当代国外翻译理论

当代国外翻译理论导读
作者:谢天振编者:谢天振
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目录
前言
第一章语言学派翻译理论
1.罗曼·雅科布逊论翻译的语言学问题
2.彼得·纽马克交际翻译与语义翻译(Ⅱ)
3.约翰·卡特福德论翻译转换
4.尤金·奈达论对等原则
5.巴兹尔·哈蒂姆互文介入：利用翻译中缺省语篇的理论体系
6.玛丽·斯奈尔—霍恩比翻译：一种跨文化活动
第二章阐释学派翻译理论
7.乔治·斯坦纳阐释的步骤
8.安托瓦纳·贝尔曼翻译及对异的考验
第三章功能学派翻译理论
9.凯瑟琳娜·莱斯翻译的抉择：类型、体裁及文本的个性
10.汉斯·弗米尔翻译行为中的目的与委任
11.克里斯汀娜·诺德目的、忠诚及翻译中的惯例
第四章文化学派翻译理论
12.詹姆斯·霍尔姆斯翻译学的名与实
13.伊塔玛·埃文—佐哈翻译文学在文学多元系统中的地位
14.吉迪恩·图里描述性翻译研究的理论基础
15.安德烈·勒菲弗尔大胆妈妈的黄瓜：文学理论中的文本、系统和折射
16.苏珊·巴斯奈特文化研究的翻译转向
17.西奥·赫曼斯翻译研究及其新范式
第五章解构学派翻译理论
18.瓦尔特·本雅明译者的任务
19.雅克·德里达巴别塔之旅
20.保罗·德曼评本雅明的《译者的任务》
21.劳伦斯·韦努蒂文化身份的塑造
第六章女性主义翻译理论
22.雪莉·西蒙翻译理论中的性别化立场
23.劳丽·钱伯伦性别与翻译的隐喻
24.巴巴拉·格达德女性主义话语／翻译的理论化
25.冯·弗罗托女性主义翻译理论批评
第七章后殖民翻译理论
26.道格拉斯·罗宾逊后殖民研究与翻译研究
27.特佳斯维妮·尼南贾纳翻译的定位
28.盖亚特里·斯皮瓦克翻译的政治
29.埃尔斯·维埃拉解放卡利班们——论食人说与哈罗德·德·坎波斯的超越／越界性创造诗学
第八章苏东学派翻译理论
30.安德烈·费奥多罗夫翻译理论的任务
31.吉维·加切奇拉泽文学翻译中的创造性原则
32.吉里·列维翻译是一个作选择的过程
33.安娜·丽洛娃翻译研究的范畴
Translation Theory
(2007-09-29 14:13:41)
标签：
学习公社
translatio
n
english
theory
Translation Theory
By Juan Daniel Pérez Vallejo
Translation teacher,
University of Cd. Del Carmen, Campeche, Mexico
The study of proper principle of translation is termed as translation theory. This theory, based on a solid foundation on understanding of how languages work, translation theory recognizes that different languages encode meaning in differing forms, yet guides translators to find appropriate ways of preserving meaning, while using the most appropriate forms of each language. Translation theory includes principles for translating figurative language, dealing with lexical mismatches, rhetorical questions, inclusion of cohesion markers, and many other topics crucial to good translation. Basically there are two competing theories of translation. In one,the predominant purpose is to express as exactly as possible the full force and meaning of every
word and turn of phrase in the original, and in the other the predominant purpose is to produce a result that does not read like a translation at all, but rather moves in its new dress with the same ease as in its native rendering. In the hands of a good translator neither of these two approaches can ever be entirely ignored. Conventionally, it is suggested that in order to perform their job successfully, translators should meet three important requirements; they should be familiar with: the source language
the target language
the subject matter
Based on this premise, the translator discovers the meaning behind the forms in the source language and does his best to produce the same meaning in the target language - using the forms and structures of the target language. Consequently, what is supposed to change is the form and the code and what should remain unchanged is the meaning and the message. (Larson, 1984)
One of the earliest attempts to establish a set of major rules or principles to be referred to in literary translation was made by French translator and humanist Étienne Dolet, who in 1540 f ormulated the following fundamental principles of translation ("La Manière de Bien Traduire d’une Langue en Aultre"), usually regarded as providing rules of thumb for the practicing translator:
The translator should understand perfectly the content and intention of the author whom he is translating. The principal way to reach it is reading all the sentences or the text completely so that you can give the idea that you want to say in the target language because the most important characteristic of this technique is translating the message as clearly and natural as possible. If the translation is for different countries besides Mexico, the translator should use the cultural words of that country. For example if he/she has to translate ”She is unloyal with her husband” in this country it can be translated as “Ella le pone los cuernos” but in Peru it can be translated as “Ella le pone los cachos”. In this case it is really important the cultural words because if the translator does not use them correctly the translation will be misunderstood.
The translator should have a perfect knowledge of the language from which he is translating and an equally excellent knowledge of the language into which he is translating. At this point the translator must have a wide knowledge in both languages for getting the equivalence in the target language, because the deficiency of the knowledge of both languages will result in a translation without logic and sense. For example if you translate the following sentence “Are you interested in sports?” as “¿Estás interesado en deportes?” the translation is wrong since the idea of this question in English is “¿Practicas algún deporte?”
The translator should avoid the tendency to translate word by word, because doing so is to destroy the meaning of the original and to ruin the beauty of the expression_r. This point is very important and one of which if it is translated literally it can transmit another meaning or understanding in the translation.
For example in the sentence.- “In this war we have to do or die”, if we translate literally “En esta guerra tenemos que hacer o morir” the message is unclear. The idea is, (.) “En esta guerra tenemos que vencer o morir.”
The translator should employ the forms of speech in common usage. The translator should bear in mind the people to whom the translation will be addressed and use words that can be easily understood.Example. “They use a sling to lift the pipes” if the translation is to be read by specialists we would translate it “Utilizan una esling a para levantar la tubería”. If the text is to be read by people who are not specialists we would rather translate it “Utilizan una cadena de suspension para levantar los tubos”.
Flip to Text Version La Trobe University
Harry Aveling
A Short History of Western Translation Theory
1. Traditional Translation Theories
