| Is there any translation criterion? If any, what should it be? The translator’s intention? The client’s intention? Or the author’s pragmatic intention? As far as the pragmatic research at home and abroad is concerned, few researchers have ever touched upon translation study from a perspective of pragmatic intention, and thus further investigations are badly needed. Within the framework of Pragmatic Translation, this paper sets out to revisit translation criterion by integrating relevant theories from Speech Act Theory, Hermeneutics, Speech Communication Theory, Rhetoric Reception Theory, etc. Adopted in this study are approaches of diachronic and synchronic comparison, interdisciplinary and exemplitary analysis.A brief view is first made of the influence and limitations of Structuralism Translation paradigm and Deconstructionism Translation paradigm, and of previous intentionality translation studies. The combination of pragmatics with translation is then put forward to solve their dispute with a view to increasing explanatory power. Through the systematic linkage of Speech Act Theory with translation, a better understanding is gained of the essence of translation and its theory and practice. Thus we draw a conclusion that, in the process of translation, the essence of language lies in its intentionality, that the essence of pragmatic equivalence should be illocutionary equivalence instead of perlocutionary effect and that when we view translation as an intercultural pragmatic behavior, its communication success lies more in whether the translator’s action is in conformity with the speaker’s/author’s intention.Following the line of "linguistic meaning-utterance meaning-pragmatic intention", this paper then defines and classifies pragmatic intention and puts forward two principles (integrity principle and hierarchy principle) and three standards (survival context, quantity in semantic level and freedom extent in operation), by which pragmatic intention is classified into three categories-representational intention, affective intention and argumentative intention on the surface and another dichotomy in deep structure of single focused intention and comprehensive diffusive intention. And further research on pragmatic intention has been carried out as to its understanding and interpretation, its expression and reception in the process of translation, and the translation principles of single focused intention and comprehensive diffusive intention with numerous examples for the above-mentioned proposals put into application and analysis. |
