Translating the unspeakable: activist translation of sexuality into Chinese via social media

ABSTRACT

Previous studies on the translation of sexuality into Chinese have been primarily limited to literary texts and scientific works. In recent years, increasing attention has been paid to the fansubbing of queer audiovisual material into Chinese. Against the backdrop of a global digital expansion of feminist and LGBTQ+ activists, this paper examines the translation of sexuality via social media. It focuses on the translations of JoinFeminism and Zhihe Society, two grassroots groups committed to addressing gender and sexuality issues in China. This paper uses Gideon Toury’s translation norms to analyse how the two groups collectively highlight sexuality as a means of resisting the repression of sexuality in the mainstream media. Moreover, it investigates the implications of the groups’ gender-sensitive translation and discusses their creation of an alternative sexual discourse. Drawing on insights from various areas of study such as fansubbing, feminist/queer translation and citizen media, this paper argues that the two groups’ translations, as a form of self-mediation, contribute to a specific type of feminist/queer activism in China: one that is less obsessed with political rights, but uses translation and social media to disseminate knowledge related to sexual diversity and therefore to create an online counter-discourse on sexuality.

KEYWORDS:

• Translating sexuality
• translation via social media
• activist translation
• feminist/queer media and activism
• translation norms

Acknowledgement

I would like to thank the reviewers and the editors for their careful reading of my manuscript and thoughtful comments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

1. All the data on social media were collected by 24 April, 2021. The data concerning the translation of the two groups in this paper are collected from the following sources: https://space.bilibili.com/39186759?from=search&seid=16364204235977740201, https://weibo.com/joinfeminismsubs?nick=JoinFeminism字幕组, https://weibo.com/fudanzhihe and the WeChat public account复旦大学知和社.

2. Zhihe Society did not reply to my interview request; JoinFeminism refused, saying they wanted to protect the privacy of its founder and members.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mengying Jiang

Mengying Jiang is a postdoctoral fellow in the School of Foreign Languages, Tongji University. Previously she worked as an assistant professor in the programme of Applied Translation Studies at BNU-HKBU United International College. She has studied in China, Britain, and New Zealand. Currently, she is working on expanding the definition of translation and aims to adopt a transdisciplinary approach to Translation Studies. She is interested in how an expanded definition of translation can inform other areas of studies in humanities and social sciences, including but not limited to gender, media, and popular culture.