English To Chinese Translation Of Advertisements Guided By Nida’s Functional Equivalence Theory

With the development of economic globalization, economic communications between different countries are becoming more frequent than ever, and advertisement has become one of the most important means of cross-border marketing. The quality of advertisement translation will directly affect the sale of products, and this is why advertisement translation has become particularly important nowadays. However, in the process of English to Chinese translation, some translators do not take the differences between English and Chinese into consideration, and they blindly pursue the equivalence in form, leading to very satisfactory translation. To deal with this situation, appropriate translation theory for advertisements, including principles and strategies of advertisement translation is needed, which is the aim of this thesis. Eugene Nida’s translation theory of functional equivalence provides a suitable perspective for the translation of advertisement. The thesis discusses the feasibility of functional equivalence theory in the advertisement translation, studies the characteristics of advertisements, puts forward relevant principles and explores strategies of advertisement translation. It is hoped that better advertisement translation will render better service to Chinese consumers, and contribute to the development of translation theory and practice.