There is a continuity of intellectual expression from Ancient Greece, Rome, the Middle Ages, through to the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the rise of the early European nation states. The central language of scholars and other readers was Latin, while the core of this tradition was classical
literature and Judeo-Christianity. There was a profusion of economic and political contacts throughout Europe and the Middle East, and this must have involved an abundance of linguistic transactions. Nevertheless, Lefevere"s words provide an accurate background to understanding the social position of the subjects of traditional translation theory: "In such a culture, translations were not primarily read for information or the mediation of the foreign text. They were produced and read as exercises, first pedagogical exercises, and later on, as exercises in cultural appropriation - in the conscious and controlled usurpation of authority." (Lefevere 1990: 16).
2. German Romanticism
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, a second, more philosophical and less empirical, formation began to open within discourses on translation theory (Munday 2001: 27). This formation was connected, in one direction, with the rise of philology as a university discipline, and in another with the literary movement of Romanticism. Philology provided a range of new and exotic texts and allowed the experts to produce translations aimed primarily at other experts, not the general culture of which these scholars were a part (Lefevere 1990: 22). Romanticism exalted the translator "as a creative genius in his own right, in touch with the genius of his original and enriching the literature and language into which he is translating" (Bassnett-McGuire 1980: 65). The stress on both the original author and the translator as being artists was not part of traditional discourse formations.
3. The Early and Middle Twentieth Century
Discussion in English of translation theory during the first half of the twentieth century continued to be dominated by the themes of Victorian discourse on translation, "literalness, archaizing, pedantry and the production of a text of second-rate literary merit for an elite minority" (Bassnett-McGuire 1980: 73). In his list of major contributors to the area of translation theory, Steiner recognises only the names of Dryden, Quine and Pound among English-speakers. Quine and Pound both belong to the twentieth century and challenged the dominant discourse. Willard V. Quine (b. 1908), a major American philosopher, wrote on "the indeterminacy of translation" within the field of linguistic philosophy (Quine 1960). Ezra Pound (1885-1972) was a poet and critic. Ronnie Apter has argued that Pound made three major innovations to thinking about "the nature and intent of literary translation…he discarded the Victorian pseudo-archaic translation diction; he regarded each translation as a necessarily limited criticism of the original poem; and he regarded good translations as new poems in their own right" (Apter 1987: 3).
More radical, and more decisive, developments in translation theory took place in Europe. These begin with the Russian Formalist movement, which
focused on the "what makes literary texts different from other texts, what makes them new, creative, innovative" (Gentzler 1993: 79). One of their answers was that literary texts rely on a process of "defamiliarisation", using language in new and strikingly different ways from ordinary speech. This led the Formalist to focus on "surface structural features" and "to analyse them to learn what determines literary status" (Gentzler 1993: 79). In so doing, they began the search for descriptive rules, which would help scholars understand the process of translation, and not normative rules, in order to study and assess the work of other translators (Bell 1991: 12). Their work was extended and refined by the Prague school of linguistics, founded by Roman Jakobson, who had earlier worked in Moscow. In his essay "On the Linguistic Aspects of Translation" (1959), Jakobson expanded traditional discourse of "equivalence" into the theme of "equivalence in difference". In so doing, he argued that words should be seen within their (arbitrary) semiotic context, and that "the grammatical pattern of a language (as opposed to its lexical stock) determines those aspects of each experience that must be expressed in the given language" (Venuti 2000: 114).
4. Translation Studies
Three factors worked to limit this sharp focus on descriptive linguistics as the major form of discourse on translation. The first was the questioning of Chomsky"s linguistic theories by linguists themselves. The second was the development of a number of new and dynamic fields within linguistics, such as "discourse analysis, text linguistics, sociolinguistics, computational linguistics, prototype semantics, and other assorted wonders" (Pym 1992: 184). These "wonders" took in prior fields such as British social anthropology and American cultural anthropology, as well as contemporary and parallel developments in philosophy, information and communication theories, computational linguistics, machine translation, artificial intelligence, and the ideas of socio-semiotics as developed within French structuralist and post-structuralist thought (Nida 2001: 110). The sense increased that: "Language is not the problem. Ideology and politics are…" (Lefevere 1990: 26). This has led to a separation between linguistic and cultural approaches to translation in the last quarter of the twentieth century. For some translation scholars, indeed, it has seemed that "strictly linguistic theories have been superseded, [as] translation has come to be considered in its cultural, historical and sociological context" (Woodsworth 1998: 100).
Basic Knowledge of Translation Theory
I.Translation
1.Definition
1)The definition in the old days
l“译即易，谓换易言语使相解也。

