History of Translation Studies 5

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Translation Thoughts

On Form and Spirit in Translation 文偲荇 Wen Sixing

Key words

translation methods，form，sprit

关键词

翻译方法，翻译的形与神

Translation Strategies

Translation of Business Contracts from the Perspective of Functional Equivalence Theory 胡瑾 Hu Jin

Abstract

business contract and translation

Key words

business contract; Functional Equivalence Theory; contract translation

The Translation Strategies of Chinese Political Terms under the Standard of "Political Equivalence" 高明珠 Gao Mingzhu

Abstract

With the development of globalization, the political communication among countries is more and more frequent, and the translation of political terms has gradually become one of the heated topics in the translation field. Political terms translation is challenging, because not only does it concern the relationship between countries, national status, political attitude and other important issues, but also it is developmental. Political neologisms will keep emerging, and some political terms will contain new connotations with the advancement of the times. In addition to the above characteristics, Chinese political vocabulary has many affixes, abbreviations, four-character phrases, metaphors.In 2008, Yang Mingxing and other scholars put forward the "Political Equivalence" based on Eugene Nida's "Functional Equivalence" theory for the translation of Chinese political terms, which pointed out that the translation of political words should follow the three principles of "political", "dynamic" and "balanced". On the basis of some related papers, this chapter will sum up the specific strategies such as supplement, omission, keeping or converting analogical body, adding explanation and narration for translating Chinese political terms with characteristics of having lots of affixes, abbreviations, four-character phrases and metaphors following the guidance of "Political Equivalence".

Key words

political equivalence Chinese political terms translation strategies

摘要

随着全球化的发展，各国间的政治交流愈加频繁，政治词汇的翻译也逐渐成为翻译界讨论热点之一。政治词汇的翻译是具有挑战性的，不仅是因为它关系到国与国之间的关系、国家地位、政治态度等重要问题，而且因为政治词汇是发展性的，政治词汇中会不断有新的词汇涌进，且某些政治词汇会随着时代的发展而增加新的内涵。而中国政治词汇除了具有以上特点，它还有多词缀、缩写、四字短语[1]，多用隐喻等修辞手法的特点。2008年，杨明星等学者针对中国政治词汇的翻译，基于尤金·奈达的“功能对等”理论提出了“政治等效”翻译标准，该标准指出政治词汇的翻译要遵循“政治性”、“动态性”、“平衡性”三大原则。本文基于相关文献，总结出在该标准下，对中国政治词汇在具有多词缀、缩写、四字短语及多采用隐喻这几个特点下的翻译可采用的具体的翻译策略，如增补法、省略法[1]、喻体保留法（完全保留、部分保留）、喻体转换法、喻底补充法、喻义直叙法[2]等。

关键词

政治等效 中国政治词汇 翻译策略

Translation Appreciation

Study of Xu Chi’s translation of Walden from the Stylistic Perspective 袁诗琦 Yuan Shiqi

27.1.1 Abstract

Walden is a classic literary work of Henry David Thoreau, which has become a classic work in the Treasure house of American literature. The Chinese translator Xu Chi first translated it into China, and since then Walden has been retranslated and republished many times. In China, the version of Walden translated by Xu Chi is the most widely spread and influential one, and has been highly regarded as a classic translation. There are a lot of studies on Walden, both at home and abroad, such as studies on the ecology of the prose, studies on birth background and living conditions of the author Henry David Thoreau, and systematic studies on Chinese translation version of Walden under different theoretical frameworks. There are few studies on Chinese translations of Walden from stylistic perspective. This paper will focus on the lexical, syntactic, rhetorical features of Xu Chi’s translation and analyze its stylistic effects. It is hoped that this study will be of certain reference value to the translation studies of Walden and the literary translation criticism from the stylistic perspective.

27.1.2 Key words

Walden, Chinese Translation of Xu Chi , Stylistics

27.1.3 摘要

《瓦尔登湖》是亨利·大卫·梭罗的经典文学作品，已经成为美国文学宝库中的经典之作。中国译者徐迟首先将其译入国内，此后《瓦尔登湖》多次被重译再版。在中国，徐迟翻译的《瓦尔登湖》汉译本流传最广、影响最大，而且一直被推崇为“译文经典”。对于《瓦尔登湖》的研究，在国内和国外有很多，例如对散文涉及生态的研究，对于作者亨利·戴维·梭罗出生背景和生活状况的研究，以及不同的理论框架下对于《瓦尔登湖》中文翻译版本的系统研究。但是从文体学角度研究《瓦尔登湖》中译本的不多。本文着重探讨徐迟译本在词汇、句法、修辞层面上的特征，分析其文体效果。希望本研究对《瓦尔登湖》的翻译研究及从文体学视角开展文学翻译批评具有一定的参考价值。

27.1.4 关键词

《瓦尔登湖》、徐迟中译本、文体学

27.1.5.1.1 Introduction to Henry David Thoreau

Walden is a collection of essays written by American writer Henry David Thoreau. Henry David Thoreau was born in 1817 and died in 1862. He is a famous writer, philosopher, representative of Transcendentalism, abolitionist of slavery and naturalist in the United States. He was deeply influenced by Emerson. He advocated returning to the original mind and being close to nature. Thoreau created more than 20 first-class prose collections in his whole life. His essays are concise and powerful, simple and natural, full of thought, which hava unique style in American proses in the 19th century in the United States. In 1845, he lived in seclusion by Walden lake, two miles away from Concord. He cultivated and ate by himself and experienced a simple and close to nature life. Thoreau loved, appreciated and immersed in nature. He understood the world through nature and regarded the world as a whole for people to appreciate and enjoy. He advocated simple life, so he abandoned all material enjoyment and pursued spiritual enrichment. Thoreau lived a very simple life by Walden lake. With the keen thinking of a philosopher and the rigorous spirit of science, Thoreau put himself into the embrace of nature and explored everything around him.

27.1.5.1.2 Introduction to Walden

Walden is the record of Thoreau’s life when he lives alone by Walden lake. Walden is composed of 18 essays. It describes what he saw, heard and thought for more than two years. In the process of the change of four seasons, it records in detail Thoreau’s inner desire, conflict, disappointment and self-adjustment, as well as the complicated mental process of his desire again after adjustment, which go through several cycles until the final realization. Walden is a Transcendentalist classic and is recognized as the most popular nonfiction work in American literature. After more than 100 years of circulation, the book has become a classic in American literature. So far, it has been published in more than 150 editions and translated into more than 40 languages. Thoreau’s own practice in Walden lake and his works have a consistent proposition, that is, returning to nature. In his works, he constantly pointed out that most of us modern people are trapped by family, work and various material needs, lost their spiritual pursuit and lived a materialistic life. Thoreau persisted in the pursuit of spiritual happiness and rejected material comforts. This is why Thoreau lived a simple life by Walden lake, enjoying a life of leisure while his neighbors pursued a life of wealth and material comforts, enslaved by their own desires.

The Implications of Luther's Translation Principles amid Renaissance for Modern Literature Translation. 王美玲 Wang Meiling

王美玲 Wang Meiling

Abstract

The Renaissance is the fourth peak in the history of Western translation and a great development in the history of Western literature. During the 16th century and the period following the Renaissance in Europe, translation reached an unprecedented climax in the fields of thought, politics, philosophy, literature and religion. At that time, the German translation of the Bible by the Martin Luther is the most well-known one in the whole translation circle, and its influence is unique and long-standing in Germany as well as in the whole Europe continent. Since the Reform and Opening-up, China has gradually stepped into the center of the world arena, and its literary works bearing the quintessence of Chinese culture has become a crucial bridge connecting the rest of the world with China. Despite the rise of machine translation, it can never replace the overwhelming role of human translation in the literary translation. Luther’s translation thoughts have exerted an important influence on the development of Western translation theories, so what sparks can be drawn between his translation principles and Chinese modern culture and literary works? This paper makes a brief comment on the main translation activities of renaissance, then compares the translation thoughts of Luther and Lu Xun, and applies Luther’s detailed translation rules to the actual translation practice,finally analyzes the influence of Luther’s translation thoughts and principles on modern translation practice and their significance for reference.

