Toward standardization: The English translation of Chinese terms related to calligraphic scripts

Calligraphy is revered as embodying the cultural and aesthetic values of traditional China and holds first place among Chinese arts. This article explores how certain translations began to appear, circulate and be accepted over the past decades. It is noticed that “repeated use” and de facto “popularity” of certain translations can be determining factors in evaluating the adequacy of the translation. By prioritizing the effect of cross-cultural understanding, this study does justice to some of the existing translations that have been constantly doubted by previous scholars. The existing translations in question, as new “signifies”, have been re-contextualized and thus they gain increasingly more cultural meanings of the “signifieds”. Copyright © 2019 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.