The development of British sinology and changes in translation practice

Abstract

This study sets out to demonstrate that both foreignizing and domestication translation strategies may be used for the purpose of organizing, controlling, and disseminating knowledge of a foreign country in ways that do not necessarily "respect" the foreign. Analysis of early 19th century translations from Chinese into English and contemporary reviews reveals that a split in translation practice emerges between 1815 and 1830, whereby translators produced both foreignizing and domesticating translations for different audiences. Coupled with changing attitudes toward the Chinese on the part of the British, both types of translations fostered an orientalist discourse in the emergent discipline of sinology and had a negative impact on the image of China in the British imagination.