C-E Translation Of Instructions On Cosmetics Packages From The Perspective Of Adaptation Theory

The data shown in Technology Guidelines for Export Commodities edited by Ministry of Commerce demonstrate that the quantity of Chinese exported cosmetics has been increasing sharply, arising from 243,700 tons in 2007 to 671,400 tons in 2011, which indicates that domestic cosmetics are gradually entering the international market. If they want to hold their grounds in the market, domestic cosmetics should be equipped with not just high quality, but also good brand images and appropriate publicity. Packaging is an effective way to publicize products. The instructions on packages are an important part of the packages, therefore the translation quality of instructions on packages will influence the images of products in overseas consumers’minds. Currently, many studies have been conducted on cosmetics instructions and have already got some achievements. However, studies on instructions on cosmetics packages are rare. Thus, studies on the respect will be a great help for better development of domestic cosmetics in the international market.The thesis makes a study on C-E translation of instructions on cosmetics packages on the basis of Verschueren’s Adaptation Theory, aiming at finding out how translators make adaptations to target language during C-E translation of instructions on cosmetics packages and the existing problems in C-E translation. Adaptation Theory states that language use is a dynamically adaptive process of choice-making according to different situations. Language has three characteristics, i.e. adaptability, negotiability and variability. During the process of linguistic choice-making, adaptation factors that should be taken into consideration are contextual correlates, structural objects and dynamics of adaptability and the salience of adaptation process. Likewise, translation is a process of language choice-making and should also consider these four respects, thus Adaptation Theory can be applied to translation studies. In this thesis, the author firstly collects 50 Chinese instructions together with their English texts on packages of domestic skincare products and 50 English instructions on packages of foreign brand skincare products from shopping websites at home and abroad, and then adopts the qualitative method and contrastive method to analyze these instructions, making attempts to explore features of Chinese and English instructions on cosmetics packages and their similarities and differences. Next based on these findings and Verschueren’s Adaptation Theory, the author makes an analysis of the English texts of the 50 Chinese instructions from the perspective of contextual correlates and structural objects of Adaptation Theory, finding that pragmatic problems and linguistic problems are the major problems existing in C-E translation of instructions on cosmetics packages. Lastly, in order to solve these problems, the author, by combining with Adaptation Theory and functions of instructions, recommends that C-E translation of instructions on cosmetics packages should abide by fidelity principle and dynamic equivalence principle and provides some translation suggestions from adaptation preparations and processes of adaptation.