”——贾公彦(618-907)唐朝
l“夫翻译者，谓翻梵天之语转成汉地之言。

音虽似别，义则大同。

”——法云(960-1279)宋代
It means that translation is a rendering from nbone language (Source Language) into another (Target Language), remaining the meaning.
l The British scholar Dr. Samuel Johnson once said: “To translate is to change into another language, remaining the sense.”
2)The current definition
l The American translation theorist Eugene A. Nida wrote in 1964: Translation consists in reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalence of the source language, first in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style.
（所谓翻译，是在译语中用切近而又最自然的对等语再现原语的信息，首先是意义，其次是文体。

）
1)再现原文的信息(message)而不是保留原文的形式结构(formal structure)
2)对等(equivalence)不是同一(identity)
3)对等是最贴近、自然的对等
4)意义是优先考虑的因素
5)文体很重要
l The British translation theorist Tytler’s definition in 1970 about translation: “A good translation is one which the merit of the original work is so completely transfused into another language as to be as distinctly apprehended and as strongly felt by a native of the country to which that language belong s as it is by those who speak the language of the original work.”
l Prof. Huang Long Translatology
Translation may be defined as follows:
The replacement of textual material in one language (SL) by equivalent textual material in another language (TL)
（翻译可以作以下界定：用一种语言（目的语）的文本材料对等地再现另一种语言（源出语）的文本材料。