Key words

Renaissance; Luther; literary works; translation principles; influence;

摘要

文艺复兴运动是西方翻译史的第四次高潮，也是西方文学史上的一次大发展。文艺复兴在欧洲普遍开展的16世纪以及随后一个时期，翻译活动达到了前所未有的高峰，深入思想、政治、哲学、文学宗教等各个领域。在整个翻译界，德国马丁·路德的《圣经》德译本是该时期最负盛名的译本，其影响不论是在德国乃至整个欧洲都是独一无二且源远流长的。改革开放以来，中国日益走进世界舞台中央，承载着中华文化精髓的文学作品成为了重要桥梁。纵然机器翻译兴起，但绝不能替代人工翻译在文学翻译领域的绝对性地位。路德的翻译思想对西方翻译理论的发展产生了重要影响，那么其翻译思想和理论原则与中国当代文化及文学作品又能擦出什么样的火花呢？本文将通过对文艺复兴时期的主要翻译活动进行简评，再对比路德与鲁迅的翻译思想，接着将路德的翻译细则运用到实际的翻译实践中，分析路德的翻译思想及理论原则对于当代翻译实践的影响以及借鉴意义。

关键词

文艺复兴；路德；文学作品；翻译原则；影响；

Introduction

The Protestant Reformation Movement in Germany in the 16th century ushered in a new era of translation and dissemination of Bible.Under the protection of Protestantism, Martin Luther devoted himself to the German translation of the Bible. By the time of 1544 Luther’s death, 430 versions of his Bible translation had been published. In order to make common people more directly understand the meaning of the Bible, Martin Luther translated it in national language. He insisted on his translation thought and fought against the church power and his opponents. He made unremitting efforts in the great project of the Bible translation, which promoted the unification of German language and created a graceful literary language.His translation thoughts are still of great significance to the current translation theory and practice."First of all, from a historical point of view, translation has two main functions in promoting the birth and development of national culture and the transformation of national culture into world culture: one is to promote cultural exchange; the other is to disseminate ideas."

Since the beginning of reform and opening-up, China has gradually stepped onto the world arena. China persists in its cultural development geared to the needs of the world and actively promotes cultural development to the world. Literary works bear the essence of Chinese culture, whose export is an crucial way to spread Chinese culture to the world. Over the years, despite the rise of machine translation, which has a certain practical role, it can not replace the overwhelming role of manual translation in literary translation. So what significance does Luther’s translation thought and theory born in the reform era have in guiding modern translation theory and practice, especially in the field of literary translation?

Chapter 1 Brief comments on translation thoughts in the period of Renaissance

1.1

1.2

1.3

1.4

Study on Interpreter's Memory and Translation Memory in Interpreting 康浩宇 Kang Haoyu

Chapter 1 Introduction

1.1 Background

Memory plays an important role in interpreting and it is a kind of interpreting competence. The information processing in interpreting is complicated. When the information is input, interpreter first recognize and keep the information, which will then be analyzed, encoded, stored and retrieved. And the interpreter finally decode the information into target language(Wang Jianhua, 2019).Because of the fast input of information and limited time for pausing, great memory is required for interpreters. Whether a good or poor memory has a direct effect on the quality of interpreting. With the development of science and technology, machine translation and computer aided translation, which is also called CAT, was invented as two effective and efficient ways for translation. In CAT, there is a concept called translation memory. Different from human beings’ memory, translation memory is more likely a database. Nowadays, translation memory of CAT has been put into wide use in translation. And in recent years, translation memory has also been applied as a tool in interpreting. As the technology is not yet mature, there are still some limitation and weakness.

1.2 Significance of the Study

There are some studies on the memory of interpreters. But most of them focus on its practical aspects such as how to improve interpreters’ memory or how to make the best of memory in interpreting, instead of substantial facts. The nature of memory and mechanism of memory is also worthy to be studied, so readers can have better understanding and cognition of what is memory and how it works. Therefore, readers can better address our problems in memory of interpreting. The study will fully analyze memory from the aspect of psychology and science. And then it will study on memory of interpreting in details including systems, mechanism, coding and theories. Translation memory is quite a novel topic as it belongs to a sort of science and technology. As the world stepped into information era, digital era and even Artificial Intelligence era, translation memory has been used more widely than ever before. It really facilitates the translators as it both saves a lot of time and greatly improved the translation efficiency. However, there are few studies on the translation memory application in interpreting field. Actually, in many situations, interpreters also uses this kind of technology to help their interpreting. They study will research on the fact of translation memory in interpreting.

1.3 Structure of the Study

This thesis will be developed in five chapters. Chapter 1, the introduction part, is initiated by introducing the background, research problems, and significance of the study. Chapter 2 is functioned to define and categorize the memory. Chapter 3 will present the memory mechanism and related theories in interpreting. Chapter 4 will mainly focus on the translation memory technology at present and its application in interpreting. The concluding chapter generalizes the content of the study and put forward the limitations.

Chapter 2 Study on Memory

2.1 The definition of the Memory

Memory has different definitions in different fields. Generally speaking, human memory is a reflection of what the brain has experienced. From the perspective of psychology, memory is the recognition, maintenance, reappearance of experienced things by the human brain, and it is the basis of advanced psychological activities such as thinking and imagination. It is the retention and extraction of past experience by human brain. It is a psychological process in which individual experience is accumulated and preserved in the mind. All things that have been perceived can be kept in people's minds, and can be reproduced when necessary. This refers to the process in which the human brain encodes, stores and extracts meaningful information input from the outside world(Peng Danlin，1991). From the perspective of neurology, human memory is closely related to the changes of chemical composition in hippocampus and brain. All memory that exists in the brain depends on various nerve cells of the brain, which are called neurons. According to information processing theory, memory process is the process of encoding, storing and extracting input information. Only coded information can be remembered. Coding is the process of processing and transforming the input information, and coding is the key stage of the whole memory process.

2.2. Memory Systems

Based on the structure, memory can be categorized into three systems. There are sensory memory, short term memory and long term memory. The later two systems are also often referred as STM and LTM. The three memory systems are different from each other but closely related.

2.2.1 Sensory Memory

As the shortest memory system, sensory memory is the first channel for human brain to get the information. It has some capacity. According the research in Cognitive Psychology(Wang Su, Wang Ansheng, 1992), People’s visual sensory capacity is more than 9 chunk while their auditory sensory memory capacity has less capacity, which is about chunk. chunk here are memory units, and the size of chunk varies with people's knowledge and experience. A chunk can be a word, a number, a phrase, a sentence, a word list, etc. Sensory memory works as temporary storage for sensory information. It depends on the physical nature of external stimulus to code the information and it is the real copy and transcription of the external stimulus. Most sensory memory can stay for one to two seconds and then disappear. Only with more attention and focus can the sensory memory be processed and then become short term memory(Bao Gang, 2005). People’s visual sensory memory can just keep for less than one second while their auditory sensory memory can keep for 4 seconds. It is inevitable that information will lose with the disappearance of sensory memory.

2.2.2 Short Term Memory

Short term memory is the second memory system. Short term memory is based on the neuron network in hippocampus. It keeps the information that has been selected in the hippocampus of human brain. In some cases, part of information will move from the short memory in hippocampus to long term memory in cerebral cortex. In psychology, short term memory can keep for about one minute with the capacity of about 7 chunks. That means that people can memorize seven unrelated numbers or phonemes for about one minute with their short term memory. However, the capacity of short term memory is not decided by the amount of stimulus but by the modes of chunk and coding. Chunks can effectively expand the capacity of short-term memory. When processing information, people can use the knowledge and experience stored in long-term memory to combine several single stimuli into larger information units, which can effectively expand and increase short-term memory span and improve memory efficiency. Moreover, the coding of short-term memory is mainly auditory coding, and there are also visual coding and semantic coding. Instead of chunk and information unit, people can also use retelling to transfer short term memory to long term memory. Retelling refers to the psychological operation process of repeating the materials just memorized by language to consolidate memory. In the case of retelling, the learning materials kept in short-term memory will transfer to long-term memory. The content of short-term memory can be transformed into long-term memory by retelling.

