Dependency-based Analysis Of The Unsmoothness In English-to-Chinese Sight Translation

Sight translation refers to a mode of oral interpretation of a written text from the source language into the target language,where the interpreters are required to read and interpret simultaneously.In English-to-Chinese sight translation,given that the text is already available,there is no listening obstacle.Besides,the interpreters with Chinese as their mother tongue have a relatively high capacity in constructing a sentence with any given word as the starting point.However.under the time pressure,unsmoothness frequently occurs,such as unfinished sentences.broken delivery,semantic problems and grammatical errorsAccording to dependency grammar,every word in the sentence is in a binary asymmetrical dependency relation.The two words with dependency are denominated respectively as the governor and the dependent.Dependency distance is the linear distance between the governor and the dependent and is defined as the difference of the serial number of the two words in the sentenceThe paper aims at exploring the causes of unsmoothness in E-C sight translation from the perspective of dependency grammar.The following assumptions are made(1)In E-C sight translation,the appearance of unsmoothness can be largely attributed to the rupture of dependency relation caused by the improper sentence segmentation;(2)The dependency is prone to be cut off when the dependency distance surpasses certain limit;(3)Even if the dependency distance exceeds the limit,the interpreters can sti ll keep the rendition smooth with the help of certain strategiesThe experiment involves eight subjects and verifies the correctness of the first two assumptions by calculating the proportion of dependency related unsmoothness and observing the range of the mean dependency distance and maximum dependency distance of these sentences.The paper also summarizes six strategies commonly used in those smooth renditions,including repetition,omission,addition.generalization,information externalization and word order adjustment,with an attempt to provide reference for student interpreters in their E-C sight translation training.