）
1)部分地替代
2)对等概念
In summary
1)Translation is the information transferring between two languages and
the cultural communication between two language families.
2)Translation is a rendering from one language into another. Translation
is a science, an art, a bilingual art, a craft, a skill, an operation and communication.
3)Translation is a representation or recreation in one language of what
is written or said in another language.
4)Translation is a kind of science because it was a whole set of rules
governing it and certain objective laws to go by in the process of
translating.
2.Varieties of translation
1)Interpretation and written translation
2)In terms of SL and TL, Interlingual translation语际(不同语言
之间)，Intralingual translation语内(同一语言rewording)，
Intersemiotic translation符际(eg.把语言符号用图画、手势、数字
或音乐来表达)
3)In terms of style, political essay政论，practical writing应
用文，science and technology科技，literary translation
II.Translation Criteria or Principle
l Tytler’s: Essay on the Principles of Translation, 1791
1) A translation should give a complete transcript of the ideas of
the original work.译文应完全复写出原作的思想。

2)The style and manner of writing should be of the same character
as that of the original.译文的风格和笔调应与原文的性质相同。

3) A translation should have all the ease of the original
composition.译文应和原作同样流畅。

l Yanfu’s: Faithfulness, Expressiveness and Elegance (信、达、雅)
1.“Faithfulness” means the full and complete conveying of the
original content of thought.
2.“Expressiveness” demands that the version should be clear and
flowing without any grammatical mistakes or confused logic and
sense.
3.“Elegance” refers to the use of classical Chinese before the
Han Dynasty.
In summary, the first two words as translation criteria are acceptable.
The original meaning of “Elegance” is unacceptable for today, but we can
give it new sense -----elegant style in translation.
l Others:
Lu Xun’s (鲁迅)translation principle:
Rather be faithful (in thought) than smooth (in language) in opposition to
Liang Shi-qiu’s translation principle in 1930s. (宁信不顺)
Fu Lei’s付雷translation criteria:TL should be similar to SL both in Form
and in Spirit. (形似、神似)
Liu Chongde’s刘重德translation criteria: faithfulness, expressiveness
and closeness. (信、达、切) faithfulness: to be faithful to the content of
the original; expressiveness: to be as expressive and smooth as the original;
closeness: to be as close to the original style as possible.
Liang Shiqiu ‘s and Zhao Jingshen’s (梁实秋，赵景深) translation
principle in 1930s:“It’s better to have a smooth version than a faithful
one.”宁错务顺
Eugene A. Nida’s translation principle: Dynamic equivalence or Functional
equivalence or Equivalent-effect theory.The main idea is that the
translator is to produce as nearly possible the same effect on his readers
as was produced on the readers of the original.
Peter Newmark’s translation principle:From the angle of contextual
analysis, he puts forward two translation approaches: Semantic translation
and Communicative translation.
Semantic translation: The translator attempts, within the bare syntactic and semantic constraints of the TL, to produce the precise contextual
meaning of the author. Semantic translation focuses primarily upon the
semantic content of the source text.
Communicative translation: The translator attempts to produce the same
effect on the TL readers as was produced by the original on the SL readers.
Communicative translation focuses essentially upon the comprehension and response of receptors.
l In summary, translation criteria: faithfulness and smoothness忠实与通顺.
Faithfulness refers to that content and style of TL should be faithful to the SL.
Smoothness requires that version should be clear and distinct, flowing and
easy to read without signs of the mechanical word-for-word translation,
of obscure language, of grammatical mistakes, confused structure and logic. III.Prerequisites of a translator
As Zhou En-lai said: To be a good translator we should strengthen our “basic training” in the three essential aspects:
1)The enhancement of our political consciousness
2)The betterment of our command of the relevant languages
3)The broadening of the range and scope of our general knowledge. IV.Translation strategies: foreignization and domestication
Foreignization:If the translator’s preference is placed on preserving the language and cultural differences of the Source Text, we call this kind of approaches or its translation foreignizing or foreignization.
Domestication:It refers the method or practice of adapting the translation to the norms and values of the Target Language and culture is called domesticating or domestication.
For example,
C-E
谋事在人，成事在天。

