Interpreting Intertextuality in AVT

Abstract

Focusing on the semiotic context of translation, the current study explores the issue of intertextuality in audio visual translation. With the English drama series Downton Abbey and two subtitle versions in Chinese mainland and Hong Kong as data, the study discovers the necessity to distinguish the virtual context from the real-life context when dissecting the semiotic interactions in AVT. Meaning indeterminacy is closely related to how semiotic structures are recognized and divided in the original virtual reality, while systematic consistency demonstrated in the target text is largely bound by the social, cultural conventions and existing media practices that are well attuned to the specific target audiences.