A Study On The Characteristics And Functions Of Translation Variation Strategies In Liaison Interpreting

In face of the information age, people require efficient information exchange and thus selectively pick what they need in countless information. As a result, complete translation is sometimes difficult to meet the needs of the market. The phenomenon encouraged Professor Huang Zhonglian to put forward the concept of translation variation based on his abundant translation experiences. He summarized8strategies for flexible translation, namely, addition, omission, reorganization, narration, alteration, condensing, merging, and imitation. A great many scholars at home have approved the efficiency of the strategies and successfully explored their use in various fields, such as tourism, international communication, news report etc. Since1990s, growing international communication has promoted the need for interpreting in social affairs. Therefore, the study on interpreting has gained increasing attention. Interpreting strategy, a subject closely related to real practices, gradually becomes one of the most attractive topics for researchers. There have been some scholars exploring the feasibility of applying these strategies in interpreting. However, their studies mainly discussed the issue from the perspective of theories such as Skopos theory. Empirical studies are still seldom to see in this regards.Relying on Skopos theory and Gile’s Effort Model, the thesis conducts a case study to explore the functions and characteristics of applying translation variation strategies in liaison interpreting as well as their effects on interpreters. The study involved8student interpreters from Guangxi University, and the data mainly came from their interpreting recording, think-aloud, and interview. The author proposed a hypothesis in advance on the basis of Skopos theory-translation variation strategies could be applied efficiently as target-oriented strategies in liaison interpreting. Then, the following3questions are set to be answered:1. What are the functions of translation variation strategies used in liaison interpreting? What are the characteristics of the application?2. What are the causes for interpreters to use translation variation strategies in liaison interpreting?3. What are the positive effects of the application? Are there any negative effects? What are they? This study is expected to explore the feasibility and the problems of applying these strategies in liaison interpreting, thus offering some references for future interpreting teaching and practices.The findings of the thesis are as follows:1. Translation variation strategies are applied voluntarily by the interpreters as target-oriented strategies. But, they are also used as process-oriented strategies to address the difficulties of interpreting in the process. Therefore, the application in liaison interpreting is endowed with its own characteristics.2. The causes of applying process-oriented strategies mainly lie in the over-load of the efforts, which results from interpreters’failure in coordinating their efforts properly in the process.3. The application of translation variation strategies in interpreting is a doubled-edged sword, which can encourage interpreters to give full play to their subjectivity in real communications and help them interpret in a more flexible way. However, it may do harm to the long-term development of student interpreters if they over rely on these strategies for dealing with the over load of efforts in their interpreting training. Therefore, only by improving the interpreting competence could translation variation strategies become a real helpful tool in liaison interpreting.As a trial of studying the application of translation variation strategies in interpreting, this empirical study definitely has much room to be improved. It is expected to provide some references for future studies on translation variation strategies and interpreting teaching.