对比语篇视角下的四种翻译策略个案研究thesis

本dissertation旨在基于阅读与翻译Basil Hatim《跨文化交际—翻译理论与对比篇章语言学》这一外著的基础上，试图在对比语篇的视角下探讨四种翻译策略的问题。笔者通过翻译解读文本来理解书中涉及的一些理论和观点.完成本文写作的工作内容包括三大部分,笔者首先是把外著《跨文化交际—翻译理论与对比篇章语言学》从英文翻译成中文，一共花了四个月的时间去完成50000多字的译本。这一著作提出了许多翻译理论，如话题转换，文本形式，对比篇章语言学等等。然而，我最感兴趣的是对比篇章语言学这一理论。所以本dissertation主要是研究对比篇章语言学这一理论。通过去收集相关资料,到中国知网检索以及查找相关的词典,从而获得更多与这一理论相关的知识。最后，开始着手写本dissertation,本文共分为五章，第一章节是简单地介绍《跨文化交际》一书，并从中选择了一些自己最感兴趣的翻译理论进行讨论。第二章是陈述国内外对这些理论的研究与评价，以及我写这篇dissertation的目的。第三章是对本dissertation涉及的一些核心术语和翻译策略进注释。第四章是本文的主要部分，主要是结合案例去分析直译、意译、加译法和减译法这四种翻译策略。最后一章是结论，主要是回顾和展望未来，以及它的发展趋势与将来更深入的研究。

 

Abstract摘要

 

This thesis attempts to explore translation Strategies from the perspective of contrastive text linguistics, on the basis of reading and translating of the monograph Communication Across Cultures Translation Theory and Contrastive Text Linguistics by Basil Hatim. This thesis aims to make a better understanding of the theories and suggestion in the monograph, though translating and explaining the text. The tasks of this paper include three parts. Translation of the monograph Communication Across Cultures is the first step. It took four months to translate it from English to Chinese. There are Chinese translation more than fifty thousand words. The monograph refers to Lots of translation theories, such as topic shift, text-type, contrastive text linguistics and so on. However, what makes me interest most is the contrastive text linguistics. Therefore, the thesis is to study this theory, by means of collecting related data, searching the CNKI and looking into related dictionary. Lastly, to write this thesis. The paper consists of five chapters. The first chapter is to introduce briefly the monograph Communication Across Cultures. Besides, to extract the translation theory what me interest most on Hatim’s book to discuss. The second chapter states the previous survey at home and abroad and put forward the goal of this thesis. The third chapter will explain the core terms and four translation strategies. The fourth chapter is the key part of the paper. A case study of four translation strategies, some case studies both English-to-Chinese and Chinese-to-English in practice translation will be taken as examples to better understand those theories and translation strategies, including literal translation, free translation, addition and omission. The last part is conclusion that is retrospect and prospect, which tells its developing tendency and further research in the future.#p#分页标题#e#

 

Key words: contrastive text linguistic，discourse analysis，translation strategies

 

Contents

 

Abstract .I

 

摘要………………………………………………………………………………………………………II

 

Chapter 1 Introduction 1

 

1.1 Introduction to Communication Across Cultures Translation 1

 

1.2 Structure of this thesis 1

 

Chapter 2 Literature Review 2

 

2.1 The contrastive text linguistics study oversea 2

 

2.2 The contrastive text linguistics study at home 3

 

2.3 The purpose of this thesis 4

 

Chapter 3 Methodology 4

 

3.1 The annotation of core terms in this paper 4

 

3.2 The strategies of translation 6

 

3.3 Methodology 8

 

Chapter 4 A Case study of four translation strategies 8

 

4.1 Literal Translation 9

 

4.2 Free Translation .........................................................................................................11

 

4.3 Addision ..................................................................................................................12

 

4.4 Omision 14

 

Chapter 5 Conclusion 16

 

Acknowledgements 18

 

Bibliography 19

 

Chapter 1 Introduction引言

 

This chapter mainly introduces the monograph Communication Across Cultures. The author have read and translated this monograph before writing this paper, after that, it was found that translation is not an easy job. In a word, the methods of translation are very importance, so studying those methods of translation is necessary for English major students. Some of principles, strategies, methods and techniques of translation already attract to me by means of translating the Hatim’s monograph. This paper will choose four strategies that make me interest most to discuss.

