A Study On Chinese Translation Of Foreign Automobile Brand Name From Skopostheorie

Brand is the soul of products; it is the symbol of helping thecustomers to distinguish one kind of products from another. When we seea vast array of products, brand awareness decides what products wechoose and we do not choose. The successful manufacturers have foundbrand value through motive research. Brand naming plays an importantrole in consumers’ choosing products. Whether brand naming is good orbad has a direct impact on the motivation of consumers to chooseproducts, and thus it will directly affect the market competitiveness ofproducts and also the economic efficiency of business operations.Therefore, many operations of business never hesitate to spend a lot ofenergy and financial resources on brand naming.With international standards, the auto market in China has beendeveloping rapidly, the demand of Chinese consumers for automobiles has been growing, and a large number of foreign auto companies aregearing up to open a broader market prospects. So, in order to win thefavor of consumers, stimulate their purchasing behavior, and ultimatelybring huge economic benefits to the enterprise, how should we do whennaming a brand? In the paper, the author is trying to, from the newperspective of Skopos theory, research into the Chinese translation of theforeign auto brand name.Skopos theory is a newer concept from the field of translationstudies. It was established by the great German linguist Hans J.Vermeer and Vermeer has comprised the ideathat translating and interpreting should primarily take into accountthe function of both the source and target text. Skopos theory focuses ontranslation as a purposeful, cross-cultural activity. The Skopos theoryholds that “the way the target text eventually shapes up is determined to agreat extent by the function, or “skopos”, intended for it in the target context”(Hatim2005:74). As a result, it is the skopos (the purpose) of thetranslation which determines the translation methods and strategies that atranslator may adopt in order to produce a functionally adequatetranslation. Skopos theory is a newer theoretical translation model. It isnot only further enriches translation theory, but also opened up a newperspective for the auto brand name translation. From the Skopos theory,the auto brand name translation gets rid of the “faithful” and equivalent”linguistic bound, and is even more conducive for the translator to play adynamic role in the translation process, so that the target text can achievemore desirable results.This thesis not only studies the brand-naming of foreign auto brandsand their Chinese translation, meanwhile, it also aims to arouse theawareness of globalization and intercultural communication for the globalproducers, especially our Chinese auto producers in leading self-ownedbrand translation into the world market.