Comments were made on the ＂word-for-word＂ literal translation method used by Mr. Nigel Wiseman in A Practical Dictionary of Chinese Medicine. He believes that only literal translation can reflect Chinese medical con...Comments were made on the ＂word-for-word＂ literal translation method used by Mr. Nigel Wiseman in A Practical Dictionary of Chinese Medicine. He believes that only literal translation can reflect Chinese medical concepts accurately. The so-called ＂word-for-word＂ translation is actually ＂English-word-for- Chinese-character＂ translation. First, the authors of the dictionary made a list of Single Characters with English Equivalents, and then they gave each character of the medical term an English equivalent according to the list. Finally, they made some minor modifications to make the rendering grammatically smoother. Many English terms thus produced are confusing. The defect of the word-for-word literal translation stems from the erroneous idea that a single character constitutes the basic element of meaning corresponding to the notion of ＂word＂ in English, and the meaning of a disyllabic or polysyllabic Chinese word is the simple addition of the constituent characters. Another big mistake is the negligence of the polysemy of Chinese characters. One or two English equivalents can by no means cover all the various meanings of a single character which is a polysemous monosyllabic word. Various examples were cited from this dictionary to illustrate the mistakes.展开更多
Mr. Wiseman believes that Western medical terms chosen as equivalents of Chinese medical terms should be the words known to all speakers and not requiring any specialist knowledge or instrumentation to understand or i...Mr. Wiseman believes that Western medical terms chosen as equivalents of Chinese medical terms should be the words known to all speakers and not requiring any specialist knowledge or instrumentation to understand or identify, and strictly technical Western medical terms should be avoided regardless of their conceptual conformity to the Chinese terms. Accordingly, many inappropriate Western medical terms are selected as English equivalents by the authors of the Dictionary, and on the other hand, many ready-made appropriate Western medical terms are replaced by loan English terms with the Chinese style of word formation. The experience gained in solving the problems of translating Western medical terms into Chinese when West- ern medicine was first introduced to China is helpful for translating Chinese medical terms into English. However, the authors of the Dictionary adhere to their own opinions, ignoring others＂ experience. The English terms thus created do not reflect the genuine meaning of the Chinese terms, but make the English glossary in chaos. The so-called true face of traditional Chinese revealed by such terms is merely the Chinese custom of word formation and metaphoric rhetoric. In other words, traditional Chinese medicine is not regarded as a system of medicine but merely some Oriental folklore.展开更多
文摘Comments were made on the ＂word-for-word＂ literal translation method used by Mr. Nigel Wiseman in A Practical Dictionary of Chinese Medicine. He believes that only literal translation can reflect Chinese medical concepts accurately. The so-called ＂word-for-word＂ translation is actually ＂English-word-for- Chinese-character＂ translation. First, the authors of the dictionary made a list of Single Characters with English Equivalents, and then they gave each character of the medical term an English equivalent according to the list. Finally, they made some minor modifications to make the rendering grammatically smoother. Many English terms thus produced are confusing. The defect of the word-for-word literal translation stems from the erroneous idea that a single character constitutes the basic element of meaning corresponding to the notion of ＂word＂ in English, and the meaning of a disyllabic or polysyllabic Chinese word is the simple addition of the constituent characters. Another big mistake is the negligence of the polysemy of Chinese characters. One or two English equivalents can by no means cover all the various meanings of a single character which is a polysemous monosyllabic word. Various examples were cited from this dictionary to illustrate the mistakes.
文摘Mr. Wiseman believes that Western medical terms chosen as equivalents of Chinese medical terms should be the words known to all speakers and not requiring any specialist knowledge or instrumentation to understand or identify, and strictly technical Western medical terms should be avoided regardless of their conceptual conformity to the Chinese terms. Accordingly, many inappropriate Western medical terms are selected as English equivalents by the authors of the Dictionary, and on the other hand, many ready-made appropriate Western medical terms are replaced by loan English terms with the Chinese style of word formation. The experience gained in solving the problems of translating Western medical terms into Chinese when West- ern medicine was first introduced to China is helpful for translating Chinese medical terms into English. However, the authors of the Dictionary adhere to their own opinions, ignoring others＂ experience. The English terms thus created do not reflect the genuine meaning of the Chinese terms, but make the English glossary in chaos. The so-called true face of traditional Chinese revealed by such terms is merely the Chinese custom of word formation and metaphoric rhetoric. In other words, traditional Chinese medicine is not regarded as a system of medicine but merely some Oriental folklore.