 

1.1 Introduction to Communication Across Cultures Translation

 

Basil Hatim put forward that “The feasibility of the contrastive text linguistics theory which is applied to the translation process, namely the significance of language structure, such as syntactic and semantic character, and he points out that the text type is a central topic in the study of context analysis”. Although the theory of translation, contrastive linguistics and discourse analysis have been made a great development in the past about 20 years, few books dare to put all three disciplines together to discuss. However, Communication Across Cultures Translation Theory and Contrastive Text Linguistics is a monograph which text linguistics and contrastive linguistics, translation theory is combined with the study of intercultural communication. It is focus on the perspective of the present translation theory, comparative linguistics, discourse analysis three disciplines integrated academic situation, the author tries to combine the three disciplines together, put forward clearly in a cross-language, cross-cultural communication, how language, rhetorical expressions applied to text conversion, such as translation and interpret studies and other problems. Through translating and studying Basil Hatim’s monograph .This thesis from the contrastive text linguistics perspective to discuss discourse analysis in some translation methods.#p#分页标题#e#

 

1.2 Structure of this thesis

 

The paper consists of five chapters. The paper consists of five chapters. The first chapter is to introduce briefly the monograph Communication Across Cultures. Besides, to

 

extract the translation theory what me interest most on Hatim’s book to discuss. The second chapter states the previous survey at home and abroad and put forward the goal of

 

this thesis. The third chapter will explain the core terms and four translation strategies. The fourth chapter is the key part of the paper. A case study of four translation strategies, some case studies both English-to-Chinese and Chinese-to-English in practice translation will be taken as examples to better understand those theories and translation strategies, including Literal translation, Free translation, addition and omission. The last part is conclusion that is retrospect and prospect, which tells its developing tendency and further research in the future.

 

Chapter 2 Literature Review

 

This chapter is going to make a brief introduction of the contrastive text linguistics and discourse analysis at home and abroad, after that I will state some reasons of writing this paper. The history of translation is as old as the history of humans being. Where mankind communication exists, there are translation activities. Translation study is a long-term issue. Generations after generations of translators have practiced translation and acquired rich experience and methods in translation, which forms the basis of translation research. After year by year, translation researchers have tried to establish a theory that is acceptable to more and more people, to breaking away from the traditional method of translation ,and put forward some constructive proposals.

 

2.1 The contrastive text linguistics study oversea

 

In 1965, J.C.Catford tried to draw on the grammatical theory of Halliday to establish a translation theory mode that is based on linguistics. The relationship between text analysis and translation survey is interactional. The most typical of which is the functional linguistics of Halliday. Among the translation monographs guided by text linguistics, which people can see Halliday’s theory and Hatim’s Communication Across Cultures.

 

In twentieth Century 70-80, Contrastive linguistics and discourse analysis is closely combined to dicuss, finally, it is resulted in a new branch in text contrastive analysis. On the foreign development of text contrastive analysis is mainly due to Ron Scollon and Suzanne Wong Scollon, Basil Hatim and so on.

 

According to G. Cook , discourse is a coherent stretch of language in use, the context contains taking on meaning for its users, and be cited by them as purposeful, meaningful and unified. Cook described discourse as being a text and context together. Pike put forward that discourse is a product of human mutual behavior, which under the social cultural context. Van Dijk argues that discourse includes three aspects: language use, thought transmission and communication in social context. Brown & Yule look on discourse as a process.#p#分页标题#e#

 

Text linguistics is a branch of linguistics, which arose in the sixty or seventy's of the twentieth Century, although compared with other research fields, the time of text linguistics is very short. However, text linguistics has made remarkable achievements by domestic and foreign scholar’s efforts.

 

2.2 The contrastive text linguistics study at home

 

Domestic scholars are mainly focus on the perspective of rhetorical patterns, paragraph and cohesion and coherence, culture and discourse. “Discourse”, which is being used quite frequently nowadays, so it is possible to find the term being used and interpreted in different ways.

