A Study On Translation Of Advertisements Of Electronic Products From The Perspective Of German Functional Translation Theory

Electronic products are getting increasingly popular nowadays in that they makelife more efficient and convenient. Advertising of electronic products can not onlyefficiently convey the information of products but also significantly stimulateconsumers’ desires to buy the advertised products. Meanwhile, profits are thusgenerated and enterprises can directly reap benefits. Therefore, advertising hasbecome a vital channel for producers to promote their new products. With the ongoingand ever deepening globalization, an increasing number of electronic products withforeign brands have entered the Chinese market. Some of the foreign brands areespecially favored by domestic consumers. Advertising constitutes an important partof international trade and plays a major and irreplaceable role in transnational trade;therefore, the translation of the advertisements of electronic products has been put at acrucial place.As a special text, the theories and practices concerning translation of theadvertisements have received much attention in the translation circle. There are somestudies on the translation of the advertisements of different types, however, theresearch on the translation of the advertisements of electronic products still remainsweak and no one has ever done a systematic research on it.“Equivalence” theory has been the center of theories guiding translation practicefor quite a long time. However, it is found in the translation practice that there aresome weaknesses in the equivalence theory. Therefore, the German FunctionalTranslation Theory came into being and has experienced long-term development andimprovement. The Skopos Theory, put forward by Vermeer, a major representative ofthe German Functional Translation Theory, is appropriate to guide the translation ofadvertising which has special evocative function. Advertising is an appellative text; it has strong function and purpose. The finalgoal of advertising is to promote consumers to buy the products. Hence, in the processof translation, it should be taken into consideration that whether the translation canachieve the same functions and goals in the target language context as it does in thesource language context. The German Functional Translation Theory maintains thatthe goals of translation intends to achieve determines the whole translation processand translation strategies. Any type of translation strategy can therefore be adopted ifthey can achieve the ultimate goal.The thesis takes the advertising of electronic products as the major researchsubject and the German Functional Translation Theory as theoretic framework. Theauthor has carried out a number of concrete case studies on the translation of theadvertisements of electronic products. Two translation strategies namelydomesticating translation and foreignizing translation, have been summed up by theauthor. Proceeding from these two strategies, the author discusses a number ofeffective and detailed translation methods to guide the translation of theadvertisements of the electronic products. These methods can make the target readersunderstand and accept the translation, and the intended goals of advertising willtherefore be achieved. The thesis also proves the applicability of the GermanFunctional Translation Theory in guiding the translation of the advertisements ofelectronic products. It is hoped that the research findings of the thesis can promote theresearch on the translation of electronic products at home and arouse people’sattention to the translation strategies and provide guidance to the translation of theadvertisements of electronic products.