“鲜”=DELICIOUS?——“鲜味”翻译刍议

Is “Xian” Equal in Meaning to “Delicious”?

"鲜"在许多汉英词典中均被译为delicious。但事实上,我们有关"鲜"的概念与西方人关于delicious的概念有着很大出入,因此并不是在任何情况下这一译法总能成立。由于东西方文化的巨大差异,千百年来,英语词汇库中尚未出现过"鲜"的对应词。但日本人发明味精后,特别是20世纪80年代以来,"鲜味"逐渐为一些西方人所了解。近年,"鲜味"的日语对应词"旨味",以其音译形式umami被收录进了权威的英语词典。因此,若干年以后,umami可能会为许多人所知晓,因而即成为"鲜味"的标准译文。

In many Chinese-English dictionaries ＂Xian＂ is translated into ＂delicious＂, which is in fact not always the case because the concepts related to these two words are by no means the same. Due to the significant differences between Eastern and Western cultures there had never been a word in the English vocabulary before the late 20th century that was equal in meaning to this Chinese character. But since the Japanese invention of MSG, esp. since the 1980s, umami, the Japanese equivalent for Xian, has come to be known to a certain number of Westerners and has recently been included in the authoritative Shorter Oxford English Dictionary. So it could be expected that some time in the future, with its frequent use, umami will enter into people＇s daily conversation and will establish itself as an eligible English word and become the standard English version of ＂Xian＂.