A Report On The Translation Of The Thirty Great Inventions Of China(Excerpts)

Innovation is the key to national progress and also the natural endowment of Chinese people.With the development of technology,innovation serves as the core of national development and the accompanying encouragement to innovation has been the tendency of the times.In terms of invention and innovation,China has its voice as is demonstrated in the Thirty Great Inventions of China.The Thirty Great Inventions of China introduces 30 influential Chinese inventions selected by experts in history of science and technology,with the purpose of strengthening cultural confidence and encouraging innovation.Based on the translation of the Thirty Great Inventions of China,this report aims to find appropriate translation skills to achieve logic explicitation in sci-tech translation practice.This report is divided into five parts,namely,task description,process description,theoretical basis,case analysis and conclusion.Among them,the focus falls on the exploration of translation skills for logic explicitation in the fourth part,in which the author explores how to reproduce the original logic in a translated text.Given that the Thirty Great Inventions of China is a book introducing the history of several technologies in China,it is a kind of informative text for the popularity of technology knowledge,characterized by strong logic.According to Katherine Reiss,the informative texts are supposed to be translated in “plain prose” so as to transfer the equivalent concepts and information in the source texts,and explicitation can be adopted when it is required.Taking this into consideration,this report will mainly explore several appropriate translation strategies to achieve the logic explicitation in the translation of scientific and technical texts.The author categorizes the logic explicitation in the translation of scientific and technical texts into three aspects—vocabulary,sentence and discourse.In terms of the explicitation of lexical meaning,translators can adopt the strategy of applying some verb phrases that indicating logic,specifying common nouns,and achieving the explicitation of referent to accurately transfer the meanings in the source text.In terms of the explicitation of syntax logic,translators could add necessary conjunctions and reorganize sentence structure when necessary,to explicitly represent the logic of the source text.As for the logic explicitation in discourse,the translator focuses on the logical reproduction of paragraphs,and mainly adopts the translation techniques such as combination and recasting after fully understanding the deep logic connotation of the original text.Through this translation practice,the author has gained a better understanding of thefeatures of scientific and technical texts and concluded some translation skills and methods to reproduce the logic of sci-tech texts.It is hoped that this report may be a source of reference for other translators in sci-tech translation.