The “labyrinth” of gender cultural codes: Challenges to the translator
Artistic works, including animation and feature films do not only express the intentions of their creators, but also reflect the key components of national cultures - cultural codes that underlie the cultural identity of nations. At the same time, gender cultural codes, reflecting the traditional attitude of a particular people to masculinity and femininity, underlie the corresponding social roles and gender identity. By analyzing the gender cultural codes in the American animated film Mulan (1998) and the American feature film Mulan (2020) and comparing them with the cultural codes of the Chinese original source, The Ballad of Mulan, the author identifies inconsistencies caused by cultural differences of the two nations, so different in their history, traditions and worldview, and concludes that gender cultural codes form the basis of self-identification of many nations (Russians, Chinese, Arabs, etc.), which means that they are the guardians of national identity, opposing cultural integration and cultural globalization. The author also examines the problems of translating film works into Russian, caused by the inconsistency of the Chinese-American and American-Russian gender cultural codes, and identifies translation errors and their likely consequences.