A Study On Translation Strategies Of Documentary Commentaries From The Perspective Of Relevance Theory

Documentary commentary is a kind of text in the documentary that matches the TV screen during its production and playback.The text influences audiences and helps them understand the truth through accurate description of the documentary,and meanwhile can reflect the meaning of the things displayed on the screen,and strive to create the publicity effect.In recent years,Chinese documentaries provide a new approach for Chinese culture’s “Going Out”.However,studies find that the translation of Chinese documentary commentary is of various qualities,which has affected the acceptance of documentaries abroad.Therefore,the studies on the translation of documentary commentary are of great significance at present.Palace Museum,as a great documentary,comprehensively shows the glorious and mysterious vicissitudes of the Palace Museum from the aspects of architectural art,applied functions,cultural relics,and historical development processes.Since the documentary was broadcast,it has caused great repercussions in China.The English translation of the documentary can not only promote the publicity of Chinese history and culture,but also provide some enlightenments for the study of documentary commentary translation.Relevance Theory was proposed by French linguist Dan Sperber and British linguist Deirdre Wilson in 1986.According to it,translation is a communication activity between different languages.Therefore,commentary translation is a kind of communication activity between the translator and the target audiences.Relevance Theory analyzes the main concepts in three levels,that is,ostensive-inferential process,optimal relevance,and maximum relevance.This study,based on Relevance Theory,selects some chapters of Palace Museum’s commentaries as practical translation texts,and conducts in-depth explores on English translation strategies for documentary commentary from the perspectives of ostensive-inferential process,optimal relevance and maximum relevance.The purpose is to prove the applicability and scientificity of Relevance Theory in guiding the translation of documentary commentary and providing some enlightenments for the study in commentary translation.This thesis is formed by six parts.The first part is an introduction to the research background,research purpose and significance,layout of the thesis and Palace Museum.The second part is the literature review which combs the studies on Relevance Theory and documentary commentary translation at home and abroad.The third part is the theoretical framework in which the development,main concepts and feasibility of Relevance Theory are interpreted.The fourth part mainly analyzes the text of the documentary commentary.The fifth part is based on the concepts of ostensive-inferential process,optimal relevance and maximum relevance of Relevance Theory to study the translation strategies of documentary commentary.The sixth part is a conclusion of the whole thesis,which summarizes some major findings and limitations.In addition,some feasible suggestions are given for future studies.