New Zealand in Chinese Translation

黄 海

Abstract:This paper presents some interesting findings in Chinese translation about New Zealand to show how Chinese translators handle the culture issues about New Zealand.

Key words:New Zealand Maori culture websites

Ⅰ Introduction

When I began doing the research for this essay topic, I found it difficult because there were few New Zealand literary works or cultural materials translated and published into Chinese. The only information I can search for New Zealand comes from some Chinese tourism websites, which introduce the natural scenery, people, history and culture of New Zealand. However, most tourism websites emphasize more on presenting the beautiful and natural scenery rather than exploring the unique cultural features in New Zealand (eg: Mook's tourist website, China Youth tourist website, etc.). After reading the material on these websites, the tourists will have an impression that New Zealand is a beautiful, natural and small island without any pollution. It seems that in Chinese tourism translation, the culture and history of New Zealand is not regarded as an attractive and important spot for tourists. It is different from my research that the Maori culture and history is thought much of by academe. In the following, I will present some interesting findings in Chinese translation about New Zealand to show how Chinese translators handle the culture issues about New Zealand.

Ⅱ The Maori Culture

Mooks tourist website (http://travel.mook.com.tw) introduce briefly that Maori is a branch of Polynesian and settled in New Zealand 1000 years ago, they have some special customs such as greeting with noses (Hongi), the tattoo on the face (Moko) and Dance before the War (Haka). And the website claim that the tourists can enjoy the unique aboriginal features in New Zealand.

However, could the three customs present the Maori traditional culture? No. In Maori's history, they also achieved splendidness(splendor)in their literature and arts, which influence the culture of New Zealand nowadays. For example, in all kinds of museums, souvenir shops and Marae(Maoris conference room) around New Zealand, there are plenty of Moari carving and waving crafts. These crafts are designed elaborately and chicly. In Moari's music, besides the heroic Haka, they also have soft, romantic music which is showed on TV sometimes. At present, more Maori artists and authors come up, such as Gordon Tovey in visual art, Cliff Whiting and Para Matchitt in multimedia murals(Mead, 1999), etc.

Although Maori culture have a lot of attractive events, the Chinese tourism website just simplified it into three things. There might be the following reasons why the Chinese tourism website place Maori culture on a nonsignificant position. Firstly, this website is designed for tourists, whose interest in traveling is to see the unique and beautiful sceneries or seek novelty. Maybe only some scholars such as historians or anthropologists are interested in studying the history and culture of Maori. Most tourists just want to have relax and interesting trip. So the translators of this tourism website has taken accounts of the relation between translator and target readership, and achieve the skopos, or aim of the translation to some extent (Vermmeer, 1989). Secondly, the translators also take the target culture in consideration. In ancient China, Chinese often called the aboriginal tribes without civilization as “蛮夷”(man yi). There is a common view that it is impossible for Man yi to have better culture than China. Although it has been in new millennium, many Chinese still hold the view that Maori and some other Pacific islanders' culture comes from matriline clanship--the savagery and aboriginal society, so their culture is of no importance. To attract more Chinese tourists, it is not surprised the website focus more on the natural and unpolluted sceneries which was presented by famous Movie "Lord of Ring". Finally, the Maori culture also has some bloody and violent elements which may give tourists some negative impression about New Zealand. For example, the ancient Maori ate captives after war. They killed wild animals as food such as Kiwi birds. But it is unnecessary for a tourist to know all the facts in Maori's culture so that the Chinese translator chose the best side of New Zealand to convince Chinese tourists to believe New Zealand is a place worthy of visiting.

Ⅱ Multicultural Society

Compared with the brief description of Maori culture, most Chinese tourism websites have rich and colorful introduction of New Zealand multicultural feature. On the New Zealand official travel website http://www.newzealand.com/travel/zhs/about-nz (2004), the web describe that New Zealand is an exciting blend of cultural influences, especially reflecting in the arts, including Maori and Pacific Island, as well as European and Asian. From haka to hip-hop, fashion to filmmaking, New Zealand artists are making their mark at home and around the world. The website also lists the famous painters, writers, fashion designers and film directors which were influenced by the multicultural.

For the tourism, the multicultural feature might be a good advertising for tourists. Because of the trend of globalization, most countries in the world are open to each other and expecting to get in touch with various cultures. There is a Chinese saying: tourist should not only watch the scenery, but also learn the different culture. Therefore, if the Chinese tourists find that they can learn various cultures only traveling in New Zealand, they are willing to pay money to visit this multicultural interesting place. Especially the various wine and food cultures in New Zealand mentioned on the website may attract more epicures coming here.

However, although the website translation emphasized the culture of New Zealand is blend, the events and artists lists in the website belong to European style, especially the British style. For example, it presents painter Frances Hodgkins (1869-1947) is one of New Zealand's most acclaimed and influential painters. She was associated with a number of avant-garde British movements including Neo Romanticism.And the short stories by Katherine Mansfield(1888 -1923) are the depictions of turn-of-the-century colonial New Zealand.

Therefore, the translation has tried to represent the multicultural and equality in New Zealand society on the website, but it is evitable that the New Zealand culture is branded by the past British colony. Different from other colonial countries, New Zealand colonist didn't force the original resident to abandon Maori culture; they signed the Treaty of Waitangi so that the Maori still retain their culture. But since the colonizer come to New Zealand, the British Empire culture gradually penetrated into the society and bring about a fruitful mixing and mingling of cultures that gives new life blood to isolated communities (Robinson, 1997). Until now, the colonial culture become the mainstream in New Zealand so that in most Chinese tourism website, you can find that New Zealand is an English-spoken country and in the Commonwealth of Nations. Even living in New Zealand, you will find the main restaurants, school rules and schedules are similar to British style. The culture is undoubtedly belonging to European, especially British style.

Ⅲ Kiwiana

Besides the aboriginal Maori culture and colonial European culture (or called multicultural), there is an interesting and unique cultural phenomenon in New Zealand introduced by many Chinese tourism websites—Kiwiana. In the New Zealand travel website, it is translated into “奇异风格” (qiyi Feng Ge), which literally translated back into English is “ fantastic style”. This name comes from the Chinese pronunciation of Kiwi, but this translation just caters to the liking of tourists to hunt the novelty. In fact, this culture is to present the New Zealander's national identity, which is different from the traditional Maori culture or British colonial culture. It really belongs to the current New Zealander(Kiwi). And nowadays, everything related to New Zealand are often called Kiwi's, such as "kiwi' sense of humour", "a kiwi do-it-yourself' attitude". On this website, I found the Chinese translation version makes a good way to explain this culture and translated the Kiwi style vividly.

Ⅳ Conclusion

To sum up, the general impression about New Zealand coming from the websites are quite simple, especially in culture introduction. On one side, the travel agent may think New Zealand culture is not the most important feature to attract the tourists. On the other hand, the function of the tourism websites is to fetch more tourists to New Zealand, so the website only gives a superficial overview about New Zealand to attract tourists to find the details about the scenery, people, history and culture. Therefore, the websites I mentioned above have handle the translation about culture perfectly.

References:

[1]Maori Culture Introduction . http://travel.mook.com.tw on ,2004.8.5.

[2]Official Travel Website.http://www.newzealand.com/travel/zhs/about-nz on t, 2004.8.5.

[3]Nga Toi Maori: Maori art in Aotearoa New Zealand By Professor Hirini Moko Mead,http://www.creativenz.govt.nz/artsnz/maori.html,1999.

[4]Vermeer H J .Skopos and commission in Transnational action In Chederman, Andrew (ed.): Reading in Translation theory; Kelsiuk,1989.