The Impact Of Cultural Differences On Advertising Translation

Advertising, something that we are all exposed to, and also something that is likely to affect most of us in a number of different spheres of our lives and takes many forms, in most of which language is of crucial importance. The wording of advertisements, in most cases, carefully crafted to meet particular ends is sometimes intended to inform, but more often, and more importantly, for persuasion and influence.Translation is done via the vehicle of language. However, like general language, advertising language also mirrors, carries culture and culture provides frame in which advertising language operates and functions. Culture imprints advertising language with all its marks. Therefore, translation or advertising translation, in essence, comes to be an across-cultural activity.People in different areas have cultural discrepancies and even cultural conflicts, including different core cultural values, trusted authority, adopted viewpoint, and consuming tendency, which cause their impact on advertising translation. To avoid or minimize the impact, under the guidance of the theory of adaptation (Verschueren 2000:13), some culture adaptive strategies in advertising translation, such as replacement, addition or abridgement, compensation and structure-borrowing are mentioned and testified in this thesis.