There is a special type of short term memory, working memory. The concept working memory was first proposed by Baddeley and Hitch. It is used to describe the process of a person temporarily memorizing the fact and thoughts when addressing problems or working(Baddeley, 2006). In spite of limited resources and storage time, working memory is still different from short term memory in temporary storage of information(Hitch, 2012). Compared with short term memory which store information passively, the working memory process is more dynamic. Generally speaking, there are three differences. First, working memory emphasizes storing and processing information at the same time, while short-term memory only focuses on information storage. Secondly, working memory is a multi-factor system, while short-term memory is a single system. Third, working memory is more important than short-term memory for many advanced brain functions and even almost all human cognitive work(Wang Jianhua, 2019). The disappear of short term memory is often due to the interruption.

2.2.3 Long Term Memory

Different from short term memory, long term memory is stored in human’s cerebral cortex where there is more room for storage. Long term memory is very important in keeping information for long time. It can keep information for more than one minute and even for a whole life. Its capacity is unlimited. All the information kept by long term memory has been selected and filtered.According to Tulving, long term memory is stored mainly as two types(Tulving, 1974). They are episodic memory and semantic memory. Episodic memory is about one’s experience of some specific situations. Semantic memory refers to knowledge such as words, concepts, rules and other abstract things.

Machine Translation

On the C-E Translation of Traditional Chinese Medicine Instructions from the Perspective of Adaptation Theory - A Case Study of Yulin Pharmaceutical Company

陈永相 Chen Yongxiang

Abstract

Traditional Chinese Medicine (hereinafter referred to as TCM), the precious property of Chinese medicine culture, boasts the favorable curative effect and a good reputation across the world. With the smooth development of “The Belt and Road Initiative” and national economy, TCM has been playing an increasingly significant role in international trade, attracting more attention of foreign medical experts and consumers. As the essential attachment of a medicine, medicine instructions belong to the genre of practical writing, characterized by the unique language structure and stylistic features, guiding doctors and patients to learn and understand the medicines, such as usage and dosage, actions and indications, contraindication, etc. The translation of TCM instructions is a significant part of TCM translation, the quality of which determines whether the Chinese medicines could be understood and used properly by doctors and patients, as well as the prosperity of TCM in international trade. Due to the inevitable differences in language and culture between English and Chinese, however, plenty of problems appear on the C-E translation of TCM instructions.

According to Adaptation Theory proposed by the Belgian pragmatist Jef Verschueren, language use is a dynamic process of continuous choice-making and adaptation. Translation is a cross-cultural communication activity, which involves language usage and requires translators to make choices of words, translation strategies and so on between source language and target language, and to adapt with different contexts, mentalities, cultures, etc. so as to achieve the ideal goal, from which the Adaptation Theory can be applied exactly into the study of translation. This paper will apply Adaptation Theory, therefore, as the theoretical framework, to study the C-E translation of TCM instructions of Yulin Pharmaceutical Company. Employing the core concepts and investigating aspects of Adaptation Theory, the author tries to further discuss how to better translate TCM instructions.

Key words

Traditional Chinese Medicine instruction translation, Adaptation Theory, Yulin Pharmaceutical Company

摘要

中药是我国医药文化的瑰宝，有着良好的疗效和口碑。随着“一带一路倡议”的稳步推进和中国经济的平稳发展，中药药品在国际贸易中所占比重日益增加，得到了国外许多医疗专家和消费者的关注。药品说明书作为药品的重要附件，是一种实用文体，有其自身的语言结构和文体特点，能够指导医生与患者了解和熟悉药品作用、用法用量、适应症和禁忌等。而中医药品说明书英译作为中医英译的一个重要组成部分，其英译质量决定了药品能否被医生和患者正确理解和使用，以及中医药产品的国际贸易繁荣。然而，由于英语和汉语之间存在着不可避免的语言和文化差异，中医药品说明书英译依然存在着较大问题。

比利时语用学家维索尔伦提出的语言顺应论认为，语言的使用是一个不断作出选择和顺应的动态过程。翻译作为一项跨文化交际活动，需要在源语与目的语之间，就用词、翻译策略等方面进行选择，对不同语境、心理、文化等层面作出顺应。可见顺应论适用于翻译研究。因此本文以顺应论作为理论依据，通过对广西玉林制药公司中医药品说明书英译进行分析研究，运用顺应论的核心概念和研究视角，进一步探讨如何更好地翻译中医药品说明书。

关键词

中医药品说明书翻译，顺应论，玉林制药公司

1.Introduction

1.1 Research Background of the Study

As the precious property of Chinese medicine culture, TCM has been through a profound history in China. Since “The Belt and Road Initiative” proposed for the first time, as an indispensable part in medical industry, TCM has tapped the potential of development opportunity to boost its reform so as to better make inroads into the international market. Guangxi Yulin Pharmaceutical Company is a renowned TCM pharmacy enterprise mainly engaged in R&D, production and sales of Chinese medicines, one of the China Top 50 TCM pharmacy enterprises, boasting 12 national protected TCM varieties. In 2015, Consun Pharmaceutical Group Lt. has successfully brought partial share of Yulin Pharmaceutical Company, which, in return, brought opportunities for the IPO and industrialization of the company. As the essential attachment of TCM medicine, the instructions guide doctors and patients to learn and understand the medicine correctly, which closely relates to consumer safety and are of great significance. The translation of TCM instructions is a significant part of TCM translation, the quality of which determines whether the Chinese medicines could be understood and used properly by doctors and patients, as well as the prosperity of TCM in international trade. The high quality translation versions of TCM instructions will accelerate TCM to enter into the international market, to occupy more competitive market share, and to better popularize the excellent TCM culture.

1.2 Significance and Purpose of the Study

It is noticed that studies and researches on TCM at home and abroad have boomed since the ancient Silk Road period. Regarding the translation of TCM instructions, however, little attention has been drawn from experts. Because of the inevitable differences in language and culture between English and Chinese, a lot of problems appear on the translation of TCM instructions. And against such a backdrop, there are still no settled rules or translation standards to be applied and favored in the translation of TCM instructions, hence it’s quite essential to touch upon the area of C-E translation of TCM instructions in a more comprehensive and systematic way so as to find out more effective methods and strategies for the instruction translation. Adaptation Theory is proposed by Jef Verschueren, he thinks that language use is a dynamic process of continuous choice-making and adaptation. As a cross-cultural communication activity, translation is a type of language use and requires translators to make choices of words, translation strategies and so forth between source language and target language. A good translation version of TCM instructions can appropriately guide both doctors and patients to understand the pharmacological functions, usage and dosage, actions and indications and contraindications of medicines. Therefore, the quality of instruction translation has a direct impact on whether TCM can be favored and obtained a good reputation among overseas medical industry and consumers. This paper studies the C-E translation of TCM instructions of Yulin Pharmaceutical Company under the guidance of Adaptation Theory, trying to take the Company as a case study to further discuss how to translate TCM instructions in a better way.

2.Literature Review

2.1 Features of TCM Instructions

Being the essential attachment of a medicine, the instruction contains important information that explains what the medicine is, how to take it and the effects after taking it, guiding doctors and patients to understand and use medicines properly. It closely relates to consumers’ safety. Thus, TCM instructions must be objective, accurate and concise. However, the information covered in most TCM instructions is drug name, ingredients, actions and indications, usage and dosage, while adverse effects, precautions, pharmacological effects, drug interaction, contraindications etc. are quite simple, even without any description of these items, failing to meet the requirement of international standards.

Besides, due to the profound history of TCM developed in China, most of the unique TCM languages derived from the abstract philosophical concepts of ancient times remain being used until now, say, classical style and semi-classical style, which are accepted and favored by the TCM community, causing difficulties in translating them into English. And hence four-character structure, vagueness and ambiguity of the language, and no equivalence between Chinese and English are the main features of TCM instructions.

