Study On The C-E Translation Of Scenic Signs Of Sanya From The Perspective Of Skopos Theory

On January4th in2010, with the publishing of the approval by the State Council, the construction of International Tourist Destination in Hainan has become one of the nation’s major strategic projects. According to the plan, up to2020, Hainan will be developed into a world-class tourist destination, an open island, a green island and an island of civilization and harmony. As an international tourist destination, the translation of scenic signs plays an increasingly important role in displaying our country’s image and culture and especially the development of the International Tourist Destination.This thesis, which is a Skopos theory-guided and practice-based one, intends to testify and explore the effectiveness and strategies for the C-E translation of scenic signs in Sanya. First, the thesis introduces the development and basic concepts of the Skopos theory, which holds that the purpose of the translation determines the translation strategies to be adopted. In this part, the thesis introduces the text types of the scenic signs and their functions and linguistic characteristics in order to get better translations. It also analyses the principles of the C-E translation of scenic signs in light of Skopos theory. Then it comes to the main part of the thesis which gives many selected cases to analysis the effectiveness of the English versions of the scenic signs from the perspective of the Skopos theory and points out the problems and errors existing in the sign translations as well. Finally, the thesis provides lessons from the study to the scenic sign translation in Sanya or the whole International Tourist Destination.The thesis may seem to be more of an investigation report than a real paper. And the thesis concludes that the condition of scenic sign translation is quite well on the whole in Sanya although there exist many problems or errors as well; the Skopos theory serves well as the quality standard for the translation of scenic signs; and that a good grasp of the theory and the main translation approaches as well as the distinctive features will contribute a great deal to the good quality of translated scenic signs. All in all, the translating of scenic signs is not an easy task but needs a good cooperation between translators, governments and other organizations. When translating scenic signs, the translator should fully understand the source ones first and always bear the skopos of the translation and the anticipation of readers in mind. The author of this thesis hopes that the research would do some good to the quality and standardization of the scenic sign translation in Hainan and make some contribution to the development of the International Tourist Destination.