 

Because Halliday and Hassan’s text linguistics arouse actually the attention of people, in their representative works, they first time put forward the discourse concepts systematically, and to study discourse function in-depth. And then, the text linguistics were introduced into China, the research achievements in linguistics and translation circles of the domestic scholars, such as Stylistics and Translation by Liu Miqing; A General Outline of Pragmatics by He Ziran; Essentials of Discourse Analysis by Huang Guowen, Discourse Cohesion and Coherence by Hu Zhuanglin. They also have been studied extensively on text linguistics, they made Halliday’s theory become more consummative and enrich. But in the definition of discourse and text linguistics, there have great difference at home and abroad. In fact, Europe and the United States national scholars tend to “discourse” and “discourse analysis”, but Continental European scholars are accustomed to use “text” and “text linguistics”. In China, there are differences between discourse analysis and text linguistics, but there is no difference in the goals and method of study, so we are always use text linguistics.

 

2.3 The purpose of this thesis

 

The contrastive study of text or the contrastive study of language in China appeared in the early 1980s. Although the theory of translation, contrastive linguistics and discourse analysis has been made a great development in the past about 20 years, few books dare to put all three disciplines together to discuss. But Communication Across Cultures Translation Theory and Contrastive Text Linguistics by Basil Hatim, it is from different perspective to discuss the translation problems, which text linguistics and contrastive linguistics, translation theory is combined with the study of intercultural communication. In perspective of the present translation theory, comparative linguistics, discourse analysis three disciplines integrated academic situation, the author tries to combine the three together, put forward clearly in a cross-language, cross-cultural communication, how language, rhetorical expressions applied to text conversion, such as translation and interpret studies and other problems.#p#分页标题#e#

 

This thesis attempts to discuss the following questions. Firstly, the fact is that there is no universal theoretical model for contrast. It is regrettably the case that the findings of various scholars can not easily be compared because results were often derived from different experients and from different perspective. The second question is more researches are focus on written language as the data than those using spoken language. To these questions, this paper will combine the contrastive linguistics and discourse analysis to find a useful way to translate in interpreting data. It will add depth and breath both to contrastive linguistics and to discourse analysis.

 

Chapter 3 Methodology

 

Like some terms involved above, such as discourse, text analysis, contrastive text analysis, linguistic and so on. This chapter is focus on explaining the definition of some key terms. And to introduce some of principles, strategies, methods and techniques of translation, which I have read and used during the translation.

 

3.1 The annotation of core terms in this paper

 

In Basil Hatim’s book, Communication Across Cultures (2001:215) defined contrastive text linguistics as following: “An extension on the basis methods of linguistic analysis which show the similarities and differences between two or more languages. Approaching the idea of comparison and contrast from a text perspective entails that the primary object of the analysis become stretches of languages longer than the sentence”.

 

According to Halliday and Hasan (1976: 1-2): “A text is best regarded as a semantic unit: a unit not of form but of meaning”.

 

From the definition above, we can see that contrastive text analysis analyses both linguistic field, which includes text structure and texture, and cultural factors. In the present rearch we shall adopt above views, namely, text as both written and spoken language, and shall not intend to distinguish between the terms ‘text’ and ‘discourse’. It is also should analyze texts across cultures.

 

With various translation theories and translation methods emerging, this part is to explain the basic meaning of those theories and strategies. Because it is very importance to deal with translation work.

 

What is discourse and text? A text has been defined as "a document containing a sample of a particular variety of language, and serves as the basis for linguistic analysis(Hartmann and Stork 1972: 236,237). Brown & Yule explained that discourse as a process and define text as the “verbal record of a communicative event” (2000: 190). Hu Zhuanglin (1994: 1) talked about discourse in a very broad sense, which includes both discourse and text. The two terms refer to conversation and written text respectively.#p#分页标题#e#

 

Basil Hatim explains the text like this: "a set of mutually relevant communicative functions that hang together (texture) and are put together (structure) in such a way as to respond to a particular context and thus achieve an overall rhetorical purpose (2001:223)". In his definition of text, he refers to texture, text structure and context.

