A Study On C-E Translation Of Political Texts

With China's reform and opening up, political texts play a specific role in the ideology, enable people to understand its political and economic developments in the first place, and contribute to different ideologies and values of communication between countries.Political texts are generally divided into two categories: official documents and political works. Political texts, due to their authority and close bearing with policies, and the guidelines and strategies of a country, require all the more faithfulness, political sensitivity, proper sequencing of wording and employment of words with proper intensity in their translation.Thus the difficulty in Chinese to English translation of political texts lies in the fact that the translator should not only have reservations about the seriousness and accuracy of political version, while at the same time ,it should reflect the characteristics of China's political culture. Translators intend to convey original text for achieving political advocacy function under the premise, but also should make efforts to introduce Chinese culture to foreign readers.The author adopts the combining methods of induction and exemplification in political texts translation. On the one hand, the author makes a macro-analysis on literature review, background research, factors causing the difficulty of C-E translation in political texts. On the other hand, the author probes into micro-analysis, such as problems in current translation practice and skills from lexical, syntactical, rhetorical, and cultural level in political texts. At last, the author summarizes the criteria and principles of translation, and hopes to give suggestions about the translation of Chinese political texts.The thesis consists of introduction, four chapters and conclusion.Introduction is the generalization of former scholars' contribution on C-E translation in political texts, the methodology and structure of the thesis.Chapter One is the introduction of the definition and function of translation in political texts, and its general feature.Chapter Two is the statement about specific factors causing the difficulty of C-E translation in political texts: linguistic difference and cultural barrier.Chapter Three is the description of problems on C-E translation of political texts: variation, redundancy, Chinglish.Chapter Four is the analysis of skills in political text translation from lexical, syntactical, rhetorical, and cultural perspective with lots of examples to demonstrate.The conclusion is the summary of translation criteria and principles in political texts: ideology, accuracy, reader orientation, and also the depiction of the significance and practical value on C-E translation of political texts. Some limitations and suggestions of this research are given.