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lthough English has established its status as the international lingua franca, non-native speakers make up 75% of the world’s population (Neeley 2012). Doubtlessly, translation remains a crucial tool through which health knowledge can be disseminated. To our knowledge, however, the state-of-the-art research in this promising topic in the sphere of Translation Studies (TS) is dispersed and less than satisfactory. For example, drawing upon health translation as the title in the online Translation Studies Bibliography, one of the most “solid and reliable” (van Doorslaer 2005) TS bibliography databases to date, we merely retrieve 15 entries from 1986 to 2017.
Translation and Health Risk Knowledge Building in China addresses this imbalance and explores “variant translations of healthcare financial risks” (1) terminology in the Chinese culture and society.
The book is composed of seven chapters, the first of which unpacks the socio-cultural settings within which the research is rooted. Specifically, the author demonstrates that the significant role of science translation in advancing globalisation is gaining recognition in developing countries, such as China. Meanwhile, translation variability of health risk terms “reflects the largely developing nature” (2) of China’s public health knowledge system.
Chapter 2 comments on research gaps in health risk translation. The chapter integrates perspectives on the translation and variation of health risk terms and expressions, and the evaluation of their local uptake, eschewing the traditional mode that concentrates on linguistic equivalence.
Chapter 3 reviews the diachronic development of the Chinese public healthcare system since 1949. To do this, the chapter identifies keywords in publications on the healthcare insurance system (1980-1999) in the China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI) database and the World Health Organization (WHO) 2000 Report, thus revealing “contrasts and differences between the Chinese context and global healthcare research prioritisation” (26).
Chapter 4 reflects on the building and analysis of a parallel English-Chinese corpus for the WHO 2000 Report. It argues that the choice of data resources for the corpus was deliberately considered (32-33). Thereafter, risk-related terms and expressions are extracted from the corpus and grouped into four conceptually-associated clusters in terms of lexical semantic alterations. These four clusters are: risk factor, equalisation, capitation, and sustainability.
Chapters 5 and 6 conduct in-depth corpus-based analyses of variant health translations in Chinese research publication databases. The author first deploys CNKI to investigate “the collocation and disciplinary distribution patterns” (53) of high-frequency translation variations in previous clusters, and tentatively concludes that culturally and linguistically remoulded terms are more likely to achieve greater social reach in the target knowledge system than literally-rendered terms. She then sets out three innovative statistical indicators (Academic Growth Rate, Academic Dissemination Rate, and Media Distribution Rate) that further survey the distribution of the component linguistic variations within each cluster within the CNKI to validate her previous findings.
In the final chapter, the major findings and their implications for applied TS are outlined over two pages.
Generally speaking, the notable features of Ji’s volume are threefold. First and foremost, the pragmatic-focused research, which utilises the self-built parallel corpus and Chinese online publication database and applies quantitative techniques, such as regression analysis, to the analysis of the data, is aligned with the ongoing “technological turn” (Cronin 2010) in TS. More importantly, compared with results from qualitative analyses, the reliability of the outcomes is strengthened. Secondly, the research makes a thematic contribution to Chinese TS. Specialised TS is underappreciated in mainland China, as demonstrated by the limited coverage of themes in articles published in 13 international prestigious TS journals between 2005 and 2013 (Li 2015). The English-language monograph under review, whose author is of Chinese origin, fills this gap to some extent. Thirdly, the conclusion that localised terminologies appear frequently and circulate favourably sheds light on the theoretical exploration of science translation. It consolidates the contention that all translations are conditioned by social factors, shattering the long-held perception that linguistic loyalty is its primary criterion.
Despite this, there is one flaw within the text that needs to be raised. The following statement “…the literal translation, i.e. translation word by word, and the heavily domesticated translation strategy. Neither of these two somewhat polarised methods…” (3) indicates that basic TS concepts, such as translation strategies (domestication and foreignisation) and translation methods (literal translation, free translation and word-for-word translation, etc.) are obscured throughout the book (Molina and Albir 2002), which might confuse target readers, especially novices.
In short, the book under review is useful for postgraduates within TS and shows solicitude for specialised translation, terminological translation and corpus-based TS.
Yanmeng Wang and Mingwu Xu
Huazhong University of Science and Technology
E-mail: wangyanmeng92@hust.edu.cn; xumingwu@hust.edu.cn