Construction of Gender in Two Chinese Translations of Little Women

Abstract

This paper aims to explore the influence of the translators’ sexual difference on their construction of gender identity in the two translations of Little Women written by Louisa May Alcott. The influence of the translators’ gender on the translations is a controversial topic. However, most of gender and translation studies have been done from a restricted feminist translation viewpoint. Based on Judith Butler’s gender performativity theory, this paper thus takes the two Chinese translations of Little Women as examples to explore the differences between the male and female translators and their gender constructions in the translations. This paper adopts a critical discourse analysis of the source text and the translations of the characterisation of the female characters and the gendered discourses in Little Women. Focus of this paper is on the translator’s paratextual elements as well. Since these approaches have rarely been applied in Chinese translation studies, this paper opens more discussion on the gender constructions of translators. It shows that the translators’ translation strategies reflect the association of gender with their own gender identity in the translations. However, further research is needed to expand the scope of the data size to include the analysis of multiple translations by different groups of translators of different genders, to explore the operational mechanisms of translation activities and the ways how translation render or even construct gender identities.