研究生英语第一、第二单元话题讨论

Unit 1

Warm-up Questions:

1. What is art? Do you think translation is an art? Why ?

What is art?

I could tell you that art plays a large part in making our lives infinitely rich. On the other hand, art is such a large part of our everyday lives that we may hardly even stop to think about it. Your shoes are art. Your coffee cup is art. So, you could say "Art is something that is both functional and (hopefully) aesthetically pleasing to our eyes."

Do you think translation is an art? Why ?

Translation is an art. It is not only faithful to the original passage but also have the life of its own. An excellent translation is creative and skillful, which conveys the same meaning to people who live in different language systems. The same meaning is not only referring to the words’ meaning itself, but also involved in the sound, the structure and even the artistic conception. Art is abstract, the same is true in the art of translation. It takes time and effort to achieve its beauty.

2. Is the work of translation easy or difficult? What is your problem while doing translation?

Whereas, translation work is difficult because of the special features of couplets.The objective requirement for the language capabilities of translation workers for completing the translation jobs is the translator’s capability of using the native language should be better than the majority of common/normal people in his home country and the ability of using foreign language should be better than the majority of common/normal people in the respective country.This is mostly targeting literature translators. But for those translators translating science and technology, the requirement is also not relatively low. For those science and technology translators, they could not solely involve in the translation of science and technology without doing other normal translations. It is this normal translation which has put forward a fearsome/difficult language requirement in front of those science/technology translators.

3. Do you think that translation work is important? Why?(非常重要，可以例举以下例子，Significance Of Translation很多方面)

Translation is one of the most critical jobs in modern society. As the whole globe is coming together based on information sharing and communicative advances, it is only natural that there has been a constant demand and an unprecedented need for translation of ideas from one language to another. Translation plays a vital role in the performance of international companies and governments alike.

4. What requirements are needed for a good translator?