Research on the Multimodal Translation of Traditional Chinese Medicine Videos from the Perspective of Reception Aesthetics

In recent years, short online videos have experienced rapid growth. However, Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) videos have yet to fully leverage multimodal translation to enhance audience understanding and acceptance of TCM culture, often becoming lost in the vast sea of information. This paper selects three typical TCM knowledge segments from high-viewership TCM videos (over 1.34 million views) published by CCTV English on YouTube as research objects. Based on reception aesthetics theory, a qualitative analysis is conducted to examine the interaction between language translation and other modalities, identifying successful practices in the multimodal translation process. The study aims to offer practical insights for translators to improve the quality and efficiency of multimodal translation in TCM short videos, and to enable the target audience to better understand and appreciate Chinese TCM culture.