On C-E Translation Of Public Service Advertisement From Functionalist Approaches

With the development of globalization and increasing frequency of internal and external communication, China is now attracting much attention from the world. More and more foreigners are entering China, some even have settled down here. Among them, many foreigners have high enthusiasm in learning Chinese and Chinese culture. Some even have great interest in studying ancient Chinese and Chinese culture, such as Confucianism, Taoism and so on. Meanwhile, Chinese public service advertisements (PSAs) are visible in our lives with the rapid development of public welfare work in recent years. So it is not uncommon to show PSAs in English or in bi-lingual for the convenience of foreigners. However, in real life, more often than not, the translation of Chinese PSA expresses improperly or impolitely, which may confuse or offend the foreigners. So it is necessary for us to find proper theories and methods for the guidance of PSA translation. But there are a large number of researches for the C-E translation of commercial advertisements, fewer for PSA, which does not match the important position of PSA in the society. For this purpose, the author explores Chinese PSAs translation from the perspective of Functionalist Approaches.PSA is a purposeful propaganda style. Its communication functions should be paid more attention to the process of translation. Thus the Functionalist theory which stresses the functionality of the target text (TT) in the target culture will shed light on PSA translation. Under the guidance of functionalist approaches, form even contents of the source text (ST) can be changed to adapt to the target settings in order to achieve the communicative functions of PSA. Because according to the functionalist, the ST is only seen as "an offer of information" from which the translator has the right to choose the information he or she thinks important to fulfill the intended goal. Within the theory of functionalist, translators are flexible to select whatever translation techniques he or she reckons appropriate to reach the intended functions of the translation.Compared with the traditional equivalence-based linguistic approaches, Functionalist approach has opened up a new perspective to translation studies. It provides a theoretical basis for some unconventional translation techniques such as addition, adaptation and imitation. This paper is a tentative study of C-E translation of PSA from the perspective of functionalist approaches and attempts to improve the quality of PSAs translation.