How has English as a world language impacted on the

translation of Chinese traditional opera?

Introduction
With the globalization, English become a language that is more popular and more
influential. And language is playing an important role in culture development. For
example, Chinese traditional opera develop to global area will need the help of
English. Then, more people can understand about the story that the Chinese traditional
opera showing though the English. This essay will examine the effect of English to
Chinese traditional opera words and phrases translation. Through a range of
questions, this paper will investigate from pacific two types of people, one is the
young people who has basic knowledge of opera and another one is the old people
who always listen to opera. Using these two kinds of peoples view show the result of
this research. The aim of these essay is to consider the effect of English to Chinese
traditional opera words and phrases translation. Therefore, the research question is
basing on idioms, ancient language of Chinese and the feeling of adaption to consider
the effect of English to Chinese traditional opera translation. Even English is a global
language and it has advantage that other language cannot match, but from the
translation of Chinese to English, it has two sides, on one hand, Chinese traditional
opera translation to English will help more people to understand about Chinese
traditional culture; on the other hand, English may not translate the exactly meaning
of Chinese traditional opera words and phrase, and foreign people may not know
about the culture background about Chinese traditional opera. So, the essay will
discuss what feeling did people have for nowadays Chinese traditional opera words
and phrases translation to English.

Existing theory
Romaine (2006) shows that English can be used in anywhere of the world as a global
village language. So, it is a good way to help different countries culture to move
towards world. Chinese opera become global from 1929 by Mei lanfang, from that
time, more foreign people know about the Chinese traditional opera, but in that time
translation is a big problem, how to translate Chinese idioms, phrases and ancient
language, Mei lanfang as studied English and he know how to translate Chinese opera
words and phrase to English, but just the simple one, so the problem is the foreign
people do not know much about Chinese culture but have more knowledge about
what was Chinese opera said in that time by Mei lanfang acting and translate. Thorpe
(2016) indicates that in the era of globalization, Chinese traditional opera has been
adapted to other countries to performance, and some adaption was keeping the origin
vision and translate Chinese opera script base on Chinese grammar, people feel boring
and misunderstand; some adaption was using the grammar of English to translate
Chinese opera script, people feel lost the identity of Chineseness. So, the best way to
translate to Chinese traditional opera script to English is to use both Chinese and
English grammar, but how balance is a question. Therefore, according to Shen (2013)
consider that one of popular Chinese traditional opera which named The West Wing, it
is a novel that adapted to an opera, then it has been adapted to other countries in the
world, the famous one is the vision of 2008, in this vision, there are some translation
has been different from the origin vision in China, such as the protagonist name was
yingyingin Chinese but in English vision, the name translate to oriole the

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beauty, so it is very different, there also another things, such as in the idiom of
Chinese,
( ), it means that nephew handling [a] lantern -
illuminating/according to [his] uncle ([the] old [way]), because in Chinese, and
are a pair of homophones, and means "according to" as well as "to illuminate", so
it is really important for people know about Chinese and English grammar, therefore
can be known about what does the idiom talking about, the same as phrase and
ancient language of China in Chinese traditional opera.

Methodology
This is using primary research project that was using questionnaire to collect data
from people to show the effect of English to Chinese traditional opera words and
phrases translation. The survey focus on two kinds of particularly group of people
which are the young people has basic knowledge about the opera and the old people
has always watch the opera. All kinds of people are from China and age from 18 to
60, then, to do this survey people need to have a look about some Chinese opera
which has been adapted into global area, such as The West Wing, The Peony Pavilion
and Monkey-Journey to the West. There are twenty people to do this survey, ten
people is young people who has basic knowledge about Chinese traditional opera and
10 is old people who is always watch Chinese traditional opera (10 are female and 10
are male). After the questionnaire return from responses, the excel be used to analyze
the data and use the pie chart to show the result. This research will use pie chart to
show the result of questionnaire. Using pie chart can be clear to understand what
people thinking and feeling. The limitations of this survey, the first one is due to time
constraints, it is difficult to find enough people to answer the questionnaire, so that the
number of participants was relatively small, and therefore should be used as an
indication to produce large generalizations or indicates a wider study would be useful.
Besides, most of responses is from China and it also for special two types of people s
view, so it will possibly affect some questions answer, this limitation may be affect
the objective and accuracy of the result.