 

To sum up, discourse is a semantic unit of language in use, and the notion of "discourse" which constitutes the object and subject-matter of textual science has not been a simple one to define according to its comprehensive nature and the variety of disciplines that ask for interest in it. These above theoretical opinions are focus on two aspects of text, which are crucial to contrastive analysis as an interlingual activity; one is the internal grammatical and semantic structure of texts, which stress the importance of relational grammar or the communicative function of syntax. On the other hand the communicative nature of texts which is linguistic and social factors.

 

3.2 The strategies of translation

 

During translating the foreign monograph, I found that the structures of those sentences are very complex. It is not an easy job for me to translate it correctly. And it is necessary for me to use some translation theory during the translating process. These theories including literal translation, free translation, addition and so on. For example, the sentence "Europe is dying, Europe is dying, Europe is practically dead (2001:2)" If you only depend on this sentence to translate its meaning, it maybe produced to initiate an argument for the possible of Europe’s demise. But in fact, it is not really true. So, at here, you’d better use the translation theory which is Hatim’s saying “put together”. That is to say, you should pay attention to the hyponymy of original text. The hyponymy not only relate to the sentences, but also to the paragraphs and texts.

 

The standard of Chinese traditional translation is focus on "Xin, Da ,Ya",which is very popular in Chinese translation field. However with the development of translation and the western theories flood in China, such as Nida's "functional equivalence" and "functional grammar". Then the translation theories have been changing.

 

Translation is thought as a bi-lingual and bi-cultural communication, especially in the source text intents to express transferred into another language. No matter it is Chinese traditional translation standard or "functional equivalence" theory, or the combination of the two theories. The final goal is to translate one language into others accurately. Therefore, this thesis focus on four translation methods to study, literal translation, free translation, addition and omission.

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For example:

 

“The hours will be long, fifty-five per week, and the atmosphere he breathes verb confined, perchance also dusty.” (Basil Hatim 2001:37)

 

As example above, only by making a scan this sample, we don’t know how to translate it. As to the words, sentences, or paragraphs that are difficult to translate. Whether to omit them or to retain them? Whether the meaning of original text is necessary to translate and target reader is interested in it?

 

Only by taking the whole text into consideration, can we understand that the sample B just an example of the text, which is offer a demonstration for the theory of foregoing paragraphs. So it can be use "literal translation".

 

Cohesion, which is pointed out by Halliday and Hasan. They defined that a text usually has two features: ‘it is coherent with respect to the context of situation and therefore consistent in register; and it is coherent with respect to itself and therefore cohesive’ (1976:23). Cohesion and coherence are two of the most basic concepts in the field of discourse analysis. It is say that they are one of basis features in a text.

 

For example

 

[A]: Tomorrow is Sunday. RMS Titanic will be on tomorrow evening. Shall we go together?

 

[B]: Sorry, I am busying with my homework.

 

As example above, there are no cohesive devices are used, but the text will be interpreted as coherent. The example shows that cohesion is neither sufficient nor necessary for asserting that a text is coherent. Some scholars explain them in their works. Such as Stubbs , Giora, Brown & Yule (2001). They also agree to that cohesion is related to textual or discourse making, and coherence is related to textual or discourse interpretation and consistence. Cohesion also refers to the linguistic devices by which the speaker can mark the experiential and interpersonal coherence of the text, and to a textual phenomenon.

 

The contrastive discourse analysis in Hatim’s monograph, which mentions some of the issues involved in the contrastive text model to be proposed; he analyzed the sample from a Newsweek article on the subject of European unity and discussed the risk of sounding in prescriptive, record the various decisions should normally be made in the specific case of translating into Arabic. The combination of the two perspectives, both contrastive linguistics and text linguistics, is only just beginning, although a lot of theorists have been applying for many years and their calculating implementation is now feasible. However, Basil Hatim different from predecessors and contemporaries, he tackles some issues from the perspective of contrastive discourse analysis. But, in my paper, contrastive discourse analysis will not focus on English and Arabic, but emphasis on English and Chinese. To discuss From the perspective of the two different language on the basis of contrastive linguistics and translation methods.#p#分页标题#e#

 

3.3 Methodology

 

The directing theory of the thesis is Basil Hatim's Communication Across Cultures Translation Theory and Contrastive Text linguistics. Which text linguistics and contrastive linguistics, translation theory is combined with the study of intercultural communication. In perspective of the present translation theory, comparative linguistics, discourse analysis three disciplines integrated academic situation, the author tries to combine the three together, put forward clearly in across-language, cross-cultural communication, how language, rhetorical expressions applied to text conversion, such as Chinese and English translation studies and other problems. Besides, the paper also takes Halliday's functional grammar as its theoretical basis, because the latter is generally regarded as a practical and realistic theory for discourse analysis.

