The Explicitation Strategies In English-chinese Translation Of Historical Texts

“Explicitation”,refers to the translation process in which the implied information in the original text is expressed in a clearer way in the translated text,so as to make the translated text clearer and more understandable.As a universal feature of translation,explicitation plays an important role in the process of language conversion.This thesis mainly discusses the explicitation strategies in the Chinese translation of historical texts.The translation project for this thesis is The Star and The Scepter: A Diplomatic History of Israel(Chapter 11),which mainly describes the historical process in which a series of wars and conflicts were triggered by ethnic conflicts and territorial disputes between Israel and Arab countries after the founding of Israel and a peace agreement was finally reached through negotiation.The text in this translation project belongs to the historical text,which involves a large amount of historical background information such as wars and ethnic conflicts.For the translator,he/she should not only sort out the information of the original text to accurately convey it,but also take into account the Chinese readers,so as to make explicit some hidden information in the original text that may affect readers’ understanding.Therefore,some explicitation strategies were adopted in order to present the original information more clearly and help readers to better understand the original text.Based on the translation practice,this project report discusses and summarizes the explicitation strategies for different types of implicit information.From a functional perspective,explicitation can be applied to three types of information: conceptual information,interpersonal information and textual information.For conceptual information,annotation and free translation can be used to render the cultural and pragmatic meaning embodied in the source text.For interpersonal information,it is necessary for the translator to first fully understand the relationship between the involved parties in the source text.And then the implied modal meaning and evaluative meaning in the original text can be made more explicit by appropriately adding modality words and evaluation expressions.As for the textual information,the translator needs to first grasp the implicit logical relationship in the original text,and on this basis,clarifying the referential information and adding conjunctive words can be used to produce a more explicit translation.It is hoped that this translation report can provide some reference for the translation of historical texts.