A Study Of English Advertising Translation: From The Perspective Of Functional Equivalence

Advertising, as the name implies, aims to inform the public of a product orservice in order to persuade them to buy it. It is not only a commercial activity butalso a marketing strategy. In the context of globalization of the commodity economy,the advertisements, together with the products, step out of the national border. Facedwith a totally different language and culture, advertising translation emerges asrequired in this situation.Advertising translation refers to the translation of advertising texts. It bears thecommon characteristics of all types of translation but also possesses its own features.Advertising is a competitive commercial activity which aims at attracting consumers.Therefore, advertisement revolves around consumers, intending to cater to their needs,touch their hearts and finally promote purchasing activities. This is the ultimatepurpose of the advertisements. So is the advertising translation.Nida’s functional equivalence originated from the1960s. It is formerly known asdynamic equivalence and based on the “the principle of equivalent effect”. Its useserves to highlight the communicative functions of translating. A possible definition isthat the message of the original text has been so transported into the receptor languagethat the response of the receptor is essentially like that of the original receptors.According to the definition of translation itself, one can come to the conclusion thatfunctional equivalence should be achieved at the semantic and stylistic levels. At thelater stage of his translation theory, Nida has realized the intimate relationship of thelanguage and social culture. Moreover, advertising translation is also closely relatedwith culture. It is safe to say that at sociocultural level, one should also seekfunctional equivalence.Through the thorough analysis of the individual translated English advertisingtexts into Chinese, functional equivalence is actually achieved at the semantic,stylistic and sociocultural levels in English advertisements.At the semantic level, functional equivalence can be attained at the lexical,syntactic, and rhetorical levels.At the lexical level, the meaning of words is determined by the context, thesynonyms at the same semantic field and its grammatical marker. Therefore, when translating words, the translator should consider these aspects in the target languageand then choose the most suitable words.The syntactic level is concerned about the characteristics of English and Chinesesentences. At the syntactic level, in most cases, the translator will give priority todirect transfer. However, in light of the differences of the English and Chineselanguages, some adaptations often are needed in order to promote understanding.Elliptical sentences in the source text are always translated into complete sentences inthe target text or translated into several sentences to suit the reader’s interest.At the rhetorical level, several most commonly used rhetorical devices in Englishadvertisements are discussed, such as simile, metaphor, personification, parallelism,alliteration, end-rhyme, and pun. Most of the similes, metaphors, personifications, andparallelisms can find their equivalents in the target language both in the aspect ofmeaning and in that of function. If not, the translator can choose another rhetoricaldevice to compensate. This is decided by the linguistic features of the target languageand reception condition of the receptors.At the stylistic level, style is mainly related with the formality of the word andthe types of writing. If the language of the source text is formal and beautiful andbears the characteristics of a poem, then the translator will copy them in the sourcetext and translate it like a poem. The translator can change the style of the source textif the original style is not acceptable to the receptors.At the sociocultural level, owing to the wide difference between the Chinese andEnglish cultures, the translator takes the aesthetic psychology of the receptors andtransculturation into consideration when translating.In sum, two major translation strategies are proposed. One is direct transfer,which is similar to literal translating. The translator directly translates the words,syntactic structures and rhetorical devices. The effect of the source text is maintained,not damaged. The other is adaptive transfer. If the direct transfer cannot achieve theoriginal effectiveness, the second translation strategy will be used. Adaptive transfercontains the following concrete methods: using Chinese four-character structure andseven-character structure in translation; condensation of sentences into phrase andexpansion of phrase into sentence; adaptation and interpretation; translation byborrowing Chinese expressions.