The four-character structure is concise but comprehensive in meaning, implying the extensive and abstract medical concepts of TCM. The tradition of using it to describe the symptoms and ways of treatment in TCM hasn’t been changed over time but continued to be applied and advocated in modern society. The TCM instructions are difficult to understand and translate, for the peculiar traits of TCM language, as well as the technical terms coming, directly or indirectly, from the abstract medical concepts of TCM, characterized by the unique treatment method as a whole in human body, and seeking to find answers and balance principles in nature to explain the causes and treatments of diseases, which is usually not the literal one but beyond cognition. In addition, there are gaps and non-equivalence between TCM and Western Medicine. Most TCM instruction translations apply technical terms from Latin in terms of ingredients, but adopt simple words and phrases for describing actions and indications, since the TCM language with Chinese characteristics finds no match in English. Ordinary people, as well as translators, who do not have the professional knowledge may have great difficulty in understanding and translating them.

2.2 Studies of TCM Instruction Translation

Traditional Chinese Medicine wasn’t legal once in the United States until 1975, as many scholars and experts were skeptical about its medical theory and way of treatment. Since the establishment of China, the government has been devoting great efforts to the recognition and popularization of TCM across the world. And from then on, a lot of studies and researches based on the translation of TCM have been published at home and abroad. Regarding the translation of TCM instructions, however, little attention has been drawn from the experts. In view of the special wording and the abstract theory of TCM, the translation of TCM instructions is of great difficulty and complexity.

Currently, the translation of TCM instructions on the market, to a large extent, lacks readability and translation standards. Against such a backdrop, some scholars have striven to make some breakthroughs yet. Nigel Wiseman (2000) systematically elaborates the concept of “oriented by the source” in his dissertation, Translation of Chinese Medicine Terms: A Source Oriented Approach, in terms of the translation of TCM language, believing that the translation of TCM, as well as the instructions, should respect the original style and keep it in the target text as much as possible. In 2002, Translation of TCM Directions (《中医药说明书的英译》) written by Ouyang Lifeng (2002) put forward some practical methods for the translation of TCM instructions. He advocates “naturalization” and “readjustment”, namely, adaptation strategy, should be applied in translation, and if necessary, some additions and deletions are acceptable on the basis of faithfulness to the original text. Guided by Professor Ouyang, his student, Xiaoqiong, applies Peter Newmark’s Communicative Approach in her master’s thesis, On the Translation of TCM Booklets of Direction-The Communicative Approach (2008) to study the features of TCM instructions, suggesting that different approaches should be adopted regarding to different parts of the instructions. On translation Strategies of Chinese Medicine Instruction from the Perspective of Functionalist Approaches written by Luo Haiyan (2009) conducts a relatively profound research under the guidance of Functionalist Approach in terms of each part of TCM instructions. She finds out the translation of TCM instructions is not very identical and comprehensible. Cao Qing’s thesis, A Study on Translation of Chinese Pharmaceutical Instruction (2011) states the common problems of translation instructions and advises three translation methods, namely literal translation, conversion and free translation under the Skopos Theory. There are still other scholars aiming at one aspect or another to further study the translation of TCM instructions, all of which exert a significant impact for references in translating TCM instructions. From the perspectives of Zhang Mengjing (1995), Ning Zhishou and Liu Cuiwei (1997), and Fu Wei (2006), the current TCM instruction translation lacks faithfulness, readability and incompatibility with conventional norms, suggesting that more attention should be paid in this field.

Conclusion can be drawn from the above literature that studies on TCM instruction translation can be conducted from a wide scope. For the great distinction between western and Chinese culture, and the abstract medical principles of TCM, much has to be done to make the translation of TCM instructions more comprehensible and compatible with target cultures and consumers.

3.Adaptation Theory Applied in Traditional Chinese Medicine Instruction Translation of Yulin Pharmaceutical Company

From what has been mentioned above, as the important attachment of TCM, the instructions provide the correct and detailed medical information to doctors and consumers, guiding them to take medicine scientifically and properly, and hence the medicine instructions must be objective, accurate and concise. As one of the China Top 50 TCM pharmacy enterprises, Guangxi Yulin Pharmaceutical Company is a famous brand in the whole country, boasting 12 national protected TCM varieties, and the buyout also boosts the process of IPO and reform. Through observation of the C-E translation instructions of TCM for foreigners and export, hence there are some certain instructive significance for the translation of TCM instructions. Because of the special characteristics of TCM instructions and the limited information included in the instructions of the company, this part tries to analyze the C-E translation instructions from the perspective of Adaptation Theory, mainly employing the contextual correlates of adaptability, structural objects of adaptability and dynamics of adaptability, to further discuss how to better translate TCM instructions.

3.1 Contextual Correlates of Adaptability in TCM Instruction Translation

As introduced earlier, according to Verschueren, the ingredients of contextual correlates of adaptability largely include the physical world, social world, and mental world. However, the author will mainly concentrates on the adaptation to the mental world and social world due to the limited materials collected.

3.1.1 Adaptation to the Mental World

Regarding the mental world, it involves the personality, emotions, beliefs, cognitive levels, motivations, intentions and so on of both sides of language users. In the translation process, translators should take target readers’ mind into account, not just concentrating on personal mental world or literally translating the original text from one language to another language without any adaptation.

Basically, consumers of drugs tend to rely on more renowned brands when facing a bunch of medicines displayed on the shelves. The key to attract their attention not only counts on the high quality of TCM, but also on the instructions with rigorous standards, concise specification and overall comprehensibility, delivering a sense of authority and credibility.

To begin with, the name of drugs is the most direct information delivered to the consumers. Thus, a good name of the TCM can catch the eyes of buyers in the very beginning. “正骨水” is the most famous and important product of Yulin Pharmaceutical Company, however, the translation of its name in the instruction simply applies transliteration and Chinese Pinyin, namely, “Zheng Gu Shui” , which fails to adapt with the mental world of target readers. Apparently, Pinyin isn’t the way of expression that they are familiar with. Translators should consider their mental expectation and make adaptation with their familiar ways of expression. In that point, “Bone-setting Liquor” would be a better name for the medicine. “Bone-setting” means the medicine is effective for the symptoms of bone problems, and “liquor” implies the ingredients involved alcohol and other irritating ingredients so that consumers can be aware of the precautions and avoid using it on fragile mucous membranes and anabrotic wounds. Also, the same type of medicine can apply the same way of translation, such as, “金装正骨水” can be translated to “Golden Bone-setting Liquor”, and “极品正骨水” is rendered as “Superb Bone-setting Liquor”. Such a name conveys the correct medical information to consumers and better adapt to their thinking patterns.

Another example is “睡安胶囊”, the translation version is “Shui’an Jiaonang” . Obviously, it will confuse foreigners since they don’t recognize Chinese Pinyin in their cognitive levels. Translators should at least use “capsule” to indicate the medicine is some type of capsules effective for the sleeping problems. A well-recognized name will arouse attention and interest among consumers, attracting them to purchase the medicine. In order to adapt with their mental expectation and intention, as Ouyang (2002) advocates, naturalization or domesticating translation can be applied in translation. “Sleep Mate” or “Insomnia Killer” can better attract their attention and adapt with their beliefs and cognitive levels. In English, “mate” is a common word, which will be more acceptable and natural in such combination, and “killer” combined with “insomnia” implies the meaning of solving the insomnia problems, which is also more suitable and adaptable with their emotions and motivations.

A good name of the medicine can not only imply the function of the medicine, conveying the essential information to customers, but also can draw their attention and arouse their desires to purchase the medicine. Meeting the demand and preference with the mental world of target people is also one of the requirements of medicine instructions. Under the guidance of Adaptation Theory, if transliteration or simply adopting Chinese Pinyin to translate the names of medicines will confuse customers and cause misunderstanding, adaptation is required, and not just words, but also translation strategies should be taken consideration when making adaptation.

