A Study On Mistranslation Of Chinese Subtitles Of American TV Series Lost From The Perspective Of Skopos Theory

[Abstract] Translation is a purposeful cross-culture communicative activity. It is not only the transformation between two languages but also the transformation between two cultures. The cultural differences between different counties and nations inevitably cause mistranslation. Nowadays, American TV series are more and more popular with Chinese audiences. However, there are mistranslations in the translation of subtitles inevitably because of a variety of reasons. The mistranslations include unintended mistranslations and intended ones which should all arouse our attention and we should study on them. By collecting data about the Skopos Theory and mistranslations of film and TV play subtitles through browsing the search engine on the Internet and consulting books, reference materials, etc. and finding out the mistranslated Chinese subtitles through careful watching the TV play Lost, the article takes the translation of subtitles of the TV play Lost as the main examples, discusses the intended and unintended mistranslations, analyze the reasons of unintended mistranslations, briefly describe the value of studying mistranslations. In the mean time, discuss how to apply intended mistranslation from the scope of the fundamental theory of the German functionalism school-Skopos Theory and try to use the theory to put forward suggestions for unintended mistranslations. In practical translation, the method of intended mistranslation should be applied effectively as needed.