 

According to methodology, study involved in the thesis adopts positive method and inductive method. It aims to attain some objective conclusion through analyzing certain quantities of real materials in language usages. The materials of following chapter refer to some examples involved in the thesis, which come from the translations of English and Chinese articles and proverbs.

 

Chapter 4 A Case study of four translation strategies

 

In chapter three, one of core terms and translation strategies were explained. There are four translation strategies: Literal Translation, Free Translation, Addition and Omission. This chapter is to combine the four strategies with cases from the perspective of contrastive text linguistics to study. According to Halliday and Hasan viewed " A text is best regarded as a semantic unit: a unit not of form but of meaning". It is show that when we embark on translation work, we should not only keep the text structure in mind, but also focus on the meaning of the text. In translation of Chinese data, it is necessary to have knowledge of Chinese culture as well as the western. Compared with Chinese products, Chinese cultures have less popularity in the west because of the less communications between Chinese and the western countries. Though Chinese cultures have great reputation in the world, few of the foreigners understand really of Chinese cultures. Chinese and its rhetorical and discourse conventions are always out of their understandings and acceptance. Therefore, translation should basis on the contrastive text linguistics and translation strategies. These factors of Chinese text include text structure and texture, and cultural factors, and this part will focus on the cultural factors to study. As we know, different countries have different culture and customs, thinking about foreigners’ knowledge of Chinese is necessary when doing the translation work.

 

4.1 Literal Translation

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Literal translation refers to translate a sentence originally, remain the original message, which including structure of sentences, meaning of the original words, and rhetoric of original. Literal translation would be fluent and easy to understand by target language readers. Literal translation is different from word-for-word translation, which shifts words singly and out of context. The following proverbs will discuss Literal Translation from the perspective of proverbs.

 

Examples

 

(1) Seeing is believing. 百闻不如一见.

 

(2) Out of sight, out of mind. 眼不见,心不烦.

 

(3) Time is money. 时间就是金钱.

 

(4) You cannot clap with one hand. 孤掌难鸣.

 

(5) All time is no time when it is past. 光阴一去不复返.

 

According to these examples above, Literal translation may be defined as having the following characteristics:

 

1. Literal translation takes sentences as its basic units and the whole text into consideration at the same time in the course of translating.

 

2. Literal translation strives to reproduce both the ideological content and style of the entire literary work and retain as much as possible the figures of speech and main sentence structures or patterns.

 

Actually, literal translation is the chief way of translation. It is close to the original lively and natural. It is acceptable. Acceptableness is very important in translation. From theory of translation angle, translation is a theory which uses target language to express the idea, content and style of source language. It should accord with the culture and customs of the target language. Translation not only does express the idea and style of the original message, but also need to accord with the culture and customs of the target language, so that the translation can be accepted easily by target language readers. Because the differences of two languages, sometimes it is difficult to retain the idea and style of the source language. The advantage of literal translation is that almost retain the idea and style of the original, so most of translators like to use literal translation.

 

4.2 Free Translation

 

Free translation, which is according to the original, without paying attention to the details but translation would also be fluent and natural. Free translation need not focus on the form of the original, including construction of the original sentences, meaning of the original works, and metaphor of the original and so on. But free translation does not mean to delete or add content to the original and translators must consider the original carefully, know its stress, translate it naturally, and express the meaning of the original.#p#分页标题#e#

 

Example [1]

 

就对别国文明的认识而言，学习型国家也应是追求真知的国家，要做到这一点，应该有这样的意识：知之为知之，不知为不知，是知也。对其他文明的误解和曲解往往妨碍有效的文明间对话和对文化多样性的尊重。(选自中国教育部副部长章新胜2005年11月8日于“第三届全球化论坛”上的讲话)

 

The phrase ,“知之为知之，不知为不知，是知也” which Free Translation is " This real knowledge comes from a true consciousness and confession of what one knows is knowing and what one doesn't know is also knowing and sometimes an even more importance one." And its Literal Translation is " know is know, unknow is unknow". Obviously, the Literal Translation of this phrase will make English readers puzzled because the phrase is stamped with Chinese image.