（曹：95）
Man proposes, Heaven disposes. (Yang: 90)
Man proposes, God disposes. (Hawkes: 152)
注：杨宪益利用了一个英语谚语，但把其中的“God”改成了“Heaven”，从而保留了原有的宗教色彩。

而Hawkes直接引用了英语谚语，未作任何改动，这样，他把原文的佛教色彩变成了基督教色彩。

这样英美读者更为自然、更容易接受。

当然，这样一来，Hawkes把一个信佛的人变成了一个信耶稣的人了。

E-C
He made you for a high way to my bed; but I, a maid, die maiden ---widowed. (W. Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet, 3, 3, 134-135)
译文1：他要借着你做牵引相思的桥梁，可是我却要做一个独守空阁的怨女而死去。

（朱生豪译）（归）
译文2：他要借你作捷径，登上我的床；可怜我这处女，守活寡，到死是处女。

（方平译）（异）Unless you’ve an ace up your sleeve, we are dished.
误译：除非你有锦囊妙计，否则我们是输定了。

（归）
改译：除非你手中藏有王牌，否则我们是输定了。

（异）
注：英语中ace是西方玩牌赌博时藏于袖中的“王牌”，而“锦囊妙计”则是中国古代宫廷争斗或疆场征战时封在“锦囊”中的神妙计策，彼此有截然不同的文化背景和内涵。

Among Wolves one must howl.
入乡随俗（归）
在狼群中你就得嗥（异）
注：异化的翻译方法为汉语表达同一意思提供了一个新颖别致的语言形式。

Go to law for a sheep, you lose a cow.
捡了芝麻，丢了西瓜。

（归）
为一只羊打官司，却损失了一头牛。

（异）
注：异化的翻译策略表示律师借打官司之际，向原告和被告收取尽可能多的钱财，反映了西方民族习惯于通过法律途径解决纠纷的文化习尚。

V.Two basic translation methods: Literal Translation and Liberal (Free) Translation
Literal Translation means word-for-word translation. It takes sentences as its basic units and the whole text into consideration at the same time in the course of translation. It strives to reproduce both the ideological content and the style of the entire literary work and retain as much as possible the figures of speech. Liberal Translation is also called Free Translation.It is a supplementary means to mainly convey the meaning and spirit of the original without trying to reproduce its sentence pattern or figures of speech.
For example,
E-C
To kill two birds with one stone.
直译：一石二鸟
意译：一箭双雕，一举两得
The worst wheel of a cart creaks most.
直译：最坏的车轮最会嘎吱响。

意译：才学最差，叫喊最响；出力最少，抱怨最忙；能猫不叫，叫猫不能。

C-E
树倒猢狲散
直译：When the tree falls, the monkeys scatter.
意译：Members run away when the family falls. / Rats leave a sinking ship.
VI.Terms
l Polysemy:One word has various parts of speech and various meaning.
Firth said: “Each word when used in a new context is a new word.”Eg. Dry
I want my martini dry. (not sweet)
我的马丁尼酒不要甜的。

There are still some dry states in the United States.
在美国尚有几洲禁酒。

She prefers dry bread. (without butter)
她喜欢无奶油的面包。

The cows are dry. (not supplying milk)
这些母牛缺奶。

He gave us a dry lecture yesterday.
昨天他给我们作了一个枯燥无味的讲演。

I am sure what he presented was a dry fact. (plain, undisguised)
我相信，他所列举的是铁一般的事实。

l Commendatory and derogatory words: Commendatory word means a praising word, or a word in good sense. Derogatory word means a word
to lessen or impair the power or authority or a word in bad sense. Eg.
Many people think that he is one of the most ambitious politicians of our times. 很多人认为他是现今最有野心的政客之一。

Although he is very young, he is very ambitious in his research work.
他虽然很年轻，但是在研究工作中很有雄心壮志。

