中西方文化因素对广告翻译的影响

中西方文化因素对广告翻译的影响

［Abstract］Advertising and its translation，as international marketing tools，are more and more important in the background of economic globalization. Advertising，as a product of culture，is also a significant part of culture. Thus，advertising translation is inevitably influenced by cultural factors concerned. This paper will analyze the influences of Chinese and western cultural factors on advertising translation with concrete examples from three aspects，i.e. associative meaning，thinking patterns and historical background.

［Key words］advertising translation，cultural factors，influence

I. The Influence of Cultural Factors on Advertising

Translation

With the development of global economy，international trades are increasingly growing and the countries of the world compete to introduce their native commodities to the international market. Then how to realize it? A significant method is advertising. Advertising，providing commodities’information and highlighting their effect，is a main way to promote commodities and persuade consumers to buy them. And the advertising translation plays an important role. However，in some advertising translations，translators，without taking cultural differences

into account，adopt word-for-word translation method and are only confined to strive for the equivalence on the text level，which often makes the translated versions difficult to be understood or even unacceptable by target consumers，let alone achieve the ultimate purpose of advertising—make potential consumers purchase the advertised commodities.

Advertising，as a product of culture，is also a significant part of culture，and has an inseparable relationship with culture. The modern advertising in particular has more cultural tendencies. Persuasion is the main means of realizing the purposes of advertising. In the process of pursuing persuasion for maximum effect，the culture，like a persuasive talker，also brings its persuasive function into play. The most effective advertisements are those that reflect the core culture of its society. Moreover，with the improvement of living standards，when people’s material demand is greatly satisfied，they put more attention to their mind demand，which means that besides pursuing commercial consumption，people get more and more attracted to cultural consumption. It is reflected in advertising in this way，i.e. the commercial elements in advertising are gradually weakening while the cultural elements in advertising are gradually strengthening.

From selling commodities to selling culture，advertising attempts to