Restriction And Influence Of Contextual Factors On Translation

The study of context is old and young. In recent decades, as a result of emergence and development of linguistics, and pragmatics in particular, the study of context has penetrated into various fields, including translation, and is still under development. However, as a whole, the study of context is unsystematic. Although due attention has been paid to contextual analysis in the circle of translation theory nowadays, this crucial question is often neglected in translation practice. To this end, this paper is written to show how translation will be restricted and influenced by contextual factors. By investigating the application of contextual analysis in translation practice, the paper, as is hoped, will be of some help to translators to better master this method so as to improve the quality of translation.This paper begins with an introduction to the definitions of context given by scholars to meet different nee~2s, then followed by a discussion of its development both at home and abroad. Context has two major functions in communication, including restrictive function and interpretative function from which the other functions are derived. Context is thought to have the following features: definiteness, relativity, gradability, transferability, symmetry and reflexion. According to the rich content and a variety of features, context can be classified into different categories from different perspectives. The author argues that context consists of linguistic context and nonlinguistic context. Linguistic context is composed of phonetic context, grammatical context and semantic context; nonlinguistic context is subdivided into context of situation and context of background.Communication is the central use of language. In the paper, the author discusses two models of communication. After analyzing the six problems of the message model, the author introduces the definition and the process of the referential model. In what follows, a contrastive study is made between the message model and the referential model. In fact, communication is a process of inferential recognition of the communicator抯 intentions. There are three cases in the process of communication: intralingual communication, interlingual communication and mass communication. Context is, in nature, the basic frame of reference of meanings, which can be used to determine the precise meaning. Consequently, the real intention of communicators is clarified. The theory of speechact is used to explain the fact that, in attempting to express themselves, people do not only produce utterances containing grammatical structures and words, they perform actions via those utterance. The purpose of communication is achieved by performing specific actions.As far as the nature of translation is concerned, translating means communicating. Context plays a decisive role in the two major processes of translation. In order to satisfy the criteria of dynamic equivalence, contextual analysis proves to be an effective method. Fair and adequate examples are provided in the paper to illustrate how linguistic factors and nonlinguistic factors of context will restrict and influence translation. Finally, a conclusion is drawn that the choosing of translated text is restricted and affected by contextual factors.