Translation Practice Report On The Registration System Of Engineers In The UK Based On Functional Equivalence Theory

Currently,as China is entering a new development stage,it is time to learn from foreign countries about how to manage different professions and develop an internationally recognized management system.With the aim to learn how other countries manage their engineering professionals,this report is about the translation of the United Kingdom’s professional management system for engineers,which includes the governance body,professional registration,standards,professional engineering institutions and so on.Therefore,in this report the UK’s professional management system of engineers is introduced and translated to Chinese so as to provide China with some useful guidance in how to manage China’s engineering professionals.The original text is mostly engineering and technology related material selected from the official website of the Engineering Council,which is the regulatory body of the UK engineering profession.Since the objective of this translation task is to introduce foreign practices in professional management,the author adopts Eugene Nida’s functional equivalence theory for translation.On the one hand,according to Nida,translation is referred to as reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of the source message,first in terms of meaning and second in terms of style,which is exactly what translation of English for science and technology is seeking for.By this means,obscure translation can be effectively avoided,and consequently efficient information exchanges can be achieved.On the other hand,according to the theory of functional equivalence,the response of the target readers reading the translation should roughly be the same as the readers reading the original text.Thus under the guidance of the theory,the translator can better take target readers’ needs into consideration and consequently try to maintain the accuracy of the original information as much as possible.In this way,the purpose of information exchange can be well achieved.This report includes four major parts.Part One is description of the translation project.Part Two is description of translating process.Part Three is case analysis,where the theory of functional equivalence is introduced,and examples are discussed for the demonstration of the translation methods and techniques adopted in translating English for science and technology based on functional equivalence both at the lexical and sentence level.Part Four is a summary.In this part,application of functional equivalence to the translation of English for science and technology is summarized.