Eco-Translatology: A New Paradigm of Eco-translation* －A Comparative Study on Approaches to Translation Studies

As an emerging paradigm of Translation Studies from ecological perspectives, Eco-Translatology is developing progressively. Such questions and doubts about its development, however, can be heard sometimes: Where does Eco-Translatology differ from the prevailing paradigms to translation? What is the addition of knowledge that Eco-Translatology can offer to the scholarship of Translation Studies in the present world? In other words, how can Eco-Translatology be claimed as an emerging paradigm of Translation Studies? This paper makes an attempt to offer brief clarifications and responses regarding the above questions and doubts. The discussion in this paper shows that the distinctions lie at least in the following seven aspects: (1) Research perspective (ecological perspective); (2) Philosophical background (Eco-holism, Oriental eco-wisdom, Translation as Adaptation and Selection); (3) Research foci (translation ecologies, textual ecologies, “translation community” ecologies, and their interrelationships and interplays); (4) Research methodology (metaphorical analogies, conceptual borrowings); (5) Unique terminology; (6) The nine “three-in-one” expressions in the discourse construction; (7) Eco-translation ethics principles, etc. All of the above should be able to distinguish Eco-Translatology from other existing theoretical systems in Translation Studies.