 

Example [2]

 

方案一公布，大家就七嘴八舌地议论开了。

 

大家七手八脚一会儿把房间收拾得干干净净。

 

The two phrase“七嘴八舌”and“七手八脚”are related to Chinese daily life communication, the Free Translation is that “with many people speaking all at once” and “with everybody lending a hand”, other than “seven months and eight tongues” and “seven hands and eight feet”. Of course, people who are familiar with Chinese have no difficulty in understanding their means. But for the foreigners who know little about Chinese cultures will depend on explanation, if translating them by Literal Translation, it will mislead the audiences.

 

Example[ 3]

 

当时他为了逃生而奋力反抗，最后让敌人练家子了。

 

The term“练家子” is involved to Chinese martial art,which meaning is"a person who is killed in martial arts". However, there is no similarity term in English, which is corresponding to Chinese. Therefore, Free Translation is the best way to translate it into Englsih.

 

Example [4]

 

中国古代思想家孔子说：“40而不惑，50而知天命。”一个人有了几十年的生活经历，就可以更好地理解世事之变迁，更坚定地去实现自己的志向和理想。今天，在庆祝联合国50诞辰之际，人们自然更加殷切地希望联合国遵循宪章的宗旨和原则，倾听各国人民的呼声，跟上时代的步伐，以新的面貌来迎接新的世纪。(2012 星火英语《翻译指南》)

 

Translation: Confucius, China's ancient philosopher, says, "At 40 I had no more doubts and at 50, I knew the will of Heaven." A man, with decades of life behind him, can better understand the changes of events and be more hardened in his resolve to fulfill his aspirations and ideals. At this 50th birthday of the UN, it is all too natural for people to have high hopes that the UN will observe the purposes and principles of its Charter, heed the calls from people of all countries, keep pace with the times and greet the new century with a fresh outlook.#p#分页标题#e#

 

Analysis :

 

1. This passage is political comment. According to Basil Hatim’s view on the contrastive text linguistics as the chapter three stated above: “Sequences of utterances are thus seen in terms of certain contextual requirements and of the way these are implemented in text.” According to the text-type, as Hatim’s theory goes, the translation of this text should meet the requirements of the certain contextual. Thus, the characteristic of its translation should be grave and atmosphere.

 

2. More over, because of the different cultures between Chinese and English, some words should be translated in Free Translation not is the Literal Translation. Such as , “不惑”in the first sentence , the Free Translation is “have no doubt” and the“知天命”can be “ know the will of Heaven” not is “ know the will of God”. Because the “天” and “上帝” is two different things in Chinese. In order to make sure the accuracy of the text meaning in English translation, we should take Chinese cultures and English cultures into consideration.

 

3. Translation of this type of speech should not too stick to the Chinese culture and conventions, in order to avoid putting the English readers into fog. Free Translation should be the most appropriated choice for translators.

 

4.3 Addision

 

Addition is a popular method of translators in English translation. Which include the addition of semantic, rhetorical and stylistic. This method can make the target text equipped with optimized linguistic structure and improved communicative effects. Addition enables the translators to provide useful information of source terms and cultural terms for readers who lack of background information about them. As the following samples:

 

Example [5]

 

We , the human species, are confronting a planetary emergency a threat to the survival of our civilization that is gathering ominous and destructive potential even as we gather here.

