An Investigation About Documentary Subtitle Translation Based On Functional Equivalence Theory

As an indispensable component of film translation, the documentary translation isseldom concerned and its theoretical research is very less, which is not only harmful toits overall quality, but also materials of English teaching and learning. Therefore,translators must be clear about the ultimate goal of subtitle translation that is to facilitatethe audiences to understand the film beyond language and culture with subtitle and tocommunicate internationally while they are ensuring the accurateness and vividness ofthe translated version. As the famous American translation theorist Nida once said,“Meaning is primary important followed by form”, that is “functional equivalence”.Firstly, the achievements from the East and the West, especially these aboutdocumentary translation are compared objectively, and then the author searches out thedisparity. Secondly, lots of translation skills and negative influential factors areconcluded by associating the real cases with the functional equivalence theory at fourlevels including lexical equivalence, sentence equivalence, context equivalence andcultural equivalence. After that, the author proposes that the translation quality could beimproved through changing traditional teaching ideals, pursuing internal and externalcorporation. Finally, the weaknesses existing in this theme are pointed out and alsosome tentative advices are provided for the future research.