Report On English Translation Of Marriage-custom-Related Expressions In Introducing Folk-customs Of Ethnic Minorities In Southwest China

With the growth of cross-cultural exchange, the translation of folk culture is of great significance for leading the local culture to the global stage. With a history as long as the Chinese civilization, marriage customs featuring distinctive folklore and diverse forms are attracting a lot of foreigners'attention. Translating marriage-custom-related cultural texts would help more people to appreciate the profound Chinese culture.Taking the marriage custom profile in Introducing Folk-customs of Ethnic Minorities in Southwest China as the basic materials, this report is aimed to explore the English translation of marriage culture. In the translation process, a lot of loosely-structured sentences and unique marriage-custom-related expressions have been found in the source text. The main difficulties in translating these expressions lie in huge differences between the eastern and western cultures as well as language structures, making it very hard to find out complete equivalents in English. In order to deal with difficulties of no equivalents and conflicts in meaning, the author explored the translation of four types of marriage-custom-related expressions, namely expressions of marriage-custom-related materials, expressions of local marriage customs, marriage-custom-derived appellations and marriage-custom-related proverbs and ballads. And based on an analysis of their features, the author put forward some corresponding translation methods, including literal translation, transliteration with explanation, adding compensational information, digging out the deep structure, creating compound words, and borrowing from target language.Marriage custom is a popular topic whose translation should consider the readability and acceptability of target text and also the most effective delivery of cultural connotations. Therefore, with the help of parallel texts and translation aids, the author made much effort to revise and polish to produce a comprehensible target text, so that target readers will get a better understanding of marriage customs of ethnic minorities in southwest China.