On Translation Compensation For Architectural Texts

Translation compensation is to make up for the potential loss or the loss that isunder way in the translation process according to the style of the original text and thepurpose of translation.(Xia Tingde,2002:68). Though translation compensation waswidely used since the dawn of translation, scholars began to seriously treat it until the1980’s. From the views of the domestic and foreign scholars, it is not difficult to findthat equivalence is the translation purpose to most of them. They use the skill ofcompensation to reach the equivalence between the ST and TT. In the process of thetranslation of the architectural texts, translation compensation seems especiallyimportant. First of all, the translator should do some necessary annotations for thearchitectural terms, theories, styles, schools and architects, etc. according to thereceivers’ knowledge level. Secondly, through analyzing the special textual characterof architectural texts–“Aesthetic Effects”, the translators should try to describe theaesthetic feelings brought by the architectures, making the target readers as immersive.Two compensation ways can be applied when translating architectural texts–theintratextual compensation and the extratextual compensation. The former includesadding brackets, adding words on the pragmatic level and adding words on theaesthetic level; while the latter includes adding annotations and adding pictures.Adding annotations is the most widely used method to compensate for thearchitectural terms, theories, styles, schools and architects, etc.