They incited him to go into further investigation
他们鼓励他做进一步的调查。

The plotters incited the soldiers to rise against their officers.
阴谋家煽动士兵们造军官的反。

l Diction:It means proper choice of words in translation on the basis of accurate comprehension of the original.
Eg. Context
We can make out the meaning of the word from the context.
我们可以从上下文判断出这个词的意思。

We should settle the disputes in the context of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence.
我们应当在和平共处五项原则的基础上解决这些争端。

（in the context of以……为精神，在……的基础上）
It is in this context that the tragedy of Sahara was born.
撒哈拉沙悲剧正在这种情况下发生。

We must operate within the context of the Olympian Spirit.
我们必须按照奥林匹克精神办事。

In this context, I’ve to call your attention to the fact that the peaceful trend in the Indo-China Peninsula is essential to peace in the world.
就此而论，我不得不提醒大家注意这样一个事实：印度支那半岛局势的稳定对世界和平来说是至关重要的。

The traditional pattern of classroom experience at the college level brings the professor and a group of 20 to 30 students together for a 45-to-50 minute class session two or three times a week. The most common mode of instruction is the lecture.
由一位教授和二三十名学生每周会晤两三次，每次授课时间45分钟到50分钟，是大学程度课堂教学的传统方式。

最普遍的教学方式是讲课。

l Repetition:In translation we are required to repeat words over and over again for clearness, for the sake of emphasis and for
attractiveness (vividness).
Eg.
Big families had their own difficulties.
大家庭有大家庭的难处。

Ignorance is the mother of fear as well as of admiration.
无知是羡慕的根源，也是恐惧的根源。

l Amplification:It means supplying necessary words in our translation work so as to make the version correct and clear. Words thus supplied
must be indispensable either syntactically or semantically.
The number of children being excluded in the area is getting out of hand.
该地区学生被开除的现象已到了无法控制的地步。

“According to Dr. John,” he said, “the patient’s life is still in danger. The first aid must be rendered as soon as possible.”
“根据约翰大夫的诊断，”他说，“这位患者的生命仍然处于危险之中，必须尽快采取急救措施。

”
Then a little over decade ago, Professors Hoyle, Bondi, and Gold, working at Cambridge, proposed an entirely different scheme.
然而三十多年前，剑桥大学的霍伊尔、邦迪和哥尔德三位教授却提出了完全不同的学说。

l Omission:In the process of translation we may make proper omission of some individual words in accordance with the corresponding laws
inherent in the two languages concerned in order to retain and better
express the original meaning.
Eg.
He who has never reached the Great Wall is not a true man.
不到长城非好汉。

As the temperature increases, the volume of water becomes greater.
温度增高，水的体积就会增大。

l Conversion:It means that in translation a word in one language
belonging to a certain part of speech is not necessarily to be turned
into one of the same part of speech in another language.
Eg.
The turning point of my life was my decision to give up a promising business career and study music.
我生活的转折点是我决定不做发迹有望的商人而专攻音乐。

A glance through his office window offers a panoramic view of the Washington
Monument and the Lincoln Memorial.
从他的办公室窗口可以一眼看到华盛顿纪念碑和林肯纪念馆的全景。

l Inversion:By inversion in translation we mean that the constituent elements of a sentence are arranged in way different from the general
rules of word order of the language in question.
Eg.
It’s good you’ve so conside rate.
你想得这样周到很好。

Formerly a worker himself, he was now an engineer.
他过去是工人，现在当了工程师了。

Send us a message in case you have any difficulty.
万一有什么困难，请给我们一个信。

l Negation: It means in translation some words, phrases or sentences with negative expression in SL may be transformed into affirmative
expression in TL. Vice versa, some affirmative expression in SL may be
transformed into negative expression in TL, to make the version clearer
and more explicit.
Eg.
I wrote three books in the first two years, a record never reached before.
我头两年写了三本书，打破了以往的记录。

The machine is far from being complicated.
这部机器一点也不复杂。

Don’t lose time in cleaning this machine.
赶快把这部机器擦好。

l Division:It means the necessary splitting of a long sentence into shorter ones.
Eg.
There are many wonderful stories to tell about the places I visited and the people I met.
我访问了一些地方，遇到不少人，要谈起来，奇妙的事可多着呢。

