A Report On The Translation Of Know Thyself:The Science Of Self-Awareness(Chapters Eight To Nine)

The source text of the translation project includes the eighth and ninth chapter of the book,Know Thyself: The Science of Self-Awareness.This book introduces and analyzes the inner functioning mechanism of metacognition and self-awareness,as well as the limits of the mastered knowledge,so that people can better handle difficulties in their individual and public lives,and further improve their performance in making decisions.The selected eighth and ninth chapters demonstrate how effective metacognition plays an important role from the individual and collective perspective.As part of the book on psychology,the selected source text can be classified as an informative one.Its linguistic characteristics can be demonstrated from varied aspects,such as rigorous wording,frequent use of proper nouns and terms,flexible and variable sentence patterns,and both theoretical narrations and case studies.In order to convey the accurate information of the source text in an objective and fluent manner,the translator should be guided by target language-oriented strategies and strive to achieve the intended communicative purpose of the translation practice.Coincidentally,the Skopos theory proposed by Hans Vermeer from German functionalist school emphasizes that the translation process is determined by the purpose of the translation project.As a consequence,the Skopos theory is adopted as the guiding translation theory.Under the guidance of the Skopos theory,the translator analyzes the difficulties with translation case studies from the lexical,syntactic and textual levels,and proposes corresponding translation methods.At the lexical level,the translator analyzes proper noun,abstract expression,polysemy and term in the original text by consulting parallel texts,dictionaries and the Internet.The translator,under the guidance of the Skopos theory,solves these problems by using translation methods including transliteration,annotation,literal translation and free translation.At the syntactic level,to translate the long and difficult sentences,the translator employs translation methods such as division,amplification and reconstruction to satisfy the informative feature of the original text.At the textual level,the translator leverages the translation methods of conjunction and reference to ensure the coherence and cohesion.Through the translation report,the translator analyzes and summarizes the translation strategies,the unsolved problems,and the reference significance for future translation practices.