On The Nature And Application Of Zero Translation

Translation is a kind of social activity with various constraints resulting from culturaldifferences, and the culture of a nation embodies its thinking while language is the tool ofexpressing thoughts. Serving as a bridge between two different languages, translation isconfronted with many complex problems. With the development of science and technology,cross-culture communication becomes more frequent. As a result, languages fuse with eachother at faster speed as translation advances with the changes. Since the introduction of theopen-up policy, there have been more and more foreign words flowing into Chinesevocabulary, such as DIY, CPU, MV,朋克,卡拉OK, etc. These words are considered aszero translation words. In fact, zero translation can be found everywhere in our everydaylife. Most people are familiar with words of zero translation, but not the concept of zerotranslation. Even in the academia, the term has been questioned since it was proposed.There are several questions as to its definition and classification, and Chinese scholarsdiffer with scholars abroad on this matter. Western scholars regard zero translation asomission, while domestic scholars consider it a notion with much wider extension. On thewhole, it still has not yet a generally agreed definition and standard for classification. Instudying its application, some scholars equate it with non-translation and others list it as astrategy in parallel with transliteration in dealing with translation. This happens becausethe vagueness of concept has not been cleared yet. As to the wide application of zerotranslation, some scholars worry that it will harm the purity of Chinese and result inlanguage colonization.Since it is easy to confuse zero translation with other terms, this thesis compares thisterm with some related terms, such as omission, non-translation, untranslatability,borrowing, and pseudotranslation. On the basis of the comparison, this thesis puts forwardclassification and structure of zero translation. The backup evidence in China·s history oftranslation is traced to support its validity. To prove the reason of using zero translation as an established and useful jargon, this thesis studies its application through a case study oftwo influential journals: Vogue: Fashion&Beauty and Journal of Computer Research andDevelopment, which belong to two entirely different fields. Additionally, it discusses thepremise of application and the theoretic support of zero translation, and differentiates thephenomenon from language colonization.