Auto-Communication in English-Chinese Translation:A Case Study of Yan Fu's Translation of Evolution and Ethics

Language is an important communicative tool used for interpersonal communication and exerts different effects in the relevant space and time. And translation is the main means of transferring one set of languages, texts, and cultures to another. As a result, the language discipline has long viewed translation as a intercultural communicative activity. In order to understand the different aspects of translation activities, translation studies have constantly created new descriptive languages so that the Abstract:Yan Fu's translation of Huxley's Evolution and Ethics, known as Tian Yan Lun (), is a seminal work of intellectual enlightenment in modern China that contributed significantly to the cultural shaping and political changes of the late Qing society. Despite its importance, Yan's translation was not a direct rendering but rather a cultural translation that took into account the cultural context and audience's receptivity. The strategies he adopted to achieve communication with readers included intextuality and setting communicative threads, enabling the translation to integrate into the cultural context of the target language and achieve auto-communication. The evocative and poetic functions of the target text attracted a wider audience and were influential among several political factions in modern China. As such, this paper aims to analyze in detail the auto-communicative process of Yan's translation and the strategies he employed to achieve cultural integration, which remain significant today.