On E-C/C-E Interpretation Corpus In Mainland China:Present And Prospect

The essay of “Linguistic Corpus and the Study of Translation: Enlightenment and Application” by Mona Baker was published in 1933,symbolizing the starting of the study on corpus which based translation. In the same year, Professor Yang Huizhong wrote an article of “Linguistic Corpus and Mechanical Translation,” which triggered domestic study on linguistic translation. Corpus was initially applied to translation study simply and later on, to interpretation study. Directly after that, Peter Lang published the first ever academic symposium specialized in Corpus-base interpretation study titled Breaking Ground in Corpus-based Interpreting Studies. In Mainland China, the first essay on Corpus-based interpretation study was written by Hu Kaibao in 2007. This paper pointed out the problem of lagging-behind in the research of this area. Consequently, domestic researchers began to show zealous interest in the Interpretation Corpus Construction and the research of its value and feasibility in recently years.The history of Corpus is not long, not to mention that of the Interpretation Corpus. Therefore, it is a fertile land to explore and there is a big room for researchers to improvement. This author makes a study on two reputable corpora namely EPIC and EPPPC abroad, esp. on their construction methods and features. Then, the author turned her eyes to one of the most representative domestic Interpretation Corpora, PACCEL. Based on the investigation into this corpus and some famous scholars' comments on other influential ones in mainland China, including CECIC and CEIPPC, this author figures out problems existing in the mainland corpus construction: firstly, there is a lack of large-scaled interpretation Corpus; secondly, the function of such Interpretation Corpora is mainly for research but not only for teaching but also for interpreting practice; thirdly, real data collected in these corpora are not rich enough; lastly, some of the Corpora need more carefully designed system of annotation and transcription in order to improve their accessibility.Based on the results based on investigation, this author firmly believes that in the foreseeable future, it will be an increasing number of Interpretation Corpora with diversified categories will emerge; they will not only be of high-level conferences organized by the Central Government but also conferences on a vast range of topics by governments, organizations and institutions at all levels; corpus will be larger-sized with more precisely designed tagging and transcription; paralinguistic phenomena such as truncation, filler, omission will be annotated. All in all, the up-coming Interpretation Corpora will be able to supply their end-users with needed and more accessible information and data.