After singing a concert in this city, he said he wanted to greet his admirers backstage as he always does.
他在那个城市演唱了一场音乐会。

音乐会结束以后，他提出要向往常那样到后台去见见他的崇拜者。

Change of the voice:There are two kinds of voices: the active and the passive. The passive voice is much less used in Chinese than in English. In E-C translation we
may usually change the passive voice into active voice, but in C-E translation we may usually change the active into the passive, especially in EST (English for Science and Technology)科技英语.
Eg.
The happy man cannot be harried.
吉人自有天相。

He is said to be the most respected teacher in our department.
据说他是我们系上最受尊敬的老师。

Basic Knowledge of Translation Theory
I.Translation
1.Definition
1)The definition in the old days
l“译即易，谓换易言语使相解也。

”——贾公彦(618-907)唐朝
l“夫翻译者，谓翻梵天之语转成汉地之言。

音虽似别，义则大同。

”——法云(960-1279)宋代
It means that translation is a rendering from one language (Source Language) into another (Target Language), remaining the meaning.
l The British scholar Dr. Samuel Johnson once said: “To translate is to change into another language, remaining the sense.”
2)The current definition
l The American translation theorist Eugene A. Nida wrote in 1964: Translation consists in reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalence of the source language, first in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style.
（所谓翻译，是在译语中用切近而又最自然的对等语再现原语的信息，首先是意义，其次是文体。

）
1)再现原文的信息(message)而不是保留原文的形式结构(formal structure)
2)对等(equivalence)不是同一(identity)
3)对等是最贴近、自然的对等
4)意义是优先考虑的因素
5)文体很重要
l The British translation theorist Tytler’s definition in 1970 about translation: “A good translation is one which the merit of the original work is so completely transfused into another language as to be as distinctly apprehended and as strongly felt by a native of the country to which that language belong s as it is by those who speak the language of the original work.”
l Prof. Huang Long Translatology
Translation may be defined as follows:
The replacement of textual material in one language (SL) by equivalent textual material in another language (TL)
（翻译可以作以下界定：用一种语言（目的语）的文本材料对等地再现另一种语言（源出语）的文本材料。

）
1)部分地替代
2)对等概念
In summary
1)Translation is the information transferring between two languages and
the cultural communication between two language families.
2)Translation is a rendering from one language into another. Translation
is a science, an art, a bilingual art, a craft, a skill, an operation and communication.
3)Translation is a representation or recreation in one language of what
is written or said in another language.
4)Translation is a kind of science because it was a whole set of rules
governing it and certain objective laws to go by in the process of
translating.
2.Varieties of translation
1)Interpretation and written translation
2)In terms of SL and TL, Interlingual translation语际(不同语言
之间)，Intralingual translation语内(同一语言rewording)，
Intersemiotic translation符际(eg.把语言符号用图画、手势、数字
或音乐来表达)
3)In terms of style, political essay政论，practical writing应
用文，science and technology科技，literary translation
II.Translation Criteria or Principle
l Tytler’s: Essay on the Principles of Translation, 1791
1) A translation should give a complete transcript of the ideas of
the original work.译文应完全复写出原作的思想。

2)The style and manner of writing should be of the same character
as that of the original.译文的风格和笔调应与原文的性质相同。

3) A translation should have all the ease of the original
composition.译文应和原作同样流畅。

l Yanfu’s: Faithfulness, Expressiveness and Elegance (信、达、雅)
1.“Faithfulness” means the full and complete conveying of the
original content of thought.
2.“Expressiveness” demands that the version should be clear and
flowing without any grammatical mistakes or confused logic and
sense.
3.“Elegance” refers to the use of classical Chinese before the
Han Dynasty.
In summary, the first two words as translation criteria are acceptable.
The original meaning of “Elegance” is unacceptable for today, but we can give it new sense -----elegant style in translation.
l Others:
Lu Xun’s (鲁迅)translation principle:
Rather be faithful (in thought) than smooth (in language) in opposition to Liang Shi-qiu’s translation principle in 1930s. (宁信不顺)。