 

尽管我们已经聚在一起共商对策，而灾难却还在扩大，形势不容乐观。(选自美国前总统戈尔在2007年领取诺贝尔和平奖时的演讲)

 

Example [6]

 

In his classic novel, The Pioneers, James Fenimore Cooper has his hero, a land developer, with his cousin on a tour of the city he is building. He describes the broad streets, rows of houses, a bustling metropolis. (选自James Fenimore Cooper’s The Pioneer 的简介)

 

他绘声绘色地描绘了宽阔的街道，鳞次栉比的房屋，一个熙熙攘攘的大都市。

 

Example [7]

 

Xu Xiake, the great geographer, explorer and writer in the Ming Dynasty of China, spent his life in traveling and discovering the vast land of China with the spirit of "traveling without boundaries" and finally accomplished the immortal masterpiece, The Xu Xiake Travelogue.

 

徐霞客是中国明代伟大的地理学家、探险旅行家和游记文学。他坚持“旅游无界限”的精神，探人所未知，达人所未达，写下了不朽的《徐霞客游记》。(选自《英语口译基础教程》2008版)

 

Example [8]

 

Cultural communication between China and overseas countries dates back to over 2000 years ago. This can be testified by much-told stories about how our predecessors went out all the way to seek and spread civilization that have been constantly relayed from generation to generation.

 

早在两千多年前，中国便与外国有了文化交往。先辈们为了寻求与传播文化知识和友谊，翻山越岭、远涉重洋的佳话，至今为人们所传颂。

 

Analysis :

 

1. The technique of addition is depend on the different between English and Chinese, to add some words which the source text not exist but it contains that meaning to the translation. Add some appropriate words or sentences to the translation to make the structure of the translation become intact, and the meaning of the text turn to be clear. Just like the four examples above demonstrated.

 

2. Adding enables translator to provide related information of source text and cultural terms for the translation receivers who are lack of background knowledge about them. Just like the example above.

 

4.4 Omission

 

Omission is a method of translation, which is used frequently by translators. Because the discrepancies of structure of source language and target language, translators to reconstruct source text in the target language, especially when there is a great difference between source language rhetorical conventions and those of the target language. This method include the omission of structure and rhetorical. The following samples aim to illustrate the theory.

 

Example [9]

 

If you hang back, and reserve and criticise at first, you are preventing yourself from getting the fullest possible value from what you read.

 

如果读书伊始便固步自封、处处设防，甚至批评挑剔，那么你就无法尽可能地从阅读中获得最大的价值。

 

Here, the subject "you" is omitted.

 

Example [10]

 

Although pure science usually has no apparent connection with technology, it does lend itself to the development of applied science.#p#分页标题#e#

 

理论科学虽然通常与技术没有明显的联系，但确实有助于应用科学的发展。

 

At this sample, "itself" didn't be translate directly, as a reflexive pronoun, which is omitted. Both the two samples above involved, which is an omission in structure. However, the following samples are talk about the omitting of rhetorical words.

 

Example [11]

 

But if you open your mind as widely as possible, then signs and hints of almost imperceptible fineness, from the twist and turn of the first sentences, will bring you into the presence of a human being unlike any other. (选自弗吉尼亚•伍尔夫的should one read A book )

 

然而，如果你尽可能敞开心胸，那么书中那些细微的精妙之处和暗示都会从开头曲折婉转的语句中显现出来，把你带入一个与众不同的境界。

 

Example [12]

 

There was no snow, the leaves were gone from the trees, and the grass was dead.

 

天未下雪，但叶落草枯。

 

Example [13]

 

I have sought love, first, because it brings ecstasy - ecstasy so great that I would often have sacrificed all the rest of my life for a few hours for this joy. I have sought it, next, because it relieves loneliness-that terrible loneliness in which one shivering consciousness looks over the rim of the world into the cold unfathomable lifeless abyss. I have sought it, finally, because I have seen, in a mystic miniature, the prefiguring vision of the heaven that saints and human life, this is what - at last - I have found.(选自 Bertrand Russell’s Three Passions I have Lived For)

 

我追求爱情，因为它使人心醉神迷—这种沉醉是如此的美妙，让我宁愿舍弃余生，为的是享有这片刻的欢乐;我追求爱，因为它能驱走寂寞之感—这种可怕的孤独感令人不寒而栗，使人俯视天地之边缘，望向绝望的无底深渊;终于，我找到了爱。因为在爱的和谐中，我看到了圣贤和诗人幻想中神秘的缩影。这就是我所寻求的，虽然对于凡人而言，它似乎过于美好而遥不可及，但这就是我最终找到的。

 

This sample is extracted from Bertrand Russell’s Three Passions I have Lived For, which is a Beautiful Prose. According to this text-type, it is rhetorical words that were omitted, that is “first, next, finally” in the long sentence, in this way the translation become more appropriate. The translation should be fluent description, sentence should be neatly and language should be beautiful. So these cohesion words can omit when it was translated into Chinese, because the logic of recessive words can be replaced by the cohesion function in Chinese. In fact, the languages of translation will become more fluent and beautiful.#p#分页标题#e#

 

As these examples above, hypotactic is the main feature of English texts, but parataxis for Chinese. However, what kind of situation of the words can be omitted in translation, the principle of omission is that as long as the words or phrases, which have been omitted are not effect the completeness of the semantics and information of the source text. Omitting the redundant words enable the language of the translation more short and sweet.

 

Chapter 5 Conclusion

 

To apply Contrastive Text Linguistics theories, especially to be aware of the text structure which text imposes on translation could be helpful in dealing with the inadvisable mistakes of translation, especially translation of texts from English to Chinese. With the Contrastive Text Linguistics framework of Basil Hatim, this paper combines cases with four translation strategies to analyze, including Literal Translation, Free Translation, Addition and Omission. After studying, it was found that these two kinds of texts are different in aspects of field, application of discourse constraints and textual constraints. English articles place emphasis on hypotactic, while Chinese articles focus on paratactic.

 

In chapter four, the four translation strategies are discussed, we can make a brief conclusion about the use of these translation strategies. Before embarking on the translation, translator should think over translation theory. Since more and more scholars have realized that translation failures are not due to language factors but to cultural factors, it is the reason that this paper discussed translation strategies. So the translation should be considered as inter-lingual and inter-cultural communication. The version is not only combined with target culture but also with target linguistic standards such as terms and cultures. There is no doubt, translation theory can not solve all problems in the matter of the cultural barriers in the process of translation, but the theories have made useful exploration on translation practice.

 

In recent years, lots of translating methods have been put forward, especially in the field of English translation. The theory of Basil Hatim, which contrastive text languistics are concluded from the real translation practice, which made more pertinence to the purpose of translation.

 

According to the translation theory and the textual analysis of the English articles in contrast with Chinese articles, the thesis puts forward four translation strategies, namely, Literal Translation, Free Translation, Omission and Addition. According to the strategy of Literal Translation, translator should understand the context of source text well. In this way, the translated text can not only correspond to the surface meaning but also to the deep structure and implicature. The strategy Omission is applied when some contents are considered as redundant. By adapting the strategy of Addition, translators can provide referential information and supplementary explanations for benefit of comprehensibility of the target text.#p#分页标题#e#

 

The translation strategies mentioned above are in no shape exhaustive because they are inevitably overlapping. In translation practice, strategies are applied vary in accordance with particular linguistic factors. In most cases, there have a comprehensive utilization of translation strategies. Which one is used depends on the translator’s selection in his translating work.

 

Of course, these strategies are not solutions to all the existing translation problems of these texts, this thesis just aims to shed light on the way forward. The best way to improve the quality of translation is “practice makes perfect”, only putting these theories into practice can we deal with translation well.

 

Acknowledgements

 

First of all, I would like to show my deepest gratitude to my tutor -Hua Youjie, for all the help he has offered me during the preparation and writing of this paper and for all the pains he has taken in reading and correcting my drafts. It is obvious that without his patient instruction, helpful suggestions and constant encouragement, I could not have finished this thesis on time.

 

Secondly, I hope to express my thanks to all those who have helped me with the preparation of this paper. In the past one year, I have received considerable help from the teachers, and the other faculty members and the other students in different departments of other universities, without which, the completion of this paper would have been impossible. Finally, I am also grateful to all teachers who have taught me how to study and what to learn, which have helped me a lot with the writing of paper. And I would also like to thank all my fellow classmates, who have given me great support in the course of the paper writing and during the whole four college years.

 

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