TRANSLATION-MEDIATED ORGANIZATION DISCOURSE IN CYBERSPACE: A CONTRASTIVE CONVENTION ANALYSIS OF SELECTED LOCALIZED AND NON-LOCALIZED ENGLISH-LANGUAGE ORGANIZATION WEBSITES A dissertation submitted To Kent State University in partial Fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy by Bin Liu August 2018 © Copyright by Bin Liu 2018 All Rights Reserved Dissertation written by Bin Liu B.Eng., Nanjing University of Science & Technology, 2005 M.Eng., Southeast University, 2008 Ph.D. Kent State University, 2018 Approved by _______________________________, Chair, Doctoral Dissertation Committee Keiran Dunne _______________________________, Members, Doctoral Dissertation Committee Greg Shreve _______________________________ Erik Angelone _______________________________ Sara Newman _______________________________ Janet Meyer Accepted by _______________________________, Chair, Department of Modern & Classical Language Studies Keiran Dunne _______________________________, Dean, College of Arts and Sciences James L. Blank TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS ......................................................................................................... iii LIST OF FIGURES ................................................................................................................. vii LIST OF TABLES ................................................................................................................. viii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ....................................................................................................... xii I. Introduction: Context and Motivation ....................................................................... 1 1.1 A Theoretical Overview: Textual Convention in Website localization .......................... 2 1.1.1 “The most conventional digital genre”—Websites. .................................................... 2 1.1.2 Conceptualizing localization and translation in the context of cyberspace. ............... 5 1.1.3 Charting the territory of website localization with the map of Translation Studies. 11 1.2 The Research Topics under Study ................................................................................ 13 1.2.1 Counteracting some current trends in the studies of website localization. ............... 13 1.2.2 Exploring Industry-specific influence on localized websites ................................... 19 1.2.3 Searching for a variant of written English in web-mediated organization discourse: Source language-specific influence on localized websites ...................................................... 20 1.3 Summary ...................................................................................................................... 22 II. Scope and Significance ............................................................................................ 24 2.1 Research Questions and Basic Assumptions................................................................ 26 2.1.1 To what extent are navigational terms and phrases standardized in the selected localized websites under study? ............................................................................................... 27 2.1.2 To what extent do the localized website texts embody language-specific features? 28 iii 2.1.3 Is there any industry-specific conventional feature of localized websites that differentiates themselves from their counterparts from a different industry? .......................... 29 2.1.4 Does a variant of English exist in websites localized from Chinese? ....................... 31 2.2 Significance of the Current Study ................................................................................ 32 2.2.1 Providing language- and culture-specific references for localization practice and evaluation. ................................................................................................................................ 34 2.2.2 Decoding the language of localized websites: An undertaking to enrich the studies of applied Internet linguistics................................................................................................... 36 2.2.3 Addressing business, economic, and social concerns: Language planning and management. ............................................................................................................................ 37 2.2.4 Pedagogical implications. ......................................................................................... 40 2.3 The Structure of the Dissertation ................................................................................. 43 2.4 Summary ...................................................................................................................... 44 III. Research Approach and Methodology ..................................................................... 46 3.1 Instrument ................................................................................................................ 49 3.2 Sample Selection and Data Validation ..................................................................... 52 3.3.1 Terms and lexis. ........................................................................................................ 58 3.3.2 Syntax, grammar and discourse. ............................................................................... 59 3.3.3 Industry- and language-specific effect. ..................................................................... 60 3.4 Summary .................................................................................................................. 61 IV. Results and Analysis ................................................................................................ 61 4.1 Step 1 of Phase 1: Paired Comparisons ................................................................... 63 iv 4.1.1 LSP: Pactera vs. TransPerfect. .................................................................................. 63 4.1.2 Ecommerce: AliExpress (Alibaba) vs. Amazon........................................................ 71 4.1.3 University: Tsinghua vs. UC Berkley. ...................................................................... 76 4.1.4 Government: Beijing vs. Washington DC. ................................................................ 82 4.1.5 Tourism destination: Beijing vs. Washington DC. .................................................... 87 4.1.6 Cross-industry comparison. ...................................................................................... 91 4.2 Step 2 of Phase 1: Grouped Comparison ................................................................. 93 4.2.1 LSP. ........................................................................................................................... 93 4.2.2 University. ................................................................................................................. 96 4.2.3 Government............................................................................................................... 98 4.2.4 Tourism destination. .................................................................................................. 99 4.2.5 Cross-industry comparison. .................................................................................... 102 4.3 Phase 2: A Statistical Exploration of Industry- and Language-specific Effects .... 104 4.4 Summary ................................................................................................................ 111 V. Discussion and Conclusion .................................................................................... 112 5.1 Instrument .................................................................................................................. 112 5.2 Data ............................................................................................................................ 115 5.2.1 Navigational text: The buttress of website convention. .......................................... 116 5.2.2 Content text: The emergence of convention. .......................................................... 119 5.3 Analytical Framework ................................................................................................ 120 5.4 From Content to Content Strategy: Website Analysis as a Booming Field of Interdisciplinary Collaboration between Academia and Industry .......................................... 121 v 5.5 Concluding Remarks .................................................................................................. 123 REFERENCES ...................................................................................................................... 126 APPENDICES ....................................................................................................................... 142 A. The Websites Selected for Grouped Comparisons at Step 2 of Phase 1 ................ 142 B. The Lexical Items of Different Sections of LSP Websites (L: Localized website; NL: Non-Localized website) .................................................................................................. 146 C. The Lexical Items of Different Sections of University Websites (L: Localized website; NL: Non-Localized website) .................................................................................................. 147 D. The Lexical Items of Different Sections of Government Websites (L: Localized website; NL: Non-Localized website) ................................................................................... 148