A Study of Translation Strategies for Youth-Oriented Museum Publicity from a Cross-Cultural Perspective: A Case Study of Palace Museum Youth

Abstract

Against the backdrop of China’s “Cultural Going Out” strategy, museums have emerged as vital platforms for showcasing Chinese civilization to the world. Young people, as a crucial target audience, present unique cognitive and psychological characteristics that place specific demands on translation. However, current academic research has paid insufficient attention to this demographic segment. This study, grounded in cross-cultural communication theory and an audience-oriented approach to translation, takes the English texts of the Palace Museum’s youth-oriented website as its primary research material. By employing a methodology that integrates close textual reading and comparative analysis, and by establishing a functional-dimension classification framework to categorize and analyze translation examples, this research systematically investigates the translation strategies employed. The findings reveal that these texts utilize a three-dimensional strategic framework centered on simplification, interactive engagement, and cultural compensation. These dimensions address the core communicative needs: managing cognitive load, stimulating reading interest, and ensuring cultural comprehension, respectively. The conclusions of this study not only offer a systematic theoretical framework for analyzing youth-oriented museum translation but also provide a practical reference for the translation practice and evaluation of similar cultural publicity texts.