3.1.2 Adaptation to the Social World

Verschueren (2000:91) states that there is no principled limit to the range of social factors that linguistic choices are inter-adaptable with. Basically, social settings and culture play a significant role in the process of translation. What distinguishes TCM from Western Medicine mainly lies on the cultural differences. Language is the carrier of culture, and the cultural differences can be embodied in different languages, and then shown and reflected in society. Instruction translation, as the cross-cultural communication activity, is influenced largely by cultural differences in different social worlds. Followings are the very typical translation examples to illustrate the point:

Example 1(感冒止咳露)

Source Text (ST): 用于感冒或流感发热，头痛鼻塞, 伤风咳嗽，咽痛，肢痛

Target Text (TT): Used for the treatment of cold, flu and fever, headache and nasal congestion, wind damage cough, angina and melalgia

Revised Text (RT): Used for cold, flu, fever, headache, snuffle, cough, sore throat and pain in muscles

Traditionally, “伤风” in Chinese means getting cold because of the invasion of “风” into the human body. “风” is actually one of the six exogenous pathogenic factors according to the medical theory of TCM, which cannot be explained from the perspective of Western Medicine. In western society, people have no concept that the natural phenomenon, say, “风” or “火”, will cause diseases in the human body. So the revised text deletes this term with TCM characteristics to avoid ambiguity and makes it more natural and understandable in English. In addition, most common patients who seek to buy medicines in pharmacies might not have the specific knowledge of medical field due to different social settings and backgrounds, thus, “angina” and “melalgia” might be beyond recognition and acceptance. Western world highlights the importance of brevity and conciseness in their society, and they place emphasis on simplification and efficiency, seldom using the very technical terms in their lives. Such social settings and cultural differences must be considered so as to make adaptation when translating. Besides, “nasal congestion” is the word-for-word translation and may cause misunderstanding among foreigners. So the revised text adopts “snuffle” and “sore throat” to indicate the meaning of “鼻塞” and “咽痛”, applying these simple words to make adaptation with cultural differences in different social worlds, and renders “melalgia” into “pain in muscles” to better deliver the meaning of “肢痛”.

Example 2 (治咳枇杷露)

ST: 治疗儿童伤风呃逆，咳嗽痰盛

TT: Used for children’s wind-damage hiccup, cough and exuberant phlegm

RT: Used for cold, hiccup, cough and sputum in children

Similarly, example 2 also translates “ 伤风” into “ wind damage”, which is not appropriate in such description. As mentioned above, additions and deletions, if necessary, can be applied to make adaptation in translation. So the revised text deletes “wind damage” and “exuberant phlegm”, adopting noun coordination and making it more readable and adaptable to the social world of target readers.

Literal translation of instructions is not always the first option in the C-E translation of instructions. For translators, the first thing they should consider is to be faithful to the original meaning of the text, not the text itself. They need to make adaptation to the target readers’ social world, for instance, social status, social settings, social background, cultural differences, etc., striving to make the translation concise and easy to understand in their society. Amid such different social worlds, translators must bear in mind to render localization of different cultures to make adaptation without causing ambiguity and misunderstanding while successfully keeping and delivering the implied meanings as much as possible.--Chen Yongxiang (talk) 04:26, 30 November 2020 (UTC)

References

--Chen Yongxiang (talk) 12:41, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

Will Machine Translation Replace Human Translation or not? 莫玲 Mo Ling

Abstract

Science and technology constitute a primary productive force. In the contemporary era, with the continuous development of science and technology, artificial intelligence has shown more and more mighty strength, and machine translation has also been derived in the field of translation. In this regard, many people are beginning to worry that machine translation will one day replace human translation. When it comes to me, science and technology is people-oriented, and the continuous development of it aims at servimg mankind in a better standard. Therefore, it is not realistic to separate science and technology from humanities. The appropriate way to solve this dilemma is to integrate the two to achieve the perfectly qualitative change of "1 + 1 > 2". This paper will first analyze the cons and pros of human translation and machine translation, and then explore the development of computer-aided translation based on the combination of the two types above.

Key Words

Human Translation, Machine Translation, CAT, Compatibility

摘要

科技是第一生产力。在当代，随着科学技术的不断发展，人工智能展现出越来越强大的实力，在翻译领域也相应地衍生出了机器翻译。对此许多人都开始担心机器翻译终有一天会取代人工翻译。在笔者看来，科技以人为本，科学技术的不断发展是为了更好的为人类服务。因而将科技与人文割裂开来的观点是并不现实的，最好的解决办法应是将二者结合起来，实现1+1大于2的完美质变。本文将分析人工翻译与机器翻译各自的优势和劣势，进而探讨二者相结合的后的计算机辅助翻译的发展。

关键词

人工翻译，机器翻译，计算机辅助翻译，融合

Introduction

A Brief Analysis of the Chinese-English Public Sign Translation 袁天翼 Yuan Tianyi

浅析汉语公示语的英译

英语笔译 袁天翼

摘 要：在这个经济全球化、政治多极化、文化全球化、科技现代化、信息共享化的时代，全球经济纵深发展，人类命运共同体日趋形成，人与人、国家与国家间的联系日益密切，这时，汉语公示语的英译问题便被提上了议程。尽管中国汉语公示语的英译翻译员越来越多，但是汉语公示语的英译问题层出不穷。本文简析了汉语公示语定义，例举了生活中常见的一些汉语公示语的英译典型问题，并针对此给出了一些翻译方法与策略，并进行了未来展望。

关键词：汉英翻译；公示语；翻译策略

A Brief Analysis of the Chinese-English Public Sign Translation

MTI Yuan Tianyi

Abstract: In this economic globalization, political polarization, cultural globalization, technological modernization and informative sharing age, the global economy is deeply developing, and the human community with a shared future is coming into shape day by day. The relations among people and among countries are increasing day by day. At this time, the problems of Chinese-English public sign translation become the topic of us. Though the number of Chinese-English public sign translators in China grows daily, the problems of Chinese-English public sign translation emerge endlessly. This passage offers a brief analysis of the definition of Chinese-English public sign, points out some typical problems in Chinese-English public sign translation we see in daily life, analyzes some methods and strategies of Chinese-English public sign translation, and gives some outlooks on the future of Chinese-English public sign translation.

Key Words: Chinese-English translation; public sign; translation strategies

A Brief Analysis of the Chinese-English Public Sign Translation

I. Introduction

The public sign is a specially applied literary form that was formed in modern times, which has a long history. It is used in public places and seen by the masses thus realizing unique communicative purposes. The public sign has become a crucial link in the communication between China and other countries in the international community. In the meantime, there are increasingly more experts and scholars paying attention to the translation of Chinese public signs into English. (Reiss, 2004).

As an important tool for international communication, Chinese-English public sign translation plays an extremely important role in foreign friends’ understanding of Chinese culture（Wang Huili, 2019）. Its applied range is so wide that nearly covers every aspect of our daily life, including: Introductions of tourism trips, propaganda languages, warning languages, road signs, shop signs and advertising boards. It is mostly used on public infrastructure: Subway, airport, taxi, pier, tourist spot, park, street, community, shop, supermarket, restaurant, bank, hotel, cinema, hospital and etc. It uses simple words or sentences, or pictures only, or combines words and pictures to pass useful information to the masses, which not only serves Chinese people, but also is shown to the foreigners, which can help foreigners in China study, work and live.

II. The Current Situation of Chinese-English Public Sign

Public signs are an art of convincing others through effective verbal means, which are also components of language activities. They, in essence, belong to a special kind of communication. However, it is not a kind of face-to-face communication that takes place in a specific period of time, and none of the participants will appear as individuals. The object is for all the people with social behaviors in the place, regardless of gender, age, class or education level. Public signs belong to “one-way communication”, and its binding force or influence will not be as big as direct communication, but it is also used to act with words and deeds, and affects the behavior of the audience with a clear purpose.

Public signs are everywhere, so what are their functions? Zhou Shuxia (Zhou Shuxia, 2017) thinks that, their functions can be divided into showing, warning, profiting, encouraging and eulogizing such five functions.

Firstly, the public sign that has showing function offers all-round information about service, order, or informing service. Such as “Car Rental” and “Children and Senior Citizens Free”.

Secondly, the public sign that has warning function comes up with restrictive or obligatory demands to typical people, which is often used through order, ban, information or persuasion tones. Such as: “Stand in Line” , and “Thieves Beware”.

