A Study Of Cultural Default In Chinese-English Brand Name Translation Based On The Relevance-adaptation Model

With the rapid development of economic globalization and the frequent exchanges of cultures around theworld, whether in domestic or foreign markets, more and more brands flood into the markets. Brand name, as anintegral part of commodities, is not only the core of the figuration of the corporate identity, but also plays a rolein promoting cultural exchanges. Therefore, the Chinese-English brand name translation exerts huge influenceon economic development and cultural dissemination.Relevance-adaptation model in the pragmatic translation study provides a new perspective for the brandname translation. This thesis aims to adapt this model to describe and interpret the translation process associatedwith cultural default in brand names. First, conforming to the framework of RAM, the author explores threecauses of cultural default and then, divides the whole translation process into relevance-seeking and dynamicallychoice-making process under the guidance of the optimal principle. However, in the actual translation practice,these two communicative processes are often intertwined; in other words, there is no clear boundary between thetranslator’s inferential process and the dynamic adaptation process. In the relevance-seeking process, thetranslator infers the brand namer’s communicative intention based on the ostensive stimulus; and then he makesreasonable contextual assumptions and correct cultural presumptions depending on the different relevancedegree; in the choice-making process, the translator, under the guidance of optimal relevance, will dynamicallyadapt himself to the language structures, dynamic adaptation and the salience of himself. Finally, according tothe sufficient analysis on the examples, the author summarizes the reconstructed strategies for cultural default inbrand name translation. This article attempts to build the RAM of the cultural default in brand name translation,which further demonstrated that RAM has significant influence on the brand name translation. Meanwhile, toensure the success of cross-cultural communication, each step of the translation process should be carried outcarefully.The thesis falls into seven parts: Chapter one makes a brief introduction to the research background,significance and the thesis structure as well. Chapter two is the literature review. First it concerns some relatedconcepts of brand, and then reviews previous studies of the brand name translation and cultural default. It alsoreveals the research results and limitations of previous study and further proves the necessity and significance ofthis study. Chapter three is the theoretical framework of the present thesis, which contains a brief account to theRT and AT respectively and introduces the RAM. Chapter four is about research question, methodology, datacollection and analysis. Chapter five analyzes the causes of cultural default under the RAM. Chapter six is the description and analysis on the translation process with respect to cultural default in brand name translation. Thelast part is the conclusion, limitation of this thesis and suggestions for further study.