| Interpreting studies cover six aspects, one of which is the study of interpretingproducts. This aspect is often discussed together with interpreting performances,including dialogue, ST-TT correspondence, interpreting effects, the role of interpretersand interpreting quality assessment, etc. Of all the above, ST-TT correspondence andinterpreting quality assessment are closely associated with ’information’. In terms of’information’ in interpreting, more attention has been paid to accuracy andcompleteness. However, the concept of ’information density’, which is also relative toinformation in interpreting, has not been discussed enough. The existing studies aremainly about how to measure the degree of difficulty in the source text with the ideaof information density instead of making ST-TT comparison in this term.On the basis of previous studies in the field, especially the definition of’information density’, the researcher of this study tries to redefine ’information density’.Considering the fact that Chinese and English are quite different in language structure,the researcher attempts to identify the interior features of the two languages and makethe definition applicable to both.Three Chinese Texts with quite different literacy are chosen as source texts. Eachof them has a corresponding English target text. By comparing the informationdensity of both the ST and the TT, the researcher seeks to find out if any differenceexists. Meanwhile, the researcher adopts another parameter, the ’information pointpercentage’, which is utilized to judge the completeness of information in both the STand the TT. After a close analysis, it is discovered that the more formal the ST, thesmaller the difference between ST and TT in information density. In another word, theshift from ST to TT is smaller.The above mentioned trend of proposition and information change can beexplained by ’Macrorules’, which provides several of the most applicable strategies forinterpreters. Therefore, it can explain why proposition and information points changeaccordingly to the degree of literacy. Furthermore, the Effort Model can be used toexplain why information density changes according to the degree of literacy.According to the researcher findings, it is found that the definition of’information density’ adopted in this study is suitable for researches on interpretingproducts. And it to some extent reflects the corresponding relationship between STand TT. |