Finding and discussing

From the questionnaire that created by myself, it has five questions, the first question
is asking about the sex of responses, from figure 1, there are 20 responses, 9 are male
and 11are female. The second figure is about the types of people that responses are,
because it for specially two types of people, so there are 10 old people (6 are female
and 4 are male), 10 young people (5 are male and 5 are female). Then from figure 3
the question is about how do Chinese idioms and phrases translation, it is following
Chinese language style or English or both, 6 people think that should be used English
grammar to translate, 4 people think that should be used Chinese Grammar to
translate, and 10 people think that should be used both Chinese and English grammar
to translate Chinese idioms and phrase from Chinese traditional opera. Then, from
figure 4, it is question about how do ancient Chinese prose translation, it is following
Chinese grammar or English or both, 4 people think that should be English grammar,
6 people think that should be Chinese grammar, 10 people think that should be both.
Lastly, from figure 5, it is a question about the feeling of people to the vision
translate to English, 9 responses like the Chinese traditional opera translate to English,
the rest of them, 5 people dislike it, 6 people unknown, the people that unknown think
the translation one need to improve and more using Chinese tradition or culture, so
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that is the reason of responses chosen unknown.

From the above finding, it can be discussed that most people like use both Chinese
and English language style to translate Chinese traditional opera, because using the
Chinese language style can help people easier understand about Chinese opera culture
background, and from Chinese culture background can easy to understand Chinese,
because in Chinese, different words have same sounds, but the meaning is different.
Also, from the Chinese culture background is the base of Chinese idioms and phrases,
and the ancient Chinese prose is impact from Chinese culture background as well.
And people think that the effect of English to Chinese opera translation is big,
because it need to translate to global and English is a global language that most
people know it. But how to balance, people have some advices, such as using both
language style and base on Chinese culture background and add English grammar in it
will be fine.

Conclusion
In conclusion, the essay show that the effect of English to Chinese traditional opera
words and phrases translation, from these responses view on Chinese traditional
opera translate to English. It can be clear to know the answer. So, from the
questionnaire can be known that people more like the translation of Chinese
traditional opera that used both Chinese and English grammar and most of people like
the English vision that translation, about 10 people, half people of the survey,
although English can translation most of Chinese traditional opera to global area, but
still have some limitations, such as the meaning of Chinese idioms or phrases cannot
be exactly translation. But with more and more foreign professional people research
and learn about Chinese culture, such Ashley Thorpe. It can be believed that Chinese
traditional opera will be more well-known in global area and the idioms or phrases of
Chinese traditional opera will be translated more accuracy, this will help foreign
people easier to understand.

Reference
Romaine, S., (2006). Global English: From island tongue to world language, pp.
589-608. Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Shen, G. (2013). Libretto Translation and Musical Arrangement in Chinese Chuanqi

Opera, Chinese Literature, Essays, Articles, Reviews 35(4), pp.177-207.

Thorpe, A. (2016). Performing China on the London stage. London: Palgrave

Macmillan.

Appendix 1

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Figure 1

Figure 2

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 Figure 3

Figure 4

Figure 5
Appendix 2 questionnaire
How has English as a world language impacted on the translation of
Chinese traditional opera?
1. Sex: male, female

2. Type of people: a. the young people who have basic knowledge of Chinese
opera
b. the old people who are always listen to Chinese opera

3. How to translate the idioms and phrases from Chinese opera?

a. using English grammar or language style
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 b. using Chinese grammar or language style
c. using both of them

4. How to translate the ancient Chinese prose from Chinese opera?

a. using English grammar or language style
b. using Chinese grammar or language style
c. using both of them

5. What kind of feeling do you have from the translation of Chinese opera? Some
advice?
a. like
b. dislike
c. unknown