Chinese-English Translation Of Introduction To Tourist Attractions-from The Perspective Of Adaptation Theory

Introduction to tourist attractions aims to convey the information of scenic spots,to disseminate the local culture of the scenic spots and consequently to attract tourists. Thus,translation of introduction to tourist attractions serves as an important means for foreign tourists to understand the tourist attractions and the local culture.However, many English versions of these tourist texts in China are far from satisfactory and need to be greatly improved.The present thesis adopts Adaptation Theory as its theoretical framework and studies the translation of introduction to tourist attractions with special reference to introduction to Guangzhou tourist attractions so as to figure out the working mechanism of tourist text translation.Based on Adaptation Theory,both the source language and the target language have the properties of variability,negotiability and adaptability.Translation,which involves the transforming of these two languages, consists of a series of choice-making both at the inter-linguistic and extra-linguistic levels by the translators.The inter-linguistic level refers to the linguistic structure (including linguistic style,lexis,sentence and discourse);the extra-linguistic aspect means the communicative context(including the physical world,the mental world and the social world).This thesis conducts a specific analysis of the translation of introduction to Guangzhou tourist attractions from four aspects:the linguistic structure,the physical world,the mental world and the social world.With the analysis of many typical examples,the author finds that adaptation to these four aspects plays a key role in translation of introduction to tourist attractions.Translator's choice-making happens at every level of linguistic structure as well as in the physical world,the mental world and the social world.These parameters are not independent but in an interrelated relationship.During the process of translation,translators are likely to make dynamic adaptation from these four angles at the same time.It is therefore concluded that only the linguistic structure,the physical world,the mental world and the social world are well adapted can the translation of introduction to tourist attractions realize the communicative goal and attract numerous foreign tourists.