On Si Xianzhu’s Model Of Translation Quality Assessment And Its Application

Translation quality assessment (TQA) is an indispensable part in the field of translation studies, and it is also a core issue in contemporary translation researches in the West and China. With the development of globalization, translation is of greater and greater significance, so are translation quality and translation quality assessment. Studies on translation quality assessment become increasingly important in the scope of translation studies.Scholars of different schools at home and abroad have discussed TQA from various perspectives, which include Systemic-Functional Linguistics, argumentation theory, and fuzzy and mathematical approaches, etc. Some scholars have constructed systematic translation quality assessment models, such as House’s model and Si Xianzhu’s model based on Systemic-Functional Linguistics.Si Xianzhu’s research on translation quality assessment is of greatest significance in China. On the basis of criticizing on House’s assessment model, Si Xianzhu constructs a new model. Within the verbal behavioral framework of interaction among form, function and context, Si Xianzhu’s model firstly reveals deviances in the ideational and interpersonal meanings at the microscopic level; and then it classifies and reevaluates the deviances at the macroscopic level; finally the statement of translation quality is made by taking the text type into consideration. Si Xianzhu claims that this model employs methodology both "top-town" and "bottom-up", both qualitative and quantitative, both descriptive and hermeneutic.Attempting to promote the research on TQA, this paper firstly reviews the TQA studies carried out at home and abroad. Then it mainly introduces Si Xianzhu’s TQA model, including its theoretical bases, parameters and procedures, as well as the later revised assessment model. Then this paper takes the famous political speech I Have a Dream as source text and two Chinese translation versions as target texts to carry out a case study to apply Si’s model into assessing the translation quality.Through the analysis on Si’s TQA model and its application, the thesis points out the merits of Si’s model compared with House’s model.However, some demerits of Si’s model are also found in the assessing process, such as lacking of objectivity, incomprehensive operability, inflexible applicability, as well as inadequacy of case studies. Finally, based on the analysis, the thesis gives some suggestions for the future study on translation quality assessment research.