A Report On The Translation Of "Shall" In The Second Part Of Massachusetts Constitution

Constitution is the fundamental law of the country,and it is the product from the specifically social,political,economic and ideological and cultural conditions.The translation and communication of the constitutions among different countries can benefit all related countries,and can also be used for reference.Even if the Massachusetts constitution is only a state constitution of the United States,its Chinese translation version can be beneficial to the amendment and improvement of the Chinese constitution to a certain extent.It is expected to realize the benign interaction between the Chinese and American legislative culture.In view of this,the author of this report selects the Massachusetts constitution which has a profound influence on the federal constitution of the United States,as the translation material,and finds that the word "shall" is frequently used in this text.Since the accuracy of the translation of the word "shall" in the legislative text largely determines the quality of the translation of a statute,even the entire legislative text,the translation of this word is also the difficulty in this translation material.Under the guidance of Skopos theory,this translation report explores the translation of "shall" and solves the difficulty in the translation of "shall" in the text.It is hoped that this translation report can provide a good material for Chinese scholars to understand the state constitution of the United States,and also serve as a reference for scholars to study the translation of the word "shall".