A Bibliometric Analysis of Translator’s Style in Translation Studies: A Chinese Perspective (1980–2022)

Sage Open, Volume 15, Issue 1, January-March 2025.
The undeniable presence of translators has stimulated a growing interest in issues such as translator’s voice by Theo Hermans and translator’s style by Mona Baker. For a long time, existing research in China has exclusively explored translational style, with a focus on the faithful reproduction of the style of the source text (ST) in the target text (TT). Since Baker’s introduction of corpus-based translation studies in 2000, translator’s style has been an emerging and fast-growing topic in translation studies in China bolstered by empirical data for more persuasive argumentation. This research first adopts a bibliometric analysis of translator’s style by employing articles from the database Web of Science (WoS) for international studies and the Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI; CSSCI-indexed; Chinese Social Sciences Citation Index) for Chinese studies. As Chinese scholars rank first in the contributions generated according to the collaborative countries analysis, there is a need to examine the current development of translator’s style in China. This study will help answer a series of queries on topics such as the most researched domain, the most applied mode and the most researched work. Furthermore, by closely examining the timezone view of keywords of translator’s style studies, and a close reading of selected articles, three stages and three modes are suggested for studies on translator’s style. Then, recent development of translator’s style in China is presented to draw a clear picture of corpus-based studies of translator’s style in China, followed by a summary of the deficiencies present in existing Chinese studies of translator’s style.Plain language summaryA bibliometric analysis of translator’s style in translation studies (1980–2022) between China and the WestThis research first adopts a bibliometric analysis of translator’s style between China and other countries. This study employs articles from the database Web of Science (WOS) for international studies and the Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI; CSSCI-indexed; Chinese Social Sciences Citation Index) for Chinese studies. As Chinese scholars rank first in the contributions generated according to the collaborative countries analysis, there is a need to look both backwards and forwards to examine the current development of translator’s style in China. Doing so will present an overall picture of the strengths and weaknesses of translator’s style in theory and practice in the Chinese context. This study will help answer a series of queries on topics such as the most researched domain, the most applied mode and the most researched work. Furthermore, by closely examining the timezone view of keywords of translator’s style studies, and closely reading selected articles, three stages and three modes are suggested for studies on translator’s style.

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