A Report On E-C Translation Of Cultural Evolution,Memes And The Trouble With Dennett Guided By Thematic Progression Patterns

The source text of this report is “Cultural Evolution,Memes and the Trouble with Dennett” by William Benzon.This translation report is based on the translation practice under the guidance of many domestic and foreign researches on thematic progression.This report employs the literature review method and the case analysis method.Discourse translation is a significant concern of translation practice and studies,and thematic structure is widely used in discourse translation.To study translation from the perspective of discourse,we should consider the coherence and dynamics of discourse,so we should pay attention to thematic progression and the macro structure of discourse organization.The difficulties in translation is to understand semantic meaning and translate long and complex sentences.In view of this,the translator uses the thematic progression patterns to discuss the role and transformation rules of the thematic progression patterns in EnglishChinese translation,and applies these rules to translation practice.In the process of understanding the source language,the author first identifies themes and rhemes of the discourse for understanding the semantics of the text,and then analyzes the corresponding thematic progression patterns of the text to clarify the communicative intention.Finally,the translator preserves or adjusts thematic progression patterns of the target language under the premise of no distortion of the semantics.The theory not only helps in the understanding of the source text,but also in the linguistic organization of the target text.Thematic progression provides translators with a new perspective of translation.With the help of it,the translator can analyze the translation process from the perspective of cohesion and coherence.In accurately understanding the original text,we should grasp information development according to the principles of cohesion and coherence from the form and semantics of the target language translation.By achieving coherence in meaning and cohesion in form,the translation ultimately realizes semantic and functional equivalence to the maximum extent.In this report,the author shows a large amount of translation practice and substantial translation examples that the application of thematic progression patterns in translation practice can improve the understanding of the text and the quality of translation,which is one of the basic ability exercises to lay a good foundation for translation practice.The translator also realizes that although there are relatively abundant thematic progression patterns,there are still some patterns that need to be further summarized,which is one of the directions that the translator needs to study in translation practice in the future.