Translation Of English Advertisements: A Relevance-based Approach

Advertisements and their translation become more and more important with the development of international trade and globalization. Indeed, as a branch of translation study, advertisement translation has its own laws and demands a systematic study. The present study makes explorations of the advertisement translation from English to Chinese (abbreviated as E-C translation of ads) within the framework of Relevance Theory, with a hope to analyze the nature of ad translation, and develop a theoretical model covering the whole process of E-C translation of ads which can help translators to choose appropriate translation strategies.The study finds that E-C translation of ads is, in nature, an act of ostensive-inferential interpretation of the source text of advertisement. The translator plays a significant role in E-C translation of ads since he is responsible for double inferences in the translation process. One is to find out the communicative intention of the original advertiser of the source text by relevance; the other is to transfer it into the target language by inferring the contextual environment of the audience. Finally the present study proposes a translation model based on Relevance Theory covering the whole process of E-C translation of ads by which the translators can choose literal translation, liberal translation, and adaptation strategies.