Losing something in translation

[sui.generis]

I'm about to write a short paper for a chinese linguistics class with pretty much any topic. I had an idea to write about application of meaning at different levels.

What got me thinking originally was 心 and how it did not differentiate in the western convention between heart and mind.

Can anyone think of some more examples where a translation is typically made but it doesn't quite fit for any given reason? Be it for nouns, verbs or even 成语。

Thanks!

[trevelyan]

Not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but I ran into one last week with the word 牺牲. It cropped up in a Chinese translation of the phrase "truth is a casulty of war". The Chinese translation was something like 真相是战争的第一个牺牲者。

My immediate thought was that this was a mistranslation because "sacrifice" is almost always the English translation of 牺牲 and "sacrifice" doesn't mean "casualty". The former carries the implication that the loss is being consciously made for the sake of a greater good.

Talked about it with some Chinese translators, who insisted that it was a fine translation because the Chinese word doesn't have these normative implications. 牺牲 apparently signifies the negative loss of something of great value, but apparently doesn't imply anything about what or if you get something in return. So a completely meaningless death can be described as a sacrifice in Chinese in a way it can't be in English. I thought that was strange.

[HashiriKata]

Just as there are no two identical persons, there are no two words in two different languages but with identical meanings, so it can be said that something is bound to be missing when you translate. (Having said this, I'm not subsribing to the theory that you can't translate from one language to another faithfully)

Anyway, back to the real world: what about "gentleman" >< 君子 ？

[sui.generis]

Those are exactly the sorts of things I mean, thanks guys

Pretty much any word with a strong cultural context would be ideal. Since I just got finished reading 孔子 and 孟子 and 庄子, I should have several examples to work from.

But I did those readings in english (for a philosophy class), so I should ask, are Confucious' mentions of "gentlemen" rendered 君子in modern chinese? If so, then yeah, that could be a good term to use.

Thanks again!

[Lu]

How about 喜欢, as in 我喜欢你

[mandarin123]

can 牺牲者 be translated as "victim" in this case?

here come's a hilarious one by KFC.

http://xuezhongwen.com/images/myimages/KFC_do_chicken.jpg

can anyone come up with a more appropriate translation?

[Kong Junrui]

How about 喜欢, as in 我喜欢你

I too would like to know the differences between 喜欢and how it's used in English.