Translating The Names Of Local Government Agencies: An Intertextual Perspective

Unlike most of the papers on the translation of names of government agencies,this thesis probes into the issue based on a case study of Xi’an Municipal Governmentfrom an intertextual perspective. Within the framework of intertextuality theory, alltexts including the names of government agencies to be studied in the thesis areconsidered as intertexts which have endless connections and references to other texts.Agencies are classified into two types according to their intertextual features. The firsttype is overt, meaning that the intertext contains direct quotations and citations fromother texts and the second is covert, in which the intertext relates to other intertexts interms of concepts and ideas, regardless of the dependence on genre and form.Meanwhile, two major problems, that is, non-transparency and inconsistency, aredetected in the existing English names of Xi’an Municipal Government agencies. Inorder to tackle the problems and generate feasible translations, the properties of theagencies should be first defined, then compared with other intertexts bearing similarfunctions and finally converted into English by borrowing or deriving a translationfrom intertexts, or creating one based on their delimiting characteristics. Thetranslation process involved is an intertextual practice.