A Report On The Chinese-English Translation Of A Company Contract

With the integration of global economy and China’s reform and opening up,economic and trade exchanges have become frequent between China and foreign countries. In the current legal society, signing contracts plays a very important role in economic activities, as it is a common legal means to protect the rights of the concerned parties. Demand for Chinese-English translation of contract texts increases due to the rapid development of economy, legislation of social activities and growing frequency of foreign exchanges. Meanwhile, the growing of language service industry also provides a possibility for this increase. This report is based on the translation task which the writer completed when she worked as a translation intern in Shanghai Locatran Transltions Ltd. In the work flow of translation, the writer was responsible for polishing and improving the first draft of translation. This report summarizes the problems found in the process of proofreading. The report first describes the characteristics of the source text of the company contract, covering vocabulary,sentences and text style, pointing out that as a form of legal text, the source text has characteristics of preciseness. Second, by picking out some misuse of modal verbs in the first draft while polishing and proofreading it, the report analyzes the improper use of the modal verbs. Then, the writer analyzes some typical errors in the first draft at lexical and syntactic levels to fulfill her responsibility for polishing and proofreading it. As a result of polishing and proofreading, the version has the characteristic of a legal text. By polishing and proofreading the text, the author classifies and analyzes typical errors in understanding and expression. Thus, the author has achieved a deeper understanding of a translator’s responsibilities and improved her skills of translating company contracts.