Study Of Chinese-English Speech Act Translation In Functional Business Texts

This paper studies the translation of speech acts in three types of functional business texts. Combining the speech act and functional perspectives, the paper explores the feasibility of achieving speech act competency and functional sufficiency in translation.The study first begins with the conception of a translation strategy that covers the analysis and assessment of translating the speech acts in the above functional texts. The strategy is realized through a framework that integrates two theories: speech act theory and Reiss's text typology theory. The two theories in the framework serve to ensure that the translations are "sufficient" on speech act and text function levels. Reiss's text typology theory provides guidelines for text analysis and translation; speech act theory stresses the correct reproduction of specific propositional and illocutionary acts in the texts which will constitute the overall function of the target text. Due to their nature, the two theories offer supplementary advantages that cover translation analysis and translation assessment on both macro and micro-level.With the completion of the framework, the study moves on to the next step of case study. According to the framework, the case study will be divided into two parts, the analysis and assessment of translating speech acts in texts of different functions. The analysis process concentrates on the analysis of text functions and speech acts; the translation process stresses reproduction of speech acts and their functional features according to the text types.The paper finds an approach that combines a pragmatic perspective with a translation theory in the hope of formulating an effective strategy in tackling the translation of three common functional business texts on both micro- (speech act) and macro-level (functional level). It is useful in analyzing and assessing the translation of business texts of certain functions. It hopes to pave the way for future similar translation study of a wider range of texts with more functions.