A Study of Strategies for Translating Thai Food Names into Chinese : A Case Study of Thai restaurant in Chengdu, China

Abstract

The objectives of this research were to 1) analyze strategies for translating Thai
food names into Chinese, and 2) present strategies for translating Thai food names into
Chinese. The 493 Thai food names were collected from 11 Thai restaurants located in
Chengdu that were labeled the Thai Select（泰精选 Tàijīngxuǎn）The findings indicated that the 9 strategies for translating Thai food names in Thai
restaurants in Chengdu into Chinese were found: 1) transliteration, 2) literal translation, 3)
meaning-deletion, 4) addition of words or phrases, 5) general terms, 6) specific terms 7) wordequivalent translation, 8) target language-based cultural translation, and 9) using a new
name.
The most used strategy was the additional word or phrase translation (84 names).
The least used one was the target language-based cultural translation (19 names). The
strategies on how to translate the names were as follows: 1) In translating names of curry
and boiled dishes, the word “tang”（汤 Tāng）should be used, 2) in translating names of
fried dishes, the word “chao”（炒 Chǎo）should be used, 3) in translating names of yumsalad dishes, the word “liangban”（凉拌 Liángbàn）should be used, and 4) in translating
names of fried, baked, grilled, or steamed dishes, the word “zha” （炸 Zhá）should be
used The word “jian”（煎 Jiān）should be used when frying with less oil, the common
word “kao” （烤 Kǎo） can be used for baked or grilled dishes, and the word “Zheng”
（蒸 Zhēng）can be used for steamed dishes.