Analysis Of "Competitive Capitals" For Language Service Providers (LSPs)

With the continuous development of globalization,the current status in economy,politics,science and technology and society is very different from the one several decades ago.In addition,the rapid development of information technology and internet is having a great impact on our culture,life and translation,and many distinct features of the current times are reflected in translation service.It is a great chance and an necessary platform for the emergence of language service providers(LSPs),which work as a significant communication bridge for people and businesses around the world.Moreover,translation activity,as a kind of social activity,is closely related to people’s life;to some degree,we can say,translation activity possesses both properties,namely social property and economic property.Currently,LSPs mainly have two categories,that is,traditional translation companies and modern localization translation companies(including localization service companies and translation technology development companies).But to have a better understanding about the nature of LSPs,this thesis tries to borrow the concept of “translator’s capital” from the field of social translation studies,which includes “economic capital”,“cultural capital”,and “social capital”,establishing the “translator’s capital model” of ECS Model.Then this thesis tries to apply this into the study of “Language Service Providers’ capital”,with LSPs as study objects,and deduce five capitals of LSPs,namely,“economic capital”,“talents capital”,“technological capital ”,“management capital”and “symbolic capital”,thus establishing an ETTMS basic model for assessing the productivity and efficiency of LSPs.Actually,here the concept of “capital” can be interpreted as “resources”,which is an abstract concept.This thesis aims to adopt descriptive translation studies through induction and deduction to establish translator’s capital ECS Model and LSPs’ ETTMS Model as well as empirical methods by selecting a typical listed localization company to make an analysis of its annual reports,websites and other related literature and materials,and conducting aquestionnaire of four sample LSPs in different cities,to estimate and compare the“capital values” of them,and verify the established model.Meanwhile,this thesis also aims to reveal the types of talents needed by LSPs,thus providing some tips for translation teaching and talents training.