A Study On The Applicability Of German Functionalist Approach To The Translation Of Vague Language In Business Contracts

The German functionalist translation approach came into being in about 1970s. Till now, it has developed into a quite mature system of related theories and the main scholars of this approach include Katharina Reiss, Hans Vermeer, Justa Holz-Manttari, Christiane Nord. This theory is mainly made up of four parts: text typology, skopostheorie, translation action and function plus loyalty. The theory believes that the source text can be divided into three groups: Informative, Expressive and Operative, and correspondingly, each type should use different translation methods. The translation itself is purposeful and this is the basic requirement of translation. But meanwhile, the interpersonal relationship can not be ignored, both the"fidelity"and"loyalty"are important.Along with the fast development of our nation's economy and the tendency of being more integrated of the world economy, business contract gradually becomes more and more normative. Business contract is an important branch of legal text and thus it has the characteristic of preciseness. However, even if business contract is such a text that strongly requires preciseness, vague language unavoidably exists. The studies on the translation of vague language mainly center on the micro sides, for example, from the point of wording, phrase and syntax. As a result, based on the precondition of achieving the economic aims of our nation and also based on the importance of vague language in business contracts, it is needed to study the vague language in business contracts systematically and eventually to find a proper theory to guide its translation.To discuss the applicability of German functionalist approach to the translation vague language in business contracts, the thesis mainly includes the following contents: 1. Explain the key concepts such as vague language, contract & business contract. Based on the characteristics of vague language and business contract, the author will make a conclusion of the language characteristics of vagueness in business contracts. 2. Specifically illustrate the academic ideas of the German functionalist approach, which consists of the text typology (Reiss), skopostheorie(Vermeer), translation action theory(Holz-Manttari) and loyalty principle (Nord). 3. Based on the text samples collected from related books and magazines, the author will explain the applicability of using the functionalist approach to guide the translation of vague language in business contracts from four aspects: being informative vs. text typology, unclearness vs. translation action theory, a given purpose vs. skopostheorie and the role of translator vs. loyalty principle.Then the author draws the conclusion that German functionalist approach is applicable to the translation of vague language in business contracts.