城市公示语翻译的错误类型及解决措施

城市公示语翻译的错误类型及解决措施

1. Introduction

With many places famous for its natural sceneries and historical relics, China is predicted to be the most frequently-visited country in the world and the fourth largest suppliers of tourists in next few years. During these years, some tourist resorts have attracted thousands of visitors from all over the world. For the foreigners, the public signs in the tourist attractions are windows to get a better understanding of China. As a global language, English is given the priority to be the corresponding equivalence of the public signs in Chinese. The data and examples are collected from public signs, travel brochures, and websites of the tourist attractions. Among these translations, some public signs are good and standard. However, the general situation is far from satisfactory. Besides some noticeable lexical and grammatical errors, improper and confusing expressions are ubiquitous. This kind of translation not only fails to achieve the information, intentions and functions of the signs, but also affects the whole image of China and thus the Chinese tourism industry.

Informative, appropriate and attractive translations of public signs are urgently needed. Translators following the guidance of a scientific translation theory could work more effectively. Translation theory put forward by Peter Newmark can explain these unsatisfactory translation phenomena and his communicative translation strategy is helpful to improve the current situation in C-E translation of public signs in tourist attractions.

2. An Overview of Communicative Translation

2.1 Newmark s Text Typology

Bühkler sorts the functions of language into three types: the expression, representation and appeal function. And based on it, Jacobson (Newmark, Peter2001) [1]classifies language into six functions: the expressive, informative, vocative, phatic, metalingual and aesthetic function. Peter Newmark absorbs these two theories critically and establishes his text typology. He divides the texts into three main types: the expressive, the informative and the vocative texts.

“The core of the expressive text is the mind of the speaker, the writer, the originator of the utterance”. (Newmark, Peter 2001) [2] The author uses the utterance to express his feeling irrespective of any response. Expressive text focuses on the author s status in translation, thus it s author-centered and it means the author s status in the original texts is emphasize d. Typical texts of this type include autobiography, literature like poetry, novels and plays, and authoritative statements such as documents, political speeches, and scientific, philosophical and academic works.

“The informative text stresses the“external situation, reality outside language, including