The Translation of Culture-Specific Items (CSIs) in Yellow River Cultural Corpus: A Case Study of History of the Yellow River

Abstract

By constructing a bilingual parallel corpus from scratch and taking History of the Yellow River as an illustrative bilingual text, this study delves into the translation techniques applied to Culture-Specific Items (CSIs) within the framework of the Yellow River Basin civilization. The findings reveal a diverse range of approaches employed by translators, including literal translation, free translation, intracultural adaptation, omission, retention and annotation, especially in handling CSIs related to ecology, material culture, social life, religion, and language within the context of Yellow River culture. These techniques effectively preserve the intrinsic traits of the source language, thereby facilitating the propagation of Yellow River culture. The utilization of corpus-based research methodologies to analyze the English translation of CSIs in the Yellow River culture not only aligns with the essential imperatives of promoting Chinese culture on the global stage but also addresses the intricate nuances demanded by international communication.