Translation Strategies For Non-clause Noun Modifiers From The Perspective Of Functional Equivalence Theory

This translation practice report is a case study of the E-C translation practice of Building a Cashless Society: The Swedish Route to the Future of Cash Payments,which mainly narrates the innovations in payment area in Sweden and the author’s reflection on the cashless society.In this report,the translator under the framework of Nida’s Functional Equivalence Theory explores how to translate the non-clause noun modifiers in social science text to achieve a rather satisfactory translation with proper translation strategies.With the rapid development of online payment in China,the lives of people have become much more convenient and the online payment has drawn people’s attention to cashless payment.In order to popularize the knowledge of cash/cashless payment,promote the communication of currency culture between China and West,and help Chinese readers better understand the history of cash payment in Sweden,the translator tries to provide a Chinese version for the first four chapters,the key chapters of Building a Cashless Society: The Swedish Route to the Future of Cash Payments,and thus the translation practice was carried out accordingly.In view of the fact that Functional Equivalence Theory helps guide the translation of the social science text,the translator intends to use it for reference when probing into the translation strategies for noun modifiers in the selected text to make some contributions to the translation of social science text.In general,the overall function of noun modifiers is to make nouns more expressive.The noun modifier in English can be an adjective,an adverb,a noun,an infinitive,a participle,a prepositional phrase,an appositive,a relative clause and so on,while the noun modifier in Chinese is normally an adjective or a noun which is put before the head noun.Due to the difference between the noun modifier in Chinese and noun modifier in English,how to translate the noun modifiers in English-Chinese translation properly has undoubtedly become a difficult problem.Therefore,this translation practice report probes into the translation strategies for noun modifiers under the guidance of Eugene Nida’s Functional Equivalence Theory,and tries to realize the equivalence between the target text and the source text.The translation practice report is divided into five chapters.In the first chapter,the task background is briefly introduced,and the significance of this translation practice is demonstrated.The second chapter gives a retrospect of the process of the translation practice,including the pre-translation,while-translation and post-translation.Chapter Three discusses noun modifier and introduces Functional Equivalence Theory.The fourth chapter is the core of this report,where the translator with the aid of Functional Equivalence Theory makes a case study of the translation strategies for non-clause noun modifiers.The conclusion concerning the translator’s findings and limitations of this translation practice report is drawn in the fifth chapter.