Thirdly, the public sign that has profiting function promotes consumption, thus realizing enterprises’ economic profits. Such as: “Daily Special”, “Daily Service”.

Fourthly, the public sign that has encouraging function calls for or encourages people to take actions for certain goals or tasks. Such as: “One Family, One Child”, and “Working together, we can make a world of difference”.

Fifthly, the public sign that has eulogizing function gives wishes and chants to certain events or people to reach the goals of propaganda or education. Such as: “One World, One Dream”.

Eugene Nida (Eugene Nida , 2004) said, Chinese-English translation of public signs embraces the conversion of two different languages and two different cultures, which is not only to achieve the language equivalence, cultural equivalence, but also to enhance the possibility of understanding and the reading of Chinese-English translation of public signs.

Public signs are the translation with strong humanistic color (Wu Haoxi , 2019).

However, there are many problems in Chinese-English public sign translation.

In 2003, Clive W. J. Granger, a Nobel Economics Prize Winner talked of the settings and problems of public signs in Beijing when he was interviewed by a program of Beijing TV Station. He said: “Foreigners will feel a little bit nervous when they come to China, because they can not understand public signs in China. ” Clive’s comment extremely shows current problems in Chinese-English public sign translation (Lv Hefa, 2005).

On June 20th, 2017, a national standard conference of the Standard for English Translation and Writing in the Field of Public Service was held in Beijing. The Vice Minister of the Education Ministry and Director of the National Language Commission stressed in the meeting: “The language and character industry of China is expanding from ‘striving to promote and normally use the national common language, scientifically protecting every nation’s language and character’ to ‘managing social foreign language use and improving foreign language service quality’. ” The national standard of the Standard for English Translation and Writing in the Field of Public Service is the standard of English translation and writing quality in public service fields, which stipulates the English translation principles, methods and requirements of transportation, tourism, culture, entertainment, physical exercise, education, medical health, postal service, telecommunication, catering, accommodation, commerce and finance these thirteen service fields.

To sum up, there are still many major problems in China’s public sign translation, common and ubiquitous, which make foreign experts comment like that and the government use national force to normalize translation standards. Whether the translation of public signs in scenic spots into English is harmonious and unified has a great influence on cross-cultural communication (Pinkham John, 2000).

III. The Causes of Chinese-English Public Sign Translation Mistakes

3. 1 The Basic Linguistic Mistakes

To be a proficient Chinese-English public sign translator, one must, fundamentally, grasp basic linguistic rules of English and Chinese, otherwise he or she must make stupid mistakes, and some even primary learners will not make.

No.1 [1] for original source.

No.1 is a public sign put on a glass wall in a mall, the Chinese reads“全年无休(QUAN NIAN WU XIU)”, and it tries to use English to express that “This business runs the whole year”, so the precise translation should be “NO REST DAY ALL YEAR”. But there, we can see it was translated as“365DAY SA TEAR”, which does not belong to the grammatical law of English. So this is a big mistake. Only one who understands Chinese can understand. But for ordinary foreigners, they can not. So, when translating Chinese-English public sign, the translator must be clear about the target language, and know the basic grammatical venation, then begin to translate, instead of randomly putting some letters together and finishing. Otherwise, the translator will make a big mistake like this picture.

A public sign in Haichang Ocean Park of Chengdu City, Sichuan Province reads "Jellyfish Museum, the 2th floor". More specifically, it is a floor direction sign. Here, the correct English for the second floor should be “2nd”, not “2th”. Apparently that the translator has poor knowledge of English vocabulary, which led he or she to make such a ridiculous mistake. Actually, in English language, if there is a number contains “11”, “12”or “13”, its ordinal numeral should be written as “11th”, “12th” or “13th” respectively; And if there is a number contains“1”, “2”or “3”, its ordinal numeral should be written as “1st”, “2nd” or “3rd” respectively. For example, “101st”, “111th”, “201st”, “211th” and etc.

No.3 is a warning sign of a tourist spot, reads "The rockery danger, pleases no climb", whose Chinese meaning is “There stands a rockery, it is dangerous to climb, every one is forbidden from climbing it. ” The Chinese meaning is alright. But, when it was translated into English, a big mistake occurred: “The rockery danger Pleases no climb.”

First, there should be “climbing” after “no”, not “climb”, this is just English grammar knowledge that can be learned in primary school; And the “Please” is followed by a “s”, why does the translator use third person singular at the top of a imperative sentence? Second, if the translator wants to tell the tourists that the rockery is dangerous and mustn’t be climbed, he or she should write: “The rockery is dangerous. Please don’t climb” or “Dangerous rockery. No climbing” or just “No climbing”. Unless the foreigners who see this sign have supreme understanding ability, they will not easily make sense of it.

3. 2 The Tendency Towards Chinglish and Mechanical Translation

Knowing a little about English, then begin to translate public sign. This is ridiculous, which is definitely going to cause obvious mistakes. Especially when translating, there is a high probability that the translator will make Chinglish errors, or tend to seek for mechanical translation, which are the most common public sign translation problems in mainland China. With regard to the tendency towards Chinglish, it only proves that the translator’s basic skills of English are not so proficient, and he or she does not fit for translation work. For the tendency towards mechanical translation, on the one hand, it demonstrates that the translator is lazy, who is not willing to think about how to translate. On the other hand, it reveals his or her lack of basic English language knowledge. In fact, these two both can be easily avoided, only if the translator pays a little more attention to it or is earnest and dedicated to their work. All those mistakes should not have been made.

No.4, this is a sign that is hung in an Internet celebrity milk tea shop: Sexytea of Changsha City, Hunan Province. It reads "out of the cup area". It originally means that the customers should queue here to get their milk tea after finishing paying. The translator should have easily translated “出杯区（CHU BEI QU）”into “FETCH AREA”, but it was translated as “OUT OF THE CUP AREA”, what a joke! Purely it was translated word-for-word. The translator did not understand its true meaning. Probably it was translated by a machine. As an Internet celebrity milk tea shop runner, when dealing with such kind of cultural issues, he or she should be extremely careful, earnest and cautious, instead of casually simply copying the contents given by a machine or hiring a third-rate translator and asking him or her to randomly translate. Large scale milk tea shops must shoulder their required obligations, and undertake necessary responsibilities and duties on public sign translation. Imagine that a foreigner, who can not understand it, stand there and think: What? Standing here is standing outside the cup? Maybe something interesting would happen. Let me try! All those will bring big and standing jokes.

No.5 is a public sign in Mount Emei of Emei City, Sichuan Province. It reads" tourists get off area". Its Chinese meaning is: This is the place that tourists get off from a bus. But, it was translated as “Tourists get off area”, which fully shows the ignorance and lack of English language knowledge of the translators. People may can not help doubting whether it is copied from the translation given by a machine. Famous tourist spots like this, especially this kind of 5A tourist spot, can not even shoulder the cultural obligations, let alone developing in the long run. They should make big mistakes in such a little public sign translation! Do they only want to serve Chinese well while ignoring foreigners?

Similarly, No.6 is a public sign in Mount Emei of Emei City, Sichuan Province, and it reads "up the mountain". The Chinese meaning is “This is the passage that leads tourists to climb the mountain”. The translation should have been a very easy and fun job, but when the sign is showed to tourists, a big big joke was born: “Up the mountain”. We can say “uphill way” or “uphill passage”, but, the translator obviously did not realize it. What’s more, when “up” is used as a verb, it is completely another meaning. It is also the symbol of such irresponsible spot management.

No.7, it is a napkin given by an Internet celebrity milk tea shop (Sexytea of Changsha City, Hunan Province ) for free after buying its milk tea. It reads "more China, more fashion". At first glance, everything seems okay. But more carefully, we can find the mistake. The Chinese meaning is “If there are more elements with Chinese characteristics, it will be more fashionable.” But when translating, maybe with the aid of machine, or lack of a solid English knowledge foundation, it becomes “More China, more fashion”. If the customer is a Chinese, it does not matter, for he or she can understand it, and just shows a smile. But if foreigners see, they will be pretty shocked by the sight: What the hell is this? They will think that this shop lacks money to hire a good translator, and the managers are stupid. Furthermore, the Chinese national image will be badly affected. In fact, this sentence can be translated as “The more sinicization there is, the more fashion there will be” or “With greater Chinese characteristics come more fashion”. Easier? It can be “More sinicization breeds more fashion”. Translated like these, won’t it be much more correct and intelligible?

