Abstract:

The traditional Chinese architectural terms and the basic elements of traditional architectural knowledge, are critical to whether traditional Chinese architectural knowledge can be cross-culturally reproduced effectively or not. Transknowletology defines translation as cultural behavior and social practice of cross-language knowledge processing, reconstruction and retransmission. From the perspective of Transknowletology and based on descriptive method, this paper explores the adoption of translation strategies and its reasons for the traditional Chinese architectural terms by taking English translation of the TOU-KUNG series terms in A Pictorial History of Chinese Architecture as examples to reveal the cross-culture reproduction pattern for transforming local traditional Chinese architectural knowledge into global knowledge. The research results indicate that the English translation strategies for TOU-KUNG series terms are as follows: transliteration as the dominating method, the construction of context, systematic expression and image-text interpretation. The analysis shows that the adoption of English translations strategies is influenced by the internal and external factors such as the historical background, the translation purpose, the translator's accomplishment and context. The paper has certain reference value to the globalization of local knowledge and the mutual learning of civilizations.

Key words: Transknowletology, knowledge reproduction, traditional Chinese architectural term, TOU-KUNG