A Study On Translator’s Subjectivity In Advertisement Translation From The Perspective Of Skopos Theory

A Study on Translator’s Subjectivity in Advertisement Translation from the Perspective of Skopos TheoryBecause of China’s entry into the WTO and the faster international integra tion process, business between China and other countries becomes much more frequent, among which cooperation of commodity trade is a leading part of all the trades. Advertisement, as a business card for commodity, gradually becom es one of the important factors which means whether commodities could occup y a part of market in the area or not. The role of advertising is growing, but for the understandings and translations of advertisements, they often fail to ach ieve the aim of advertising commodities before the commodities come to peopl e’s life via the advertisements. These phenomena are caused by the misunderst andings for the products original advertisement slogan and the culture differenc es in the background and improper translation methods, especially the translato r’s subjectivity without being given full play. Advertising text and its translatio n have their own internal rules and specific characteristics. Therefore, there is a need to carry out a systematic study. In advertising translation activities, sour ce text, target text and target reader involved in advertising translation should be re-recognized, so the translator’s subjectivity needs taking but also should be restricted to some degree. The translator’s exerting his subjectivity in the who le translation process is under the guidance of Skopos theory, which influences that how to exert the translator’s subjectivity.Skopos theory belongs to the category of functionalist translation theory, w hich started in Germany in1970s. Kathariana Reiss applies functional categorie s to translation criticism for the first time. She thinks translation is integrated and communicative. Language functions, type of text and translation strategies i nteract to realize equivalence of conceptual content, language form and commu nicative function to the source text. This makes the original ideological framew ork of the theory. Hans J. Vermeer puts forward Skopos theory by holding that the source text is no longer the center of translating and "Skopos rule" is sup erior to any rule of translation. Translating is a behavior that possesses Skopos and achievements. Translators play a large role in translating, which means th ey determine strategies of translation and modification to the source text. Justa Holz-Manttari further develops functionalist translation theory and presents the ory of translation action. She thinks that translation is instructed by purpose, w hich has something in common with Skopos theory. Christina Nord combines v iewpoints of functionalist translation theory, and puts forward the rule of functi on plus loyalty.The term "Skopos" usually refers to the purpose of translation text. Skopo s theory holds that all translation activities should adhere to Skopos rule which is a primary one. It means that the translation text could play a part with ex pectations of target language acceptors in target language situation and culture. Skopos of translation action determines the process of translation action. Skopo s rule is followed by coherence rule and fidelity rule of translation theory, whi ch produces the primary rule of Skopos theory. It is not equivalence but adequ acy that the criterion of translation text stresses. Under the theoretical frame of Skopos theory, adequacy means translation text should meet the demand of tr anslation Skopos; equivalence refers to that target text and source text realize t he similar communicative function, though they come from different culture co ntexts. In the translating process, Skopos rule and fidelity rule are seen as gui de and adequacy is criterion to translation text. Skopos theory does not pay as much attention to equivalence of translation text and source text as the previo us translating theory does, but emphasizes translators make different options of the most reasonable methods according to various kinds of context factors wit h the function desired in translation process.This thesis attempts to start with Skopos theory by which it studies the in fluence in translation processes and expounds systematically the importance of exerting the translator’s subjectivity in EC/CE advertising translations, hoping t o make some innovations and breakthroughs in translation field.