C-E Translation Report On Fuzhou Cultural News From The Perspective Of Adaptation Theory

This report is written based on the translation practice at Yiguo Yimin Translation Service Co.,Ltd.The selected materials consist of ten pieces of Fuzhou news from June to August 2020,involving local culture about food,architecture,traditional crafts,scenic spots,etc.It is an interpretation of Fuzhou’s history and culture and a part of the extensive Chinese culture.News translation can enhance foreign readers’ understanding of Fuzhou culture,and thus disseminating Chinese culture and spreading the Chinese voice.The news is characterized by culture-loaded words,internet buzzwords,four-character phrases,names of local snacks,and it has features at the rhetorical,syntactic and textual levels,which bring difficulties to the translation work.From the perspective of adaptation theory put forward by Verschueren,the translation is presented to adapt to differences between source language and target language in society,culture and language use from four angles: contextual correlates of adaptability,structural objects of adaptability,dynamics of adaptability and salience of adaptation process.Based on that,the translation should adapt to the information in the source language,and at the same time,adapt to the idiomatic expressions in the target language.Typical examples are analyzed and translation methods and techniques suitable for cultural news are summarized.The report turns out that free translation,transliteration plus annotation and literal translation with annotation are adopted to bridge the gap between the two languages and cultures under the guidance of contextual correlates of adaptability to improve readers’ comprehension of Chinese culture.With the guidance of structural objects of adaptability,paraphrase,conciseness and shift are adopted to convert the structure of Chinese words,sentences and text into those accessible to English readers.As for dynamics of adaptability,the context and structure of the source and target language need to be taken into consideration comprehensively,and the most appropriate option is selected from multiple available translations to achieve dynamic adaptation to the source and target language.The reporter’s conscious participation is embodied in each example,but the degree of salience varies.Three points have an effect on the degree of awareness: the degree of relevance of an example to the culture,the complexity of the text itself in language and structure,and the background knowledge required.