Guide's Talk Translation-from A Functionalist Perspective

With the development of world economy and intercultural exchanges, tourism has become one of the biggest industries, where international tourism plays an important role. China, as one of the most popular destinations in the world, is receiving more and more international tourists. Under this situation, guide's talk translation becomes more and more important for the realization of successful tour activity, however, nowadays in applied translation field, there are many studies on tourism translation, with few on guide's talk translation.This thesis is an attempt to approach guide's talk translation through functionalist approaches. According to Skopostheorie, every action is a purposeful activity, so is translation; and the prime principle that determines any translation process is the skopos, that is to say, the way how we translate a text is determined by the "skopos" of this translational action. Guide's talk translation, as a special kind of translation, has its particular skopos: to make the international tourists learn and appreciate the destination culture, and even promote the local products; and for a long run, to attract more and more international tourists to come over. Skopostheorie provides a guideline for guide's talk translation, especially for the solving of problems emerging in the process. Therefore, this thesis, based on Skopostheorie, analyzes and clarifies how to translate guide's talk well with the application of related linguistic, cultural and psychological knowledge. This research is done through the experience of many tour guides, including me myself, and also through the feedback of some international tourists and international teachers.This thesis has six chapters.Chapter one is the introduction. It starts from the history of tourism industry, from which we can see the importance of this industry in modern society; and then goes on to talk about the skopos of a tour activity and the role of tour guide in it.Chapter two is the literature review, which presenting some related studies about functionalist approaches in the history of both China and western countries.Chapter three gives us a brief introduction of functionalism. In this part, we talk about Katharina Reiss' text typology, Justa Holz-Manttari's action theory, Hans Vermeer's Skopostheorie, as well as Christiane Nord's function plus loyalty principle.Chapter four does an analysis of guide's talk translation: the situation of it in present China, the particularity of it and the general process of it.Chapter five discusses how to apply functionalist approaches to guide's talk translation. Its analysis is not from the elements of functionalist approaches, but from three other aspects—linguistics, culture and psychology.Chapter six is the conclusion.