A Study On The Translation Skills Of The Government Work Report (2015) Under The Guidance Of The Skopos Theory

With China's status gradually increasing in the international community,and exchanges and cooperation between China and other countries becoming more frequent,it has become particularly urgent for foreign countries to know about China's policies and measures.The Government Work Report(hereafter referred to as “the Report”)delivered every year is an authoritative source of information for the international community to know about China,which means that its translation quality will directly affect China's international image.Skopos theory takes translation aim as a starting point and guides translators to adopt proper translation skills,making the target audiences understand and accept the content better.This thesis analyzes the text type and language features of the Report from the levels of lexical,syntactical and rhetorical,and then summarizes the translation skills adopted in the English translation version of the Report delivered in 2015 under the guidance of Skopos theory.In addition,this thesis endeavors to provide certain reference for the translation of similar political texts in the future,and attract more and more scholars concern about and study the translation of the similar political texts through the research on the English translation of the Report delivered in 2015 according to the Skopos theory.This thesis is divided into five parts.Part One is an introduction to the research purpose,significance,and structure of this thesis.Part Two is a literature review,which introduces the relevant researches into the Skopos theory and the Report delivered in 2015.Part Three reviews the four stages in the process of evolution of the Skopos theory.It summarizes the text types of the Report,and analyzes the linguistic features of the Report at the lexical,syntactical and rhetorical levels,respectively.This part also illustrates the applicability of the Skopos theory to the translation of the Report and the translation brief.Part Four adopts the three rules of Skopos theory i.e.the rule of Skopos,the rule of coherence and the rule of fidelity,and combines typical examples to summarize the translation skills of the English version of the Report delivered in 2015 such as division and omission in terms of words,sentences and rhetorical devices.Part Five is a conclusion,which points out the major findings of the thesis: the Skopos theory is a practical guiding theory for the translation of the Government Work Report.In the process of the Report's translation guided by the Skopos theory,the translator adopts translation skills of omission,substitution and so on when translating words;the translator adoptstranslation skill of division etc when translating sentences especially long sentences;the translator also adoptstranslation skills of free translation and literal translation when translating rhetorical devices.The part also points out limitations of this thesis: the author did not carry out the corresponding research on the reading and post-reading feelings of foreign English readers.And examples from the Report are quite randomly selected.The conclusion also puts forward possible study directions in the future such as finding out the most suitable translation theory for the translation of Chinese political texts comparing the Skopos theory with other theories.