On The English Translation Of Expressions With Chinese Characteristics

With the rapid development of China’s economy and the continuous improvement of its international status, China has become the focus of international arena.The Government Work Report, delivered at National People’s Congress, is an authoritative document reviewing the achievements in the past year or the past five years and making major plans of all aspects for the coming year or the next five years, including the economy, education, culture, national defense, people’s livelihood and political policies in China.As the most authoritative political documents, the successful translation of the Government Work Report is significant and essential to convey the proper China’s image to the world. This thesis is to study the Chinese-English translation of the expressions with Chinese characteristics in2004-2013Government Work Report based on Nida’s functional equivalence theory.There are five parts in this thesis. Chapter One is the introduction which mainly introduces the research background and significance, the methodologies and innovations, and its organization. Chapter Two is the literature review which gives a detailed introduction to Nida and reviews his functional equivalence theory. Meanwhile, it also briefs what Government Work Report is, what the expressions with Chinese characteristics are, and relevant researches on them. Chapter Three is the analysis of the C-E translation of the expressions with Chinese characteristics in the Government Work Report based on Nida’s functional equivalence theory. It analyzes the translation methods and techniques of many typical examples of the expressions with Chinese characteristics in three groups respectively, that is, shortened form expressions, four-character expressions and unique expressions under China’s current social and cultural context. Chapter Four analyzes the translation strategies and principles of the C-E translation of the expressions with Chinese characteristics. Based on the author’s analysis and comparison of three years Government Work Report of2004,2010and2013, the thesis aimed to find the translation tendency and guiding principles in translating the expressions with Chinese characteristics in the Government Work Report. The author found that foreignization strategy predominated in translating expressions with Chinese characteristics with an increasingly proportion and summarized that the translation guiding principles of the expressions with Chinese characteristics were "accuracy, faithfulness and smoothness". Chapter Five is the conclusion which biefs major findings of the whole thesis, limitations of the thesis and suggestions for further research. The thesis learned more about the expressions with Chinese characteristics so that it could provide some help and guidance to English learners who are interested in such research.