Application Of Schema Theory In Business Interpretation

As an important achievement in modern cognitive linguistics,Schema Theory has been widely applied in the field of SLA(second language acquisition)to study listening and reading comprehension.It points out that,when new information is received,the newly input information needs to be connected with the existed schema in people’s brain.The understanding of the new knowledge depends on how well it can adapt to the original schema.The richer the relevant schemata are,the more accurate information the interpreter can perceive.Business interpretation,a special type of interpretation,is essentially a process of input reproduction.Misunderstanding or improper interpretation resulting from the lack of schemata widely exist.Hence a good preparation of relevant schemata is of vital importance to the interpreter’s performance.In this thesis,the author has discussed the specific application of four different schemata in business interpretation in the light of the Schema Theory.Based on a large quantity of examples collected from both the author and the surrounding classmates’ practices,this thesis comprehensively analyzes the pragmatic errors caused by the lack of relevant schemata.Besides,the author gives feasible suggestions for the extension and accumulation of schemata before interpretation.This research holds that different schemata have various influences on interpretation.Accumulating a rich volume of schemata can not only help the interpreter decrease the pressure on memorizing,save time in understanding the source language,reasonably allocate efforts on information filtering and language processing,avoid misunderstanding and improper expressions in transcoding,but also make up for the inadequacy of some interpreters’ language skills.