3. 3 The Misunderstanding of the Public Sign Translators

It is the little knowledge of English of the translators that makes them can not even spell a basic word correctly; Or due to carelessness, they make mistakes on public sign translation, thus causing mistakes on the meaning of the sign. All these are significant reasons why there are so many mistakes in Chinese-English public signs.

No.8 [2] for original source.

No.8. The Chinese meaning of it is “The door or passage that leads you to the outside”, in short, “EXIT”. But the public sign was translated as“EXPORT”, so, what is “EXPORT”? In a word, it means trade among different countries. The commercial goods pass through the customs, being transported from one country to another country. Distinctly, the maker was careless, who has mixed the meaning of “出口（Chu Kou）”in Chinese, thus resulting in an obvious translation error. As for public sign translation, translators must weigh every word, and think over and over and over again, not just search online, and grab all the words you “discover”, which is a highly irresponsible behavior, an extremely irresponsible behavior to the society and the country .

No.9 [3] for original source.

No.9 is from a hospital department. Its Chinese meaning is: Here is neurology emergency department. It uses a special logogram in Chinese. But, the maker was misled, so, he or she translated it as “God Medical”. If a person has a little common sense, he or she will be made to laugh wildly. It is completely the “Understanding of a sentence simply by a word”! That should be translated as “ Department of Emergency Neurology”. Such a casual translation will make Christians think that they can see God for real. Whether can he see death here or a way to heaven with a passionate God serving you? To some extent, this is disrespect for Christians, which can even cause disputes.

No.10 [4] for original source.

No.10 is photographed in a company building. Here, the Chinese means: this is the place where you can get boiled water. However, the translator of this public sign made a huge mistake, because he or she disintegrated the three Chinese words one by one, and thus translating them one by one, which can not be understood as a whole, let alone enable foreigners to understand the meaning of this public sign, and as a result, foreigners may not receive the service that they deserve. What’s worse, many people, including intelligent Chinese, when seeing this disqualified translation, will definitely be amused, and feel funny: What is this guy’s literate level?

As a matter of fact, this public sign can be translated as “Boiled Water Room”. “开水”means “boiled water” in English. Certainly, the translator treated the “开”as a verb “open”, which is absolutely wrong.

Further, this is a single room, not two or more, so we must use “room”, which is the plural form, instead of the singular form “rooms”.

3. 4 The Falsification and Loss of Information

Originally, the managers want to use signs to warn people, but due to mistranslation, the information is tampered and missed, resulting in an opposite consequence, and producing big jokes.

No.11 is a public warning sign in Liuxiang Barbecue Restaurant. It reads " carefully hot". Is it a true warning? In the foreigners’ opinion, it is not. People who speak Chinese can realize that this sign was designed to warn customers not to be burned by the hot oven. However, the English translation is far from what it originally means. The correct translation can be “Careful! Hot!” or “Be Careful of the Hot Oven!” But according to the translation on the sign, it means “Carefully burn yourself”. Luckily, this is a small scale restaurant, if it were a large one, its reputation would be badly affected.

No.12 [5] for original source.

No.12 is a public sign in a large shopping center. As we all know, modern shopping centers now always use smooth and shiny tile floor as the ground, which makes the shopping centers look beautiful and attractive. However, smooth though it is, one big safety problem then comes into shape: The ground is too smooth to make shoppers slide and fall. Later, the managers made public signs like No.12 to warn people not to fall. The Chinese warning is okay, Chinese shoppers can understand, but when foreigners see this, he or she will burst out laughing: What? You order me to slide on the floor with care? What on earth do you mean? I have even seen an Internet celebrity girl posting an video clip that tells us a story that satirizes this mistranslation: The girl and her father slide joyfully on the ground in a shopping center while murmuring “Carefully slide! Carefully slide!” As a matter of fact, The correct Chinese-English translation should be “Caution! Slippery!” or “Beware of Wet Floor” or “Caution! Wet Floor”. Each one of the three is okay.

No.13 [6] for original source.

No.13 is a public sign that is put on the ceiling of a restaurant’s stair. Here, the translator wanted to pass such information by Chinese and English: Watch your head, do not hit the low ceiling of the stair. Be careful. Though the Chinese information is okay, the English, however, can not by understood by others, especially foreigners.

Here, the makers wanted to warn the danger of the low ceiling, not to ask people to purposely hit the ceiling. So we can correct it as: “Watch Your Head”, or “Be Careful”. Both are okay.

Here, the translator made a mistranslation, which reversed the original meaning when translating, thus producing a huge laughingstock. First, “碰”is not “meet”, but “hit”, according to this specific environment. It does not mean “meet someone”. Second, “小心碰头” means not to hit the ceiling, not to “meet carefully”.

Throughout so many examples, every one can see that the mistakes of public sign translation are ubiquitous and common in daily life, which you can even randomly pick up one from any store you meet. Pervasive errors like these in public signs will negatively affect China’s reform and opening-up and the integration into international community, which will not only make foreigners misunderstand the meaning, but also seriously damage China’s national image. Therefore, the study of the public sign translation is extremely urgent and imperative. At present, translators must start from basic demand of Chinese-English public sign translation, endeavor to learn English well, cultivate a good sense of utilizing English and a great mindset of English utilization, proactively take part in English translation practice, and be highly alert and form a sense of “Using English language in a proper, correct, suitable and decent way”. Only then will the situation of Chinese-English public sign translation turn better.

IV. Public Sign Translation Methods

There is a saying goes: “Nothing can be accomplished without norms or standards. ” So is the Chinese-English public sign translation. Zhang Yan (Zhang Yan, 2015) maintains in her paper that, the public sign translation methods can be summarized as four kinds.

4. 1 Amplification

Many new words that are with Chinese characteristics, especially combined with numbers, need using amplification to introduce to foreign readers. For example, in the past, “五讲四美三热爱(Wu Jiang Si Mei San Re Ai）”was translated as “Five Stresses, Four Beauties and Three Loves”. Many foreigners said that they could not understand it. Later, it was revised as “Five Stresses, Four Beauties and Three Loves” with the notation “ stress on decorum, manners, hygiene, discipline and morals; beauty of the mind, language, behavior and the environment; love of the motherland, socialism and the Communist Party”. Hence, foreigners can easily understand its connotation.

4. 2 Ellipsis To make sure that the translation is concise and intelligible, when doing Chinese-English translation, translators must properly delete unnecessary words according to English expressing habits to achieve overall generalization. Such as: “Food Paradise”.

4. 3 Re-translation Due to cultural differences, many folk adages with Chinese characteristics will not be understood by readers once simply read literally. So translators can moderately reorganize those sentences that can not be translated or understood. Such as: “Drinking and Driving Costs Your Life”.

4. 4 Backward Translation

There are two cases: Translating the cultural expressions that are borrowed from translation back into their original forms in the target language; Translating the expressions with obvious cultural characteristics into the idiomatic expressions in the target language. Such as: “Venus Florist”. The English public sign has its own cultural and pragmatic meanings. When doing the Chinese-English public sign translation, translators should consider about the cultural differences and avoid any form of ambiguity, misunderstanding or mistranslation, and offer high quality information service, thus making public sign translation advance with the times.

V. Public Sign Translation Strategies

He Xueyun (He Xueyun, 2006) holds in her thesis that, theoretically, semantic translation and communicative translation differ much. Semantic translation strives to keep the language specialty and unique express method of the original work, in order to express the original work’s thinking process; However, communicative translation’s key point lies in spreading information and enabling people to think, feel and act, giving play to the function of information that language conveys and the consequences it causes. Public sign translation must focus on results, and put readers first, only by this can we improve the current situation of public sign translation, thus achieving the purposes of public sign translation.

