Dynamic Equivalence--the Most Effective Principle To Direct Translation

From the beginning of translation studies, people are perplexed by a dilemma: what is better, literal translation or free translation? And the dilemma is caused by the wrong idea of "faithfulness". This thesis begins from the dilemma, and introduces a translating principle to solve this problem-the principle of dynamic equivalence. Dynamic equivalence states that only when the receptors get the correct message, can the faithful translation be possible.The thesis first gives an answer to the argumentation whether translating is an art or science. The author thinks that there are some principles in translating, and also there are artistic factors. Since there are principles in translating, it is necessary to study the theory of translation. Then the author goes on to introduce the theoretical base for the dynamic equivalence. Information theory and cybernetics are introduced briefly. Dr. Nida analyzed the core of the theory in one sentence, "translating is communicating." Just because translating is a process of interlingual communication, receptors are very important. This is not saying that receptors are more important than speakers. People used not to pay enough attention to receptors, and they think the process of translating ends with the translated text. To stress the position of receptors is to correct the wrong idea in people's mind. This "receptors response" is a new idea in translation studies. Furthermore, the author argues that the so-called '"equivalence" should be the equivalence of the effect. That is to say. the effect the target text exerts on the target readers (receptors) should be equivalent to the effect the source text exerts on the source readers (receptors).Then, the thesis takes great efforts to compare the two orientations in translation, formal equivalence and dynamic equivalence. At last, it concludes that dynamic equivalence takes into account many important factors in translating, such as the difference between source readers and target readers. That is to say. source readers are part of the culture of the text and then it is easier for them to understand the text. So what seems very easy to the source readers may be extremely difficult to target readers. Therefore, formal equivalence seems equivalent to the forms, but in fact the text is distorted and the effect is not equivalent. On the contrary, dynamic equivalence will make some adjustments on forms, but the effect is achieved, and is real equivalence. Then after comparisonand conclusion, the definition of dynamic equivalence translation is introduced, "Translating consists in reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of the source language message, first in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style."After briefly introducing the principle of dynamic equivalence, the author of the thesis listed some criticism stated by some translation theorists and her own suggestions of improvement to the theory. Among the criticisms, some are caused by the misunderstanding of the principle, some are caused by the different theory base, and some are caused by the difference between Bible and general translation. Especially to the last one, the author gives her own improvement. Dr.Nida called his theory "functional equivalence" and the function is to persuade his readers or listeners to believe in God. For this goal, he makes so great changes on the forms that sometimes they are like free translations. The author found the problem and gave her way of improvement.Dr. Nida said, "what is ultimately needed for translating is a well-formulated, comprehensive theory of translation that can take into account all the related factors"(Shen 137). Because translating is communicating, the translation theory must be centered around the communicating mode. Although Dr. Nida's theory still has room to improve, he manages to probe into various problems in translation theory and practice in a creative way, according to communication and information theory. Hopefully, the author's analysis to Dr. Nida's theory wi...