flowers nowadays, a western influence. Hongbaishiyin (literally red and black occasions) therefore ought to be translated as weddings and funerals since westerners may feel at a loss what on earth it is. This is where accommodation should be adopted. Another frequently quoted example is green-eyed or red-eyed. In English green-eyed is synonymous with jealous while in Chinese the same idea becomes yanhong (literally red-eyed). Dragon through Chinese history has been exclusively related to the emperor and royal family while it is depicted in English epics as a fierce animal to be killed by heroes. Thus the dragon hat should be translated as crown, the dragon chair the royal chair, the dragon gown the emperor’s gown, the dragon position the throne. Without such accommodation they might still be understood with initial explanation, but it causes trouble for easy and smooth comprehension.

Strategies
1. Accommodate to target linguistic conventions.
a. Not a word for a word
Defined loosely, the word is the smallest unit of language that can be used by itself. (Bolnger and Sears, 1968: 43) Mona Baker defines the written word as any sequence of letters with an orthographic space on either side. (Baker, 1992: 11) In Chinese, the character instead of the word is used. Yet the above definitions apply just all right. Nevertheless, between English and Chinese differences are many and the shackles of a word for a word must be broken. To be more specific, the English word may be translated as a Chinese phrase and similarly a Chinese character may need an English phrase or sentence to express its meaning adequately and appropriately. For instance, duibuqi (three characters) can be translated into ‘Sorry” whereas ‘incredible’ and ‘ignorant’ are usually translated as bukesiyi and yumeiwuzhi respectively (Both are four-character phrases).
b. Accommodate to collocation in target language
‘Why do builders not produce a building or authors not invent a novel, since they do invent stories and plots? No reasons as far as dictionary definitions of words are concerned. We don’t say it because we don’t say it.’ (Bolnger and Sears, 1968: 55) This is quite true in Chinese as well. We acquire them rather than learn them as in learning a foreign or second language. Most problems arise in Chinese translations owing to different collocations in different languages. For example, rules are broken in English but only weifan(violated or not abided by ) in Chinese.
c. Lexicalization with necessary annotation

By lexicalizaiton we mean to invent a new word or phrase for something that does not exit in the target language. The meaning may yet fail to be conveyed, so it is necessary for us to append an explanation immediately thereafter. For example, we Chinese do not have a habit to drink afternoon tea. Moreover tea is just tea and we drink only tea without eating any snacks. When I was invited to have afternoon tea by my English friend Andre, I was surprised to find I was offered biscuits and things. This posed a problem when I related the story to my students for I could not simply translate it as xiawucha (a literal Chinese translations). I had to explain. Morning tea similarly is quite different from zaocha in the Cantonese community.
d. Accommodate to target sentential structure
One ancient foreigner recalled his experience in learning Chinese, saying that the Chinese do not have obvious formal connections between sentences and clauses. It is true especially in the ancient Chinese transcript which even do not have a punctuation system. Full stop is merely used to indicate the end of a sentence. Sometimes full stops are not seen. But we were taught to read that and it did not seem to matter to the people of that time. The modern Chinese adopted the western punctuation system but many features of the ancient times remain. The Chinese clauses are connected through meaning while English uses functional words to string them together. Another significant distinction is that English is subject-prominent while Chinese is topic-prominent.(Li, 1976) In Chinese-English Chinese translations, proper subjects must be identified for each clause for subjectless clause is grammatically wrong in English. In English-Chinese Chinese translationss many subjects can be omitted and the clauses can be rearranged into a string of clause led by a general topic.