A Contrastive Study Of Reference In English And Chinese TV Documentaries

The paper is a descriptive synchronic study on the differences between English and Chinese in terms of reference. The purpose of describing reference-related differences is to find out the common features of and differences between English and Chinese in terms of reference by means of comparing a number of English TV documentaries and their Chinese translations. The paper also aims to analyze the factors that lead to such differences from the perspectives of language system and culture. Another goal of the paper is to suggest various strategies of translating English reference items into Chinese.Observational case analysis is the primary means of investigation. Statistics of various reference items obtained with the help of computer have been used to support my findings and a large number of examples have been examined in the absence of manipulation in order to reach objective conclusions and ensure the reliability of the results.Based on Halliday's functional linguistic theory, a relevant theory in the area of textual linguistics, which has made a detailed description of various cohesive devices in English, the paper examines the differences between English and Chinese in terms of personal reference, demonstrative reference and comparative reference.The first half of the paper is a descriptive study on the differences between reference items in English and Chinese, and it will be seen that cases of reference occur more frequent in English than in Chinese. In the second half of the paper, some methods of translating English reference items into Chinese are suggested with examples.