Search

The concept of trauma explains a disruptive experience with belated effects that are hardly controlled or mastered. Trauma damages one’s psychology by distorting the sense of self and the perception of the world. However, the application of conventional trauma theories focuses on the pains and sufferings in the victim’s life only. It has been critiqued the reluctance to acknowledge that hurting others may cause some perpetrators to experience psychological injuries as well. Drawing on Dominick LaCapra’s concepts of historical trauma and structural trauma, acting out and working through, as well as Judith Butler’s concepts of posttraumatic symptoms, which are described as vulnerability, grief and aggression, this study inquires into the traumatic experience of the protagonist Fiona Maye in Ian McEwan’s The Children Act. It aims to investigate how she transforms from a victim to a perpetrator within the context of trauma. Specifically, it explores how Fiona’s personal traumas happened earlier in life are reactivated and drive her to take the role of a perpetrator, and to hurt Adam Henry with her coldness and aggression that facilitates Adam’s death. Besides, the study also looks at how Fiona gets psychological injuries from her perpetrations. This study concludes that the perpetrator’s aggression in this situation serves as a method of self-protection and release of her repressed trauma, but traumatizing others can never be the antidote for her plights, and she is inevitably traumatized by scheming and carrying out the villainies that hurt others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study focuses on the issue of female psychopathy and the portrayal of an emotionally and mentally disturbed female character in East of Eden (1952) by the contemporary American author, John Steinbeck. Although female characters are like male characters regarding their psychological complexity, the issues of antisocial personality disorders and psychopathy have only been examined in previous studies concerning male characters. Hence, this study focuses on the issue of psychopathy as an antisocial personality disorder explored through the leading female character based on the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) by the American psychiatrist, Robert Hare (1991). A prominent view on the mentally disturbed female characters is that they are not analysed with equal attention as male characters; thus, this presumption that women are disqualified from psychological conductions on account of their gender is a predicament by itself. Accordingly, this study examines the non-traditional la femme fatale personified through the female character, Cathy Trask, and investigates the author’s portrayal of a female character with antisocial personality disorder tendencies. The findings show that, from a young age, Cathy reveals her lethal inclinations, harnessing her beauty and intelligence not only to her advantage but also to exploit those around her. Cathy also embodies the two “Personality Traits” and “Antisocial” factors and experiences many short-term marital relationships based on Hare’s (PCL-R). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Ge Sa-er (also known as Gesar) saga has been handed down for above 1000 years by Tibetan Chinese, Mongolian Chinese, the Tu and the Naxi, describing a heroic story in present-day Kangba Tibetan area. This article analyse the English translation of social discourse in the Ge Sa-er version retold by Alai (2009). Due to different knowledge shared by source and target readers, it is difficult to represent the source social meaning in the English translation. Aiming to resolve the translation problems revealed by social cognition, this article uses statistical methods together with corpus to conduct stylistic analyses on Ge Sa-er Wang (Alai, 2009). An unexpected finding of this research is that the data from statistical methods can better predict the translation difficulties of Ge Sa-er Wang than the data from corpus. Based on the stylistic features of Ge Sa-er Wang, we propose a social discourse translation model for Chinese ethnic minority literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Translation activities are not isolated, and an increasing number of researchers have applied sociological theories to translation studies, which contributions to interdisciplinary research in translation. Luotuo Xiangzi, written by Lao She, is one of the best modern Chinese novels. Its four English translation versions and translation activities that span decades have deeply interacting with various parts of society. Based on Bourdieu’s sociological theories of the “field”, “capital” and “habitus”, this case study of the English translations of Luotuo Xiangzi explored the relationship and interaction between the translator and other participants (participating groups) in the translation activity. It was discovered that the translation activity could reveal the translator’s habitus and be greatly influenced by interactions with various fields of society and by the capital engaged in the translation activity of Luotuo Xiangzi, providing proof of the explanatory and guiding power of Bourdieu’s sociological theory in translation studies. This paper tries to enrich the interdisciplinary research of sociology and translation and offers additional references for the translation and global dissemination of translated literature, particularly for Chinese literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]