A Report On The Chinese-English Translation Of The Ancient Chinese Maritime Silk Road (Excerpt)

Since the introduction of the“21^stCentury Maritime Silk Road Initiative”,it has attracted the attention of all parties.The Ancient Chinese Maritime Silk Road,by Professor Liu Yijie,introduces the history of the Maritime Silk Road from the perspective of navigation technologies.The first chapter of the book mainly focuses on the origin and evolution of boats and ships to provide new information for the public.Therefore,the translator chooses the first chapter to do translation practice and completes this translation practice report.It is hoped to carry forward China’s marine culture and promote the“going global”of the fine traditional Chinese culture.This report consists of five parts:introduction,description of the translation task,description of the translation process,case analysis,and conclusion.The introduction includes the background of the report,and the purpose and significance;the second part includes the background of the translation task,introduction to the source text,features of the source text,and target readers;the third part mainly presents the pre-translation preparations,translation process,and quality control.In case analysis,the translator,guided by the Skopos theory,discusses the translation of different translation phenomena from the lexical level,the syntactic level,and the discourse level,and presents the corresponding translation methods or techniques.At the lexical level,the translator discusses the translation of culture-loaded words and four-character structures.At the syntactic level,the translator discusses the translation of subjectless sentences and long and complex sentences.At the discourse level,the translator mainly presents the translation of the reiteration and implicit relations.The fifth part is the summary of the report,including the major findings,reflections,some deficiencies,and suggestions for further studies.Through this translation practice report,the translator has not only gained more knowledge about the birth and evolution of boats and ships in ancient times but also has a deeper understanding of the uses of translation methods and techniques in the translation practice.The source text of this translation practice is of great academic significance,thus,the translator hopes that this report can provide some reference for later studies.