A Report On E-C Translation Of Machinery Patent Description-Guided By Relevance Theory

According to the Patent Law of China,foreign patent application documents submitted must be in Chinese.Patent description is an important part of patent application document,and a good version of it is crucial to the examination and approval of patent application,and the affirmation and protection of the applicant's rights.With the development of science and technology,an increasing number of English machinery patent descriptions need to be translated.Based on the E-C translation of machinery patent description of more than210,000 words during the internship in a company,the author has found many translation barriers at lexical and syntactic levels respectively.They are the translation of new compound words,and common words having specialized meanings,and the translation of long sentences and passive voices.Literature review found that Relevance Theory is effective in explaining and guiding the E-C translation of machinery patent description.Within the relevance theoretical framework,E-C translation of machinery patent description is the process of seeking optimal relevance between the source language cognitive context and the target language cognitive context,and has the ostensive-inferential nature;and scientific knowledge,language knowledge and context information are the cognitive elements needed to conduct the translation.Under the guidance of Relevance Theory,and with the theory's illustration of E-C translation of machinery patent description,this report proposes relevant translation strategies and methods.On lexical level,new compound words should be translated according to morphology,and common words having specialized meanings should be translated according to specific context.On syntactic level,structural analysis should be done first to search for optimal relevance,then optimal translation methods should be adopted to convey this optimal relevance to the target language cognitive context.Concrete translation methods on syntacticlevel are linear translation,inverting translation,sentence splitting,combined method and using active voice.