Before beginning to do anything, we all need a world view and methodology to guide us to behave well. Likewise, when doing Chinese-English public sign translation, we also need guiding ideology to direct us. Here, I will show you four Chinese-English public sign translation strategies, which act as guiding ideology, which are definitely going to be a powerful weapon for you. Just remember them and practice them, you will gain a lot.

5.1 No Grammatical, Semantic and Logical Error

The most basic prerequisite of public sign translation is that there is no language error: No grammatical error, no vocabulary spelling error, no language context error, no Chinglish or machine-aided translation error.

“This is office area, tourists mustn’t enter” can be translated as “Staff Only”, not “OFFICE AREA PLEASE DON’T COMING”, or you will make a grammatical and redundant error. “Be careful, don’t slip into water” can be translated as “Caution! Deep Water!” instead of “TAKE CARE! FALL INTO WATER CAREFULLY!” Otherwise, people will can not help laughing.

One translator was not able to translate “The grass is so beautiful, are you sure you wan to walk on it?” into English public sign, so here comes “Fangcaoqiqi riding the Heren”. What a laughingstock! This is a combination between Chinese and English, without any grammar structure. Not to translate it will be a much better choice. We can concisely translate it as “Don’t Walk on the Beautiful Grass!”

5. 2 Concise and Intelligible Translation

One prominent character of public sign is conciseness. It asks people to ensure the translation is crystal clear and precise, without any compound or obscure sentence. Only by achieving this can the signs become popularized, instead of making people think over and over and over again to discover their cryptic meaning.

The public sign translation must be concise and intelligible, which means that you not only need to precisely convey what the maker means to people, but also must be concise. People can understand it immediately without comprehension deviation or ambiguity.

5. 3 Understanding of Cultural Background Differences

When translating, every translator must thoroughly understand the culture of the targeted language. Translators must comprehensively understand each specific use of the targeted language under different cultural backgrounds. If not doing so, it may cause severe disputes, and even cause irresistible outcomes. Here are several examples.

“Dragon” is a legendary animal in traditional Chinese culture. Chinese people often view themselves as “dragon”, and even say that they are “Descendants of the Dragon”. Thus, “Dragon” means holy and sacred thing in Chinese culture. But in English speaking countries, the meaning of “dragon” is not so. In these countries, “dragon” means something evil like Satan, sometimes it is even used to describe thugs, scoundrels or other bad behaviorists. Therefore, invariably coping the icon of “dragon” and using it in other cultures is a definite mistake. In a word, a public sign language translator must totally comprehend the cultural background differences.

5. 4 Obedience to Certain Norms and Standards

As long as someone is translating, he or she must obey certain rules, norms and standards. He mustn’t translate according to his will. This is a truth. For example, according to China’s first set of standards on how to regulate the use of foreign languages in China, which was jointly issued by the State Standards Commission and the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine on November 20, 2017 and officially implemented on December 1, 2017, some of the standards have been specified in detail.

Names of tourist spots: Names of mountains, rivers and lakes should be written in Chinese pinyin. Translations of names of temples should vary according to different situations, so are the towers’ names. In line with external service needs, English explanations can be added.

VI. The Future of Chinese-English Public Sign Translation

China is a major powerful country, and is the country with the second highest Gross Domestic Product in the world, which is why China should keep close economic and cultural relationships with other countries. In order to integrate China with international community in a better way, there must be high quality public sign translation.

High quality public sign translation must improve the China’s influence power in international community. High quality public sign translation represents that China is rich in translators and intellects, and shows that China can fulfill obligations and shoulder responsibilities as a major country. Achieving this means China not only takes responsibilities for Chinese people, but also for all human beings. Good quality public sign translation is definitely going to significantly synergize the course of reform and opening-up.

High quality public sign translation is obliged to facilitate foreigners to travel in China, boost domestic consumption demand, form a new growth point for economy, promote the rise of Gross Domestic Product, and accelerate the comprehensive, coordinated and sustainable development. High quality public sign translation is also an integral part of the New Development Philosophy: Innovation, coordination, green, open and share. High quality public sign translation corresponds to the New Normal of Chinese economy. At present, the economy of China has been changing from developing at a high speed to develop at high quality, and is at the stage of changing economic development mode, transforming driving forces of economic development and optimizing the economic structure, so high quality public sign translation is badly needed. Thus, considering the big change of Chinese economy, achieving high quality public sign translation is an urgent affair.

High quality public sign translation has the duty to embody a city’s humanism spirit, cultural speciality and charm, which is the inevitable requirement of core socialist values and system. It also promotes the spreading of Chinese culture, and improves the influence power of Chinese culture. High quality public sign translation also levels up Chinese people and overseas Chinese’s sense of identity and belonging. What’s more, it can narrow the gap between Chinese and foreigners, and acquire more recognition from them towards China. Domestically, high quality public sign translation can strengthen national cohesion; Externally, it will strengthen China’s soft power, and increase China’s international speaking right while creating national radiation power. It is an important measure to improve China’s public service and governance capability by establishing an evaluation mechanism and promoting the standardization of English translation. It is of great benefit to further improve China’s service level of opening to the outside world, demonstrate its cultural soft power and enhance its international image (Guo Jinghong, 2019).

In short, looking forward to the future of Chinese-English public sign translation from a strategic perspective, translators must remain true to their original aspiration and keep their mission firmly in mind, which is: To be devoted to the future of socialism with Chinese characteristics, to be dedicated to the landscape of translation of socialism with Chinese characteristics, and to be committed to the sustainable development of Chinese-English public sign translation of socialism with Chinese characteristics.

We must treat Chinese-English public sign translation with the point that advances with the times (Tian Guomin, 2019). The English translation of public signs of tourist attractions belongs to the category of cross-cultural communication, and the translator should have certain cross-cultural knowledge and awareness, so that the English translation can be more understood and accepted by the audience and truly achieve the purpose of cross-cultural communication (Yang Hongyu, 2019). The communicative translation theory aims for the target readers (Gutt, 1991). Translation of public signs is a very important task in China with the increasing connection to the outside world (Newmark, 2001). Since reform and opening-up, China has been integrating into the international community day by day. To fully achieve this, as regards of Chinese-English public sign translation, we still have a long way to go. There is no time for us to delay the work of strengthening, proceeding, and improving public sign translation. The rising level of quality of Chinese-English public sign translation will improve both city image and urbanization level. He Xueyun contends in her article that, many people take it for granted that if one knows a foreign language, he then can translate. As a matter of fact, basic skills of public sign translation not only includes foreign language level, but also the knowledge of foreign cultures.

VII. Conclusion

So, how to facilitate the overall development of Chinese-English public sign translation？Firstly, we need to keep pace with the times. Language is constantly changing, so are many words and idioms, and so are public signs. In order to accurately convey information to the audience, it is essential to integrate the latest, most reliable and most accepted language into public signs. Secondly, it is necessary to fully understand the idiomatic usage of public signs, because public signs are mainly aimed at English speakers, so it is necessary to strengthen the accumulation of words, phrases and idioms, which is also the basis of translation. Thirdly, the translators of Chinese-English public signs should use accurate words and phrases in combination with specific environment and objects, and should not fail to convey the meaning or deviate from the original meaning, which otherwise will result in misunderstanding. Of course, only achieving the above is not enough. In order to do a good job in the translation of Chinese-English public signs, we need to keep improving our translation attitude and spirit of study, and constantly improve and summarize and innovate on the basis of the original, so as to make the translation of Chinese-English public signs more perfect and recognized by the international audience. It is very important for the academic community and people from all walks of life to analyze the problems in the application of public signs and put forward corresponding improvement countermeasures (Liu Xiaoping, 2019).

A Chinese-English public sign translator must fully realize and shoulder the responsibilities that translators must carry, form a sense of community of a shared future, fully acknowledge the current situation of Chinese-English public sign translation, completely learn lessons from the predecessors who have made mistakes in Chinese-English public sign translation, totally implement the four public sign translation strategies I mentioned before, to make Chinese-English public sign translation serve the construction of a moderately prosperous society in all respect, the construction of modern powerful socialist country, the construction of building China into a great modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced, harmonious, and beautiful, and the realization of the great Chinese dream, that is: the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.

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