Under globalization, films and TV series start to play an importantrole in the cross-cultural communication between China and other countries.With the development of technology andthe multiplicity of modern media, more and more foreign films and TV seriesenter Chinese market. In this kind of climate, many scholars and practitioners areexploring ways to improve the quality of subtitle translation, in order to helpthe target audience accept foreign culture more smoothly. Analyzing subtitle translationfrom the perspective of translation theory can improve screen translationability systematically. This paper takes Houseof Cards as an example, aiming to analyze the characteristics andstrategies of TV series’ subtitle translation from the perspective of Skopos theory.

The case of the study in this paper, House of Cards, is a political TV play, talking about how amerciless congressman and his ambitious wife play with politics in the WhiteHouse. Based on the panoramic view of the American political ecosystem and theinterlocking plot, this TV play soon become popular in China, bringing people aunique visual angle of American culture. Many scholars have studied this playfrom different perspectives, such as media perspective, political perspective,cultural perspective and semiotic perspective. There are also many papers aboutthe subtitle translation of House ofCards, under the perspectives ranging from cooperative principle tocross-cultural perspective, as it’s a TV play with complex foreign politicalbackground and special dialogue in the usage of metaphor, being valuable forthe subtitle translation studies. Currently, not many researchers combine thestudy of translation with Skopos theory.

Skopos theory was first proposed by Vemeer in his book Framework for a General Translation Theory in1978. Skopos theory holds that all translation activities should follow theprinciple of "purpose principle", that is, translation should be ableto act in the context and culture of the target language according to the way thatthe receivers of the target language expect . There are three principles inSkopos Theory: coherence rule, fidelity rule and Skopos rule. The Skoposrule refers to the process of determining the whole translation behavior by thepurpose of the translation. The translation strategy must be determinedaccording to the purpose of translation. The coherence rule refers to the criterion that the translation mustconform to the coherence in the language, making the translation be available,readability and acceptability. The fidelity rule emphasizes the inter-lingual coherence between the originaland the translation. As subtitle translation’s main goal is to convey theoriginal information in the films or TV plays to the audiences in the targetculture context exactly, which is in accord with the goal of Skopos theory, itis reasonable to combine the studies of subtitle translation with Skopos theory.

This paper aims at making its own contribution to the E-C subtitletranslation. As many people use TV plays and films to study foreign languageand understand other cultures, the subtitle translation become the bridge of interculturalcommunication. Using translation theory to analyze the classic subtitletranslation can not only provide a new kind of research perspective but alsobring reference to other film and TV work.

2. 研究的基本内容与方案

Thispaper will analyze the characteristic of the House of Cards’ s original subtitles from aspects like conversational mode and language style, based on themain characters’ personality and the whole story’s background. It will also pickout typical examples from House of Cards’ s original subtitles and the subtitle of simplified Chinese version as theresearch object, using qualitative analysis to find out how the three basic rulesof Skopos theory are used in the subtitle translation of House of Cards . From the perspective of Skopos rule, it willanalyze whether the translation achieve its goal, making the Chinese audience overcomecultural difference and enjoy the great plots. From the perspective of coherencerule, it will analyze whether the translation is conforming to Chineseexpression habits. And from the perspective of fidelity rule, it will analyzewhether the translation presents the original information exactly. This paperwill try to find out several typical translation methods used in the House of Cards and find out theirfunctions in achieving the three principles. By this way, it will try to find out the advantages and disadvantages of the subtitletranslation from the perspective of Skopos theory concretely and vividly.Finally, this paper will conclude what kind of reference the House of Cards’ s subtitle translation canprovide for other films and TV plays.

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