The Relevance Theory:a Comparative Analysis Of Chinese Subtitles Of Forrest Gump

Film subtitle translation, though a relatively new type of translation, has assumed increasing importance in the field of translation studies as exchanges inside the global village are becoming more frequent than ever. Nevertheless, due to the unique features and technical constraints of subtitles, mainly spatial and temporal, translation of subtitles poses huge challenges to translators. Therefore, a deep understanding of the theories and practice of subtitle translation is a prerequisite for the effectiveness of subtitle translation.In view of this, this dissertation makes a comparative analysis of three versions of Chinese subtitles of the English film Forrest Gump under the framework of relevance theory, with a view to finding out how relevance theory serve as a theoretic framework for subtitle translation. The analysis is based on12examples, comparing the three versions of each in terms of degree of relevance by assessing their contextual effects and processing effort.From the analysis, we can arrive at the conclusion that relevance theory grants subtitle translators the necessary freedom in judging what the most relevant information is for the audience with adequate reasons in order to fulfill the ultimate goal of subtitling:to facilitate and smooth